{"id":7026184,"date":"2026-08-04T03:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T03:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/american-history\/unbusting-george-washingtons-cherry-tree-myth\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T03:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T03:40:11","slug":"unbusting-george-washingtons-cherry-tree-myth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184","title":{"rendered":"Unbusting George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree Myth"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<hr\/>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\"><em><strong> Is America\u2019s greatest myth <\/strong><\/em><strong>really<\/strong><em><strong> a myth?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1372\" style=\"width: 710px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1372\" class=\"wp-image-1372\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?resize=700%2C422&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"422\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?resize=1440%2C868&amp;ssl=1 1440w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?resize=300%2C181&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?resize=1536%2C926&amp;ssl=1 1536w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?resize=800%2C482&amp;ssl=1 800w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/wood_weems.jpg?w=1920&amp;ssl=1 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\"\/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-1372\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Detail of Grant Wood\u2019s 1939 painting <em>Parson Weems\u2019 Fable<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>It became the most popular story about George Washington\u2014a story about how honest he was. And then historians fell in love with the idea that it was all a lie. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But is it really accurate to call this story a myth?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Listen to our 2-part series on this story, the man behind it, and the two men working to rewrite the idea that it\u2019s a myth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm?e=ARML3736566687\" width=\"100%\" height=\"200\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><br \/><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm?e=ARML4717540316\" width=\"100%\" height=\"200\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The story that defined George Washington for generations has also become known as one of the greatest myths in American history. It\u2019s the story that Washington, when he was just six years old, took a hatchet to his father\u2019s favorite cherry tree. And instead of lying about it, he told his father that he could not tell a lie; he was the culprit.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The cherry tree story was first put into print by Mason Locke Weems, AKA Parson Weems, in 1806. Since then it evolved and took on new meanings and soared in popularity. By the late 19th century, especially after Henry Cabot Lodge\u2019s 1889 biography, professional historians increasingly dismissed Weems and called the story apocryphal, a myth, a fabrication. A pure invention of Weems.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some biographers continue to call it that. Alexis Coe recently appeared on the podcast <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/a-washington-lincoln-birthday-special\/id1811120036?i=1000749952952\">American History Hotline<\/a><\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> to discuss Washington myths with host Bob Crawford. Coe, who wrote the bestselling Washington biography <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/40nFJsJ\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You Never Forget Your First<\/span><\/i><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, called the cherry tree story \u201cby far the greatest fan fiction ever invented because it was a lie.\u201d To support her point, she said that Weems \u201cdoesn\u2019t have any connection to Washington.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To be fair, Coe did not invent the idea that Weems invented this story. Even Mount Vernon\u2019s website calls the story \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mountvernon.org\/library\/digitalhistory\/digital-encyclopedia\/article\/cherry-tree-myth\">an invention<\/a>.\u201d Coe is echoing the confident claims of generations of historians and biographers. Many of them, Coe included, have been authorities on George Washington. But here\u2019s the thing: No one claiming Weems invented this \u201cmyth\u201d has been an authority on Weems himself. In fact, the more a historian knows about Weems, the less confident they seem to be in calling this story a myth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019re going to dig into the origins of the story, how it became so popular and then so reviled, and why the evidence suggests it should not be called a lie. We\u2019re also going to look at the background of Parson Weems\u2014the man whose reputation is at the heart of this \u201cmyth.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Two men have made it their mission to explore the cherry tree truth: researchers James Bish and Dr. Richard Gardiner. They recently wrote a paper called \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.liberty1.org\/weems6.pdf\">An Analysis of the Scholarly Consensus Regarding George Washington and the Cherry Tree \u2018Myth\u2019<\/a>\u201d where they make a compelling case for revisiting the mythical status of this story. As they explain, much of the disdain and vitriol directed at Weems has little to do with anything he actually said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s because over time, the cherry tree story has morphed into something far less plausible than Weems\u2019 original version. Weems never wrote that George Washington \u201cchopped down\u201d a cherry tree or that he was somehow physically incapable of lying. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What Weems did write about was a young boy who \u201cbarked\u201d up a cherry tree so much that it died, and a father who had frightened that young boy into believing that telling a lie would cost him his father\u2019s love. It is a complete misreading of Weems to think he seriously said George Washington could never lie.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1367\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?resize=700%2C862&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"862\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?resize=1440%2C1772&amp;ssl=1 1440w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?resize=300%2C369&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?resize=1248%2C1536&amp;ssl=1 1248w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?resize=800%2C985&amp;ssl=1 800w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GW_telling_the_truth.jpg?w=1664&amp;ssl=1 1664w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\"\/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let\u2019s look at exactly what Weems said, in his own melodramatic words. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">First, immediately before the cherry tree anecdote, Weems tells us about George\u2019s dad Augustine, and Augustine\u2019s love of honesty:<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Never did the wise Ulysses take more pains with his beloved Telemachus, than did Mr. Washington with George, to inspire him with an early love of truth. \u201cTruth, George,\u201d said he,\u201d is the loveliest quality of youth. I would ride fifty miles, my son, to see the little boy whose heart is so honest, and his lips so pure, that we may depend on every word he says. How lovely does such a child appear in the eyes of everybody! His parents dote on him. His relations glory in him. They are constantly praising him to their children, whom they beg to imitate him. They are often sending for him to visit them; and receive him, when he comes, with as much joy as if he were a little angel, come to set pretty examples to their children.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Then, Weems takes us to a dark place of child disownment and death:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cBut, oh! How different, George, is the case with the boy who is so given to lying, that nobody can believe a word he says! He is looked at with aversion wherever he goes, and parents dread to see him come among their children. Oh, George! my son! Rather than see you come to this pass, dear as you are to my heart, gladly would I assist to nail you up in your little coffin, and follow you to your grave. Hard, indeed, would it be to me to give up my son, whose little feet are always so ready to run about with me, and whose fondly looking eyes, and sweet prattle make so large a part of my happiness. But still I would give him up, rather than see him a common liar.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is when Augustine\u2019s messages get a bit muddled. After telling young George he would rather see him dead than a liar, he progressively decries parents who beat their children for lying:<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cPa,\u201d said George very seriously, \u201cdo I ever tell lies?\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cNo, George, I thank God you do not, my son and I rejoice in the hope you never will. At least, you shall never, from me, have cause to be guilty of so shameful a thing. Many parents, indeed, even compel their children to this vile practice, by barbarously beating them for every little fault: hence, on the next offence, the little terrified creature slips out a lie! just to escape the rod. But as to yourself George, you know I have always told you, and now tell you again, that, whenever by accident, you do any thing wrong, which must often be the case, as you are but a poor little boy yet, without experience or knowledge, you must never tell a falsehood to conceal it; but come bravely up, my son, like a little man, and tell me of it: and, instead of beating you, George, I will but the more honour and love you for it, my dear.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This, you\u2019ll say, was sowing good seed!\u2014Yes, it was: and the crop, thank God, was, as I believe it ever will be, where a man acts the true parent, that is, the Guardian Angel, by his child.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Keep in mind this was almost 300 years ago. As tempting as it is to impose our current understanding of emotional abuse onto an 18th century father telling his son he would gladly nail him in his coffin if he lied, this was apparently considered enlightened parenting compared to gratuitous beatings. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Now that we\u2019ve set up George\u2019s dad\u2019s feelings about liars, let\u2019s give this kid a hatchet and see what happens:<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The following anecdote is a case in point. It is too valuable to be lost, and too true to be doubted; for it was communicated to me by the same excellent lady to whom I am indebted for the last.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhen George,\u201d said she, \u201cwas about six years old, he was made the wealthy master of a hatchet of which, like most little boys, he was immoderately fond, and was constantly going about chopping every thing that came in his way. One day, in the garden, where he often amused himself hacking his mother\u2019s pea-sticks, he unluckily tried the edge of his hatchet on the body of a beautiful young English cherry-tree, which he barked so terribly, that I don\u2019t believe the tree ever got the better of it. The next morning the old gentleman, finding out what had befallen his tree, which, by the by, was a great favourite, came into the house; and with much warmth asked for the mischievous author, declaring at the same time, that he would not have taken five guineas for his tree. Nobody could tell him anything about it. Presently George and his hatchet made their appearance. \u201cGeorge,\u201d said his father, \u201cdo you know who killed that beautiful little cherry tree yonder in the garden?\u201d This was a tough question; and George staggered under it for a moment; but quickly recovered himself: and looking at his father, with the sweet face of youth brightened with the inexpressible charm of all-conquering truth, he bravely cried out, \u201cI can\u2019t tell a lie, Pa; you know I can\u2019t tell a lie. I did cut it with my hatchet.\u201d\u2014Run to my arms, you dearest boy, cried his father in transports, run to my arms; glad am I, George, that you killed my tree; for you have paid me for it a thousand fold. Such an act of heroism in my son is worth more than a thousand trees, though blossomed with silver, and their fruits of purest gold.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In this original version, young George barked up his father\u2019s tree and\u2014after a moment of hesitation\u2014fessed up to it. And George\u2019s father, instead of having to gladly bury a tiny liar-filled coffin, rejoiced that his arboricidal son was honest.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is important to consider Weems\u2019 version of this story because\u2014aside from the flowery imagined dialogue and Augustine being so extra\u2014it\u2019s entirely plausible. There is nothing unbelievable about a kid with a hatchet hacking away at a young tree. Nor is there anything remarkable about a scared child confessing to something they obviously did. Only later did George\u2019s character become twisted into an impossibly pious six-year-old lumberjack felling trees.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Mason Locke Weems has been dismissed for making up lies about George Washington just to make a buck. To me this idea seems rooted in societal beliefs that historians and clergy should both be poor. It also speaks to a misunderstanding of Weems\u2019 immense popularity and literary career.<\/p>\n<p>Weems was born in Maryland in 1759, the nineteenth child in his family. He trained in medicine before turning to theology and was among the first Americans ordained in the Church of England before it transitioned into the Episcopal Church in the United States. As a preacher, Weems had a big<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> personality and habits that church elders looked down upon\u2014preaching in scandalous places like ballrooms and Methodist churches, and to enslaved Blacks. He also played the fiddle and told jokes. He was a little too showy, and it probably cost him his congregation. That\u2019s when he took to the road,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> becoming an itinerant bookseller\u2014the \u201cbook-peddling parson\u201d as one short biography dubbed him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1373\" style=\"width: 710px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1373\" class=\"wp-image-1373\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/SCHS-Weems-Parson_-2-1-768x960-1.jpg?resize=700%2C875&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"875\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/SCHS-Weems-Parson_-2-1-768x960-1.jpg?w=768&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/SCHS-Weems-Parson_-2-1-768x960-1.jpg?resize=300%2C375&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\"\/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-1373\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Portrait of Parson Weems, from the Collections of the South Carolina Historical Society.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Weems traveled the country pulling his wagon full of books from Philadelphia to Savannah and setting up shop in churches, town squares, and outside general stores and taverns, especially on court days when the townspeople would gather. He would set up wherever he could deliver a rousing sermon, followed by a sales pitch. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> travels gave him a keen sense of what Americans in the 1790s and early 1800s wanted\u2014things like Bibles, morally instructive children\u2019s books, and lurid true crime wrapped in a moral lesson.\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That was a market need that Parson Weems filled by writing it himself. He wrote a series of \u201cGod\u2019s Revenge\u201d books including <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">God\u2019s Revenge Against Murder, or the Drowned Wife<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and the spoiler-heavy title: <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">God\u2019s Revenge Against Adultery: Awfully Exemplified in the Following Cases of American Crime: The Accomplished Dr. Theodore Wilson, Who for Seducing Mrs. Nancy Wiley Had His Brains Blown Out By Her Husband<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Weems also wrote about politics, particularly the dangers of party politics. His work here is worthy of another look, especially today. Weems saw the growing partisan divide during the election between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, and he wrote a pamphlet called <em>The Philanthropist<\/em> warning the nation against putting party before country. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After Weems praises the American form of government as something that should be loved, he asks:<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But how shall we manifest our love? By splitting into parties and mortally hating one another? No, God forbid; for a furious party spirit is the greatest judgment, the heaviest curse that can befall our country. It extinguishes love in the best hearts, and in the worst it blows up the coals of hatred to ten fold fury.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Weems believes the purpose of government \u201cis to unite men in promoting their mutual interest, but the aim of party spirit is to disunite them entirely.\u201d He<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> says that party spirit:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">makes even good men shy of one another and breaks off the sweetest friendship. This vile spirit deforms everything; by giving a hardness to the features and a fierceness to the eyes it turns the loveliest woman into a fright, and the comeliest man into a demon. It pollutes the most sacred places, introducing unnatural strifes even there where sweetest harmony should ever sound; in our streets and at our tables.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Weems sent a copy of this pamphlet to Washington and Washington happily endorsed it, probably because it echoed the sentiments in his own farewell address.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>In 1799, months before Washington died, Weems set out to write a morally instructive biography of him. After Washington\u2019s death the appetite for such a work only grew, and Weems already had a head start in feeding it. His first version of the life of Washington came out in 1800. In 1806 he greatly expanded the work with newly collected anecdotes and released the fifth edition; this is the first edition that contains the story of Washington and the cherry tree.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1371\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/weems_washington.jpg?resize=700%2C483&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"483\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/weems_washington.jpg?w=960&amp;ssl=1 960w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/weems_washington.jpg?resize=300%2C207&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/weems_washington.jpg?resize=800%2C552&amp;ssl=1 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Weems\u2019 biography of Washington became so popular that for decades it was reportedly the second bestselling book in the country, second only to <em>The Bible<\/em>. A backlash against such a popular work was practically inevitable.<\/p>\n<p>In their <a href=\"http:\/\/www.liberty1.org\/weems6.pdf\">paper<\/a>, Bish and Gardiner trace the history of the backlash against Weems and address the main reasons historians have written him off, even acknowledging that Weems wasn\u2019t above the occasional plagiarism.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s be clear: t<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">here are many reasons to be skeptical of Mason Locke Weems. If he were a victim in an episode of <em>Law &amp; Order: SVU<\/em>, the assistant district attorney would be nervous about putting him on the stand\u2014would he be credible enough for the jury to believe him? And Olivia Benson would remind the ADA that there are no perfect victims. Nor are there perfect sources. Then Ice-T would chime in, \u201cNo perfect parsons, either.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Parson Weems is the only printed source we have for this story, and a major reason historians have dismissed him\u2014recently cited by Alexis Coe\u2014is the idea that he had no connection to Washington or his family, no access to a family story like this. Folks who have studied Weems know this isn\u2019t true. Weems corresponded with Washington, he stayed at Mount Vernon with him, and he married into his extended family. In his book <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/40px3lC\">I Can\u2019t Tell A Lie: Parson Weems and the Truth about George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree, Prayer at Valley Forge, and Other Anecdotes<\/a>, Bish painstakingly makes the case that Weems was extremely well-connected to collect anecdotes for a book about Washington\u2019s youth from people who knew Washington as a young man.<\/p>\n<p>So where did Weems get this story? He said the cherry tree story was \u201crelated to me twenty years ago by an aged lady who was a distant relative, and when a girl spent much of her time in the family.\u201d This vague reference to a nameless source has been used to discredit the story, but Bish and Gardiner make a compelling case that Weems would likely have interacted with a woman who fit this exact description while he was drafting the book. That woman was Washington\u2019s cousin Sinah Ball McCarty. Four years his elder, she spent a lot of time with George as a child.<\/p>\n<p>Bish and Gardiner admit this is no smoking gun, but it should be ample enough evidence to stop anyone from saying Washington had no connection to Weems.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1370\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/washingtons_birthday.jpg?resize=700%2C1089&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"1089\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/washingtons_birthday.jpg?w=526&amp;ssl=1 526w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ploddingthroughthepresidents.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/washingtons_birthday.jpg?resize=300%2C467&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\"\/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Even if we assume that Sinah Ball McCarty was Weems\u2019 source for the story\u2014which is a speculative assumption\u2014that still doesn\u2019t make the story <em>true<\/em>. In other words, even if an elderly Sinah Ball told Weems the story, that doesn\u2019t mean it actually happened.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That would be relying on something called \u201creminiscent testimony,\u201d not a historian\u2019s preferred sourcing, but sometimes the best or only thing you can get about certain subjects. Lincoln biographer Douglas L. Wilson talks about this in his book <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/46jVRz5\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Honor\u2019s Voice: The Transformation of Abraham Lincoln<\/span><\/i><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the absence of reliable evidence, Lincoln biography for this period must be almost exclusively woven out of a more doubtful material: the recollections and anecdotes, reported long after the fact, of people who knew him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Reminiscent testimony is admittedly problematical. Not only is it often vague and ambiguous, it is notoriously subject to the aberrations of memory, the prejudices of the informant, the selective character of the reporting, and the subtle transformations that occur when a story is either resurrected from the depths of the past or recalled repeatedly over time.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Reminiscent testimony may have been, in this case, all Weems had. For him that would have been more than enough. He <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">wasn\u2019t writing history the way professional historians write history, but the field wasn\u2019t really defined at the time he was writing. Collecting anecdotes and publishing them was a major part of biographies through the early 20th century.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Weems was taking anecdotes and adding dialogue and accentuating the moral lessons he wanted to convey. This resulted in stories that sound overwrought and unbelievable, but when you remove the style and look at the substance, there\u2019s nothing unbelievable about a<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> six-year-old boy hacking at a young tree with a hatchet and confessing to it. That is the heart of the story, and that story has never been <em>proven<\/em> false or definitively debunked.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The anecdote may be dubious or even doubtful. It may even be a myth in the sense that it has become a legendary story. But the meaning of myth as something false\u2014as <em>a lie<\/em>\u2014cannot be accurately or responsibly applied to this story. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In that sense, the real myth\u2014according to Bish and Gardiner\u2014is that this story has been proven to be a myth.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>For more about Bish and Gardiner\u2019s cherry tree truth seeking journey, check out James Bish\u2019s book <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/40px3lC\">I Can\u2019t Tell A Lie: Parson Weems and the Truth about George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree, Prayer at Valley Forge, and Other Anecdotes<\/a> and Bish and Gardiner\u2019s incisive paper <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.liberty1.org\/weems6.pdf\">An Analysis of the Scholarly Consensus Regarding George Washington and the Cherry Tree \u2018Myth.\u2019<\/a>\u201d<br \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Listen to our two-part deep dive into this story. In our first episode, we dig into the background and larger-than-life character of Mason Locke Weems:<br \/><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm?e=ARML3736566687\" width=\"100%\" height=\"200\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>In our second episode, we welcome researchers James Bish and Dr. Richard Gardiner to discuss their recent work on the cherry tree story and its source.<br \/><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm?e=ARML4717540316\" width=\"100%\" height=\"200\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;\nn.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,\ndocument,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js?v=next');\n<\/script><script async defer crossorigin=\"anonymous\" src=\"https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/sdk.js#xfbml=1&#038;version=v3.3\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Is America\u2019s greatest myth really a myth? Detail of Grant Wood\u2019s 1939 painting Parson Weems\u2019 Fable. It became the most popular story about George Washington\u2014a story about how honest he was. And then historians fell in love with the idea that it was all a lie. But is it really accurate to call this story [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7026185,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12032],"tags":[2986,1365,18562,1639,189926,40237],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7026184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-american-history","tag-cherry","tag-george","tag-myth","tag-tree","tag-unbusting","tag-washingtons"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Unbusting George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree Myth - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Unbusting George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree Myth - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Is America\u2019s greatest myth really a myth? Detail of Grant Wood\u2019s 1939 painting Parson Weems\u2019 Fable. It became the most popular story about George Washington\u2014a story about how honest he was. And then historians fell in love with the idea that it was all a lie. But is it really accurate to call this story [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-04T03:40:11+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/wood_weems.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1157\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"16 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371\"},\"headline\":\"Unbusting George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree Myth\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-04T03:40:11+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\"},\"wordCount\":3271,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/wood_weems.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Cherry\",\"George\",\"myth\",\"Tree\",\"Unbusting\",\"Washingtons\"],\"articleSection\":[\"American History\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7026184\",\"name\":\"Unbusting George Washington\u2019s Cherry Tree Myth - 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