Wagon Wheel Tree
Maker unknown · Palmetto State Park, Gonzales County, Texas
Photo: Larry D. Moore / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0), taken 28 February 2023, resized, as published on Street Art Utopia (What the Trees Kept (9 Photos), 1 November 2026).
An old wagon wheel lies around the foot of a tree beside a trail in Palmetto State Park, Texas, and the tree has grown up around it. A hiker wrote in January 2022 that the wheel “had been absorbed by the tree that grew up around it”. Source Source Checked
Seen Feb 2023 — Larry D. Moore photographed the wheel and tree on 28 February 2023, according to the camera date of his photo. We found no later dated photograph. Source Checked
💡 4 things to know
- Absorbed by the treeHiker Rod Haden called it the best part of his walk in the park: “the wagon wheel that had been absorbed by the tree that grew up around it.” Source Reported
- Beside the San Marcos River TrailA 2021 trail guide says “an old wagon wheel is growing out of a tree along this trail”, close to the site of the old mud boils. Source Reported
- Nobody knows who left itNone of the sources says whose wheel it was or when it was left there. Source Source Unconfirmed
- A park the CCC builtPalmetto State Park opened in 1936; Civilian Conservation Corps companies built it between 1934 and 1937, and it is named for the dwarf palmetto that grows there. Source Reported
📍 Where it is
Palmetto State Park in Gonzales County, Texas, northwest of Gonzales and southeast of Luling. The wheel is beside the San Marcos River Trail, near the site of the old mud boils. Source Source Checked
🗓️ Sightings
- 202117 Mar
Trail guide mentions the wheel
- 202219 Jan
Hiker photographs it
- 202328 Feb
Photo by Larry D. Moore
Green stamps mark dated photographs; amber stamps mark records or reports; red stamps mark loss. Publication dates are not camera dates.
🗞️ In the sources
“The best part was the wagon wheel that had been absorbed by the tree that grew up around it.”
“An old wagon wheel is growing out of a tree along this trail.”
✅ The facts
- Left by
- Not recorded in the sources Source Source Unconfirmed
🔗 Related
All sources & image credits
- rodhaden.com: Into History, Into the Future (Rod Haden, 19 January 2022)
- penelopepercivaltravels.com: Why you will never want to leave Palmetto State Park (17 March 2021)
- en.wikipedia.org: Palmetto State Park
- commons.wikimedia.org: Embedded Wheel Palmetto State Park 2023, photo by Larry D. Moore, CC BY 4.0 (taken 28 February 2023)
- Image: Larry D. Moore / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0, taken 28 February 2023, resized, as published on Street Art Utopia (What the Trees Kept (9 Photos), 1 November 2026); a 16:9 share crop was made from it.
Last checked: 1 November 2026. How we verify art