The American chestnut tree was an icon in the eastern half of North America for approximately 60,000 years, its range extending from lower Canada to Georgia and as far west as Indiana and Kentucky.

It was dominant along the Appalachian Mountain range, where one in every four trees was an American chestnut. Pennsylvania boasted the most trees, with as much as 40 percent to 50 percent of the states timber acreage being covered in chestnut.

The tree provided food for people and animals, and was an essential for industries, being the perfect wood for furniture, leather tanning, charcoal making and lumber for home building.

But in 1904, a blight, believed to have been brought to America on imported Chinese chestnut trees, was discovered on a tree at the Bronx Zoo and quickly spread around the country. Carried by birds, its devastated the American chestnut.

"It took us about 30 years to wipe them out," said Dave Armstrong, Pennsylvania coordinator for the American Chestnut Foundation.

"When we lost the tree to the blight, it was economic devastation to Pennsylvania," he told members of the Mercer County Wood Lotters Association during their annual dinner Saturday evening at Grantham's Landing in New Lebanon.

Armstrong attended the event to update the group on what is being done to re-introduce the American chestnut back into its natural habitat and protect it from the blight that is still a very prominent threat to the species.