The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
Our family's historic large oak tree in Stronghurst, older than this nation at least, was taken down Tuesday, December 9, 2025 and it is conjuring up lots of memories for each of us in the Andrews-Rodeffer family.
When our home was built in 1977 on land that was gifted to me by my parents, Paul and Belva Bell of Stronghurst, we positioned our home at an angle in order to make room for two huge oak trees.
One fell in the early 2000's behind our garage driveway, but the mighty Oak in front of our garage continued to shade a large portion of our home and yard until this month.
Over the last 10 years, one by one, several large limbs would drop, shaking the ground on a clear day with no wind or rain, and they always managed to miss our home.
This July, a bolt of lightning hit the tree during an early-morning lightning storm and firemen came to fill the tree with foam to stop the fire. It was hollowing and our family members feared a windstorm would send the tree onto our home as most of the branches that were left were leaning that way.
The tree must be older than our nation which turns 250 next year in 2026 and was growing before white people settled here. I know there were lots of arrowheads in the ground after we cleared the timber to build our home.
Oaks can grow as old as 300-600 years or even more!
After I posted on the family group text that our Oak Tree is being taken down today, my son Damon replied, "HOMEPLATE!"
I replied that maybe they could saw it off level to the ground and let it remain as a homeplate. Other family members wanted pieces of the tree to hang on their Christmas tree as ornaments or to make into something as a remembrance.
Soon I posted a few photos of part of the large trunk being taken down and cut in large pieces, and right away I received a phone call from our son Damon Andrews who was in Switzerland on a business trip for Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc., a subsidiary of Corteva.
Damon was leading a meeting with some of his colleagues but told them, "Okay, I have to stop and make a call." He called me to make sure we saved a log he could strip down and make into something as a remembrance. The Swiss men he was meeting with could not believe the size of the tree.
Kevin Shaw, owner of Small Town Tree Service was amazing in his careful dismantling of this gigantic memory of days-gone-by. It was where the kids golfed, had races, played football, but mostly baseball games where the tree had made an excellent backstop.
Kevin explained that the tree was too hollow to make into homeplate, and the wood around the edges would eventually rot away. Instead he suggested buying a homeplate to put there as a monument to the mighty oak. He also sliced up several nice pieces from a log for each of our kids plus left a nice log for Damon.
Kevin's business is at his home between Oquawka and Keithsburg, and he has posted several excellent videos of his crew taking down this giant oak landmark of the Rodeffer families.
He began his business because he has lots of energy and he loves the challenges that each job brings him.
"I've always worked as a kid and I get bored easily and in this job, I love figuring out how to safely dismantle a tree, avoid obstacles, when I am called to remove a tree. he stated. ...The boys took down a hunker today."
Thank you Kevin and crew for a job well done. Clean-up was amazing! Watch clips of the process on Small Town Tree Service Facebook.
Although our home is safer, and looks a lot bigger when I pull up the drive with the tree gone, the open space left, brings up tears and a strange ache in the stomach, due to a lot of good memories made together around that old beloved oak tree.
One can see what this is called "the mighty" oak tree, as even the 20" slices of this giant tree were almost too heavy for Dessa to pick up, land a fire log was impossible.
Kevin Shaw, having a little fun with his crew after dropping a big hollow Oak tree at Mike and Dessa Rodeffer's home at the edge of Stronghurst last Tuesday.
"The boys (at Small Town Tree Service) took down a hunker today, Kevin Shaw stated.