Courtesy Douglas Reed

history continued

In his design for the Rouse's, Town organized the house in a linear, though rambling, configuration that responded to the massive Southern Live Oak as well as several younger oaks, integrating the trees into the composition. The house is quite significant as an early expression of modernism in Baton Rouge; when paired with the sprawling tree, the result is an excellent example of the integration of the built and natural environment. The Rouses sold the property to Alma Lee and H. Norman Saurage, Jr. shortly after construction was completed in 1947. Over the years, the Saurages engaged arborists annually to provide ongoing care for the tree, including feeding and pruning and eventually devising support posts for its massive branches.

The Southern Live Oak was registered with the Live Oak Society of the Louisiana Garden Club Federation, Inc. in 1977 (Registration Number: 606, Name of Tree: Hundred Oaks Plantation). With the circumference of the tree trunk then-documented as sixteen feet, ten inches, the tree qualified as a centenarian. Today, the trunk of the tree has a 19-foot girth at breast height, the canopy is approximately 112 feet in diameter, and the tree stands 50 feet tall. The massive limbs of the tree host a variety of mosses, ferns, and orchids. By comparing the 1977 measurements with those of today, arborists believe the tree to be approximately 280 years old.