The Wawona Tree, also known as the Wawona Tunnel Tree, was a famous giant sequoia that stood in Mariposa Grove

Mariposa Grove

Mariposa Grove is a sequoia grove located near Wawona, California, United States, in the southernmost part of Yosemite National Park. It is the largest grove of Giant Sequoias in the park, with several hundred mature examples of the tree...

, Yosemite National Park

Yosemite National Park

Yosemite National Park is a United States National Park spanning eastern portions of Tuolumne, Mariposa and Madera counties in east central California, United States. The park covers an area of and reaches across the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountain chain...

. It had a height of 227 feet (69.2 m) and was 90 ft (27.4 m) in circumference.

A tunnel was cut through the tree in 1881, enlarging an existing fire scar. Two men were paid $75 for the job. The tree had a slight lean, which increased when the tunnel was completed. The tree eventually became a popular tourist attraction. Often travelers would come to have their picture taken either driving through it or standing underneath the tree. Throughout its history thousands of pictures were taken of it by tourists; it was photographed accommodating everything from horse-drawn carriages in the late nineteenth century to automobiles in the 1960s.

The Wawona Tree fell in 1969 under an estimated two-ton load of snow on its crown. The giant sequoia is estimated to have been 2,300 years old. It is now known as the Fallen Tunnel Tree.