On Friday morning, Jesse Wimberley sat at his front porch on a pre-Civil War deacon’s bench — a seat for ministers and preachers that was originally made in Charleston, S.C. — listening to birds chirp and flit through shafts of light filtering through dense tree canopies.
Built by his great-grandfather 150 years ago, Wimberley’s home is made of heart pine, derived from the same robust longleaf pines that surround his home and the same wood the deacon’s bench is made from — offering shade and encompassing time that has passed, and time to come.
Wimberley is the founder of the Sandhills Prescribed Burn Association and is a fourth-generation burner, following his family legacy to protect N.C. forests and restore native plant growth.
Longleaf pines are an abundant native species in the state and are part of an ongoing discussion among biologists, researchers and natives alike — including Wimberley — that has burgeoned into the “Saving Our Savannas: Stories of the Longleaf Pine” series. These educational seminars intersect science, history and cultural sociology.
The NC. Botanical Garden organizes the series, which has been ongoing for the past five months, ending in June. This educational program was designed to incorporate conservation efforts, spread awareness of the trees’ cultural significance to Indigenous and African American communities as well as encourage action and education — both scientific and historic.
The events have ranged from teaching the history of using fire and controlled burns in N.C forests, to species that rely on the longleaf pine ecosystem — like venus flytraps and red-cockaded woodpeckers.
Sarah Crate, who gave a lecture for the series in January, is the communications coordinator for The Longleaf Alliance, a nonprofit organization that works to preserve longleaf pines. Crate said that the original pre-colonialism longleaf pine forests covered about 90 million acres, spanning nine southeastern states.
But in the early eighteenth century, the British started using the N.C. longleaf pines to build ships. They used the trees’ sap to make tar, which was used to paint the ships’ bottom. This tar acted as a sealant and was highly coveted by the British.
“I would suggest the reason English is spoken all over the world is the longleaf pine,” Wimberley said. “It was a longleaf pine which allowed the British to really overwhelm the seafaring world.”