This is all that remained in 2008 of the Jeffrey Pine on Sentinel Dome that was the subject of the famous Ansel Adams photograph,”Jeffrey Pine, Sentinel Dome.” Somewhere I even have my early attempts at trying to do the “Ansel Adams thing” with my black and white film camera when I was much younger, featuring one or more photographs of this very tree, while it was still alive. Trust me, if you are a Sierra Nevada landscape photographer of a certain age, you knew this tree and probably visited it.
I photographed this close-up “portrait” many years after the tree died, while on a quick hike over to the summit of Sentinel Dome along the Glacier Point Road in 2008. Things change slowly in the Sierra, but they do inevitably change. This is now, objectively speaking, another dead snag atop a Yosemite granite dome — however, this snag has achieved a sort of iconic status. Yet, perhaps there will eventually be another, maybe even the younger tree seen in the background beyond the dead stump.
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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email
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Thanks, Charlie. I hadn’t been up there for a few years either, but I found myself with an extra hour or so on the way to Glacier Point and thought, “what the heck!”
As you know, that famous tree is not the only one on the summit, though it did (does?) occupy an almost central spot. As I visited it on this trip I thought about several things: Seeing the Ansel Adams photograph as a very young person (an image that became iconic for me), my own attempts to photograph it “Ansel style” at a younger age… and thoughts about what other tree might eventually (decades? centuries?) achieve a similar status on top of that dome.
It was the latter thought that was in my mind when I photographed the base of the old snag with a narrow aperture, and positioned one of the younger and still vital trees beyond it.
Oh, yeah, and I was also trying to make a photograph that is different from the usual “Sentinel Dome Tree” photos – and one that might resonate for others who share our long acquaintance with that tree.
Dan
Dan, that was an amazing tree. I hear it was the drought in the early 70s that did it in. I have a photograph from 1978 where you can still see a few needles. I haven’t been up to see it since it fell over a few years ago. Your image is very strong, especially considering what’s left! Charlie