The American Chestnut Foundation Chair

In early 2015, we were brought in touch with the American Chestnut Foundation's VT/NH chapter thanks to Tom Thiel at Northwind Tonewood and a presentation that the chapter held in our hometown of Sandwich, NH. Although it's not widely known, there are still a few chestnut trees alive in the Northeast that have held out against the blight which ravaged millions of trees and removed the chestnut from our landscape for the last three generations. When found, these trees become identified as potential "mother trees" for the ongoing hybridization efforts of the American Chestnut Foundation, which seeks to repopulate the lost chestnuts of the Northeast with blight-resistant stock. 
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Randy Knight (l) of the VT/NH chapter of the American Chestnut Foundation, and Adam Nudd-Homeyer (r) of Tappan Chairs, with the slab of chestnut from the "mother tree" from which this special edition Tappan Rocker will be crafted. Photo credit: Yurij Bihun, VT/NH chapter president
In the last few years, one of these "mother trees" in Berlin, VT sadly finally succumbed to the blight, and upon its passing it was quickly harvested by the VT/NH chapter. The result: a small cache of extremely rare, unwormed chestnut. Nearly all chestnut found on the market in our current age is heavily wormed, having died on the stump from the blight and then been infested with worms over years, if not decades, before being found and harvested for use. 

We are honored to have been selected by the VT/NH chapter of the American Chestnut Foundation to use some of the wood from this very special "mother tree" to craft a Tappan Rocker for the purposes of fundraising for the Foundation, as well as helping to build awareness of their mission. Our deep thanks to the American Chestnut Foundation and its VT/NH chapter for this wonderful opportunity!
​Presenting the "American Chestnut Chair", which made its debut at the national conference of the American Chestnut Foundation at Penn State College in October of 2015!