The Tree Lady Meets the President

It’s not every day that you get a call inviting you to meet one of your heroes, but when our CEO Wendy Burton was invited to meet ex-president Jimmy Carter she jumped on the next available flight.

President Jimmy Carter has a 15 acre Empress Tree plantation in Plains Georgia that is mature and ready for harvest. President Carter loves his trees, and in the past has cut down individual trees to create beautiful furniture that has been auctioned to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for Habitat for Humanity. 

Wendy met President Carter and his wife Rosalynn at their home, and after talking for more than an hour President Carter agreed to partner with World Tree to harvest his plantation.

Wendy has been working closely with President Carter's assistant, Jill Stucky, to organize the harvest and it was an exciting day we got a contract back with the presidential signature on it.

This week Barry Comis and Roy James from  the World Tree team are travelling to Plains Georgia to supervise the harvest. The ‘presidential’ lumber will be used to make a line of custom guitars along with other speciality products. Empress lumber is especially good for making musical instruments because of its tonal qualities. Fender guitar have bought Empress wood from World Tree to make telecaster guitars, which not only sound amazing, they are also lighter than other guitars.

We are also harvesting three other mature plantations this winter, and look forward to sharing more on that over the coming months.

Pictured below is Wendy Burton with Jill Stucky, admiring one of President Carter's Empress trees.