From the Clay County Courier:

"Not 'The Hanging Tree' "

"A colorful story is being circulated around town this week since an old landmark in the court yard is being removed.  While interesting, and based on actual historical facts, this is the wrong tree...  the right one is farther on down the street about two blocks.

"The story of the hanging of Bent Taylor is being retold by those who mistakenly thought the big elm tree which stood for years in the Southeast corner of the court yard was the famous, "hanging tree."  After hearing the story, J. M. Oliver, Jr., Corning's historian, was contacted and he confirmed the story as being fairly accurate but the tree as being in the wrong location.

"Oliver said that the only legal hangings in this area were in 1882 and 1885 and both of these took place in "The Goose Pasture" located about where Second and Myrtle streets cross in South Corning.  He said there are numerous stories of hangings having taken place around the county and some of them most likely are true, but he never heard of any hanging stories concerning the big elm or any other tree in the court yard.

"The big elm had become somewhat of a local landmark over the past years, especially since it lost its bark about three or four years ago, giving it a ghostly appearance.  Some think the tree was struck by lightning,  killing it, but Oliver and others remember that the tree was trimmed at the wrong season of the year and failed to put on new growth the following Spring.

"Any way [sic] the tree which proved to be hollow, fell over on its side last week and provided an interesting place for children to play last weekend.  Workmen, who have been removing other dead trees from the court yard, are sawing the old elm into smaller easier to handle pieces and before the week is over the tree, which was almost mislabeled as a historical landmark, will be gone forever.

"I didn't put too much stock in the stories concerning the court yard hanging when they began circulating this week, especially after I heard the part about a piece of rope which was used in the hanging way back in the 1880's [sic] had remained in the tree until about 1958 -- I grew up with the court yard as a playground, just like a lot of other youngsters and you can rest assured that had there been a rope in any of the trees we would have known all about it and how it got there.  And furthermore, we were already scared of the court yard at night and a sure way of putting a stop to a bunch of running, yelling kids playing there all day would have been for someone to tell a scary tale similar to the one going around this week.

"But, while on the subject of landmarks -- whatever happened to that stone which was supposed to be a part of a fallen start that was always in the court yard?  It was just a big chunk of gray-white looking stone and was [end of article missing]."

Submitted by Danny Moore