Back in the late 19th century in America, people could easily live in stumps from felled trees. Or arrange a dance floor on such a stump. Wondering how this can be?
It's just that we are talking about huge trees, ancient sequoias, which have grown here untouched for centuries and millennia - until the "conquerors of America" came. The immigrants from Europe, who thought that America is the place where you can not really limit yourself, have done various things about which their heirs speak with some degree of repentance.
In states such as Oregon, Washington and California, the forestry industry was actively developing - that is, ancient forests were simply cut down. All this was mixed with the "gold rush", the poverty of desperate Europeans who came here out of despair and tried to survive somehow. It is clear that the questions of ecology, history, preservation of the pristine nature simply did not confront the people who came here, who suddenly felt like masters. In general, the forests were cut down - but the stumps remained.
In the local forests there were such huge trees that it could easily take a month to cut down one. Trees 30 feet, or over 9 meters wide, are common. Of course, for Europeans it was a novelty - hence the round dances around the immense trunks, and sincere photos in the style of "I caught such a fish" against the backdrop of gigantic trees.
But everything went into the furnace of the new civilization of European America. There were cases when, when laying a road, tunnels were cut through the trees through which cars were traveling. An example in the photo - this road in Washington DC goes through a red cedar.
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Of course, stumps have become local attractions as well. Let's say the very first US post office on the North Olympic Peninsula was opened in a tree stump in 1892. They say that this is an example of a particular entrepreneurial spirit and even adventurism of a particular person. But in any case, it was a quick and relatively easy decision - to make a house in the stump of a felled tree. Which is significant.
It is believed that the first such house was built by the McAllister family, who settled in the house from the stump in 1847. Then they built an ordinary house, and the stump was used as a barn for livestock. This is what it might look like (but apparently they are not MacAlisters):
How did they make such houses? The interior was gouged out or burned out so that sufficient wall thickness remained. And the roof was made from above - also of wood. It really was the most economical way - and then there was no particular choice for those who had come in large numbers.
It is interesting that such houses remained “alive” - cases are described when houses were bought and, as it were, “cut off” for transfer to another place, where they quickly fell into disrepair. Surely there were other advantages of living in such an "ecological house" - surely now, with proper filing, such houses could have a high price.
Or maybe not. In general, Americans remember this part of history simply - seemingly barbarism, which in our times would be inappropriate, but also as an example of forced decisions on which the survival of future generations of residents of the "New World" depended.
