You may have noticed a cluster of older gentlemen wearing black Derbies gathered on the front lawn of the Lancaster County Historical Society on the afternoon of May 13.

They were solemnly celebrating the 25th anniversary of the deadly Philadelphia Police helicopter bombing of the headquarters of the radical group MOVE.

Just kidding. They were cheerfully celebrating the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Pirates, a social organization that is not at all radical, except in that it has no by-laws, keeps no minutes and collects no dues.

Pirates call themselves "footloose and fancy free" and rarely act like real Pirates.

On May 13, they didn't even look like real Pirates.

Wearing spanking new centennial Derbies, they looked like Lancaster merchant and civic leader Henry S. Williamson, who held the first meeting of Pirates on May 13, 1910, at his mansion adjacent to the historical society's grounds.

Later in the evening, the bederbied Pirates would celebrate at Riverdale Manor along the Conestoga River, but in the afternoon they were simply contemplating a tree.

When Williamson died in 1917, surviving Pirates planted a hemlock in his memory at the Accomac Inn, along the Susquehanna River in York County. Williamson had led a Pirate cruise there two days before his death.

The hemlock eventually died and Pirates removed an associated stone memorializing Williamson.

Several years ago, the Pirates replanted that stone beneath a Japanese Snowbell tree in the historical society's extensive Tanger Arboretum .

The Pirates did not tarry at the tree last week. Under the leadership of Chief Wally Otto, they swaggered slowly to the watering hole on the Conestoga to reminisce about 100 years of benign Piracy in Lancaster County.

Cabbage Hill tree preserved

Speaking of trees, the life of a city tree can be perilous.

Especially the life of a tree that has lived in the city for so long that it spreads out over six houses.

A Norway maple growing in the backyard of Alana Hunter's Poplar Street home on Cabbage Hill is so enormous that, until last week, it blocked the sun from several yards and touched two roofs.

Neighbors complained.

Hunter, who lives in tanner Goodhart Hartell's 19th-century house at 629 Poplar and operates Gallery 141 downtown, listened to her neighbors.

They wanted her to cut the tree's enormous leader branch, which carries just about half the tree.

But she went to City Hall and there found Jim Bower, the city arborist, who said the tree could die if trimmed too severely.

So everyone agreed to cut more judiciously. Treemendus Job, a city tree-trimming business, cut back smaller branches. Now nothing is touching roofs. Neighbors have a little more sunlight.

And a tree that Bower estimates is at least a century old has been preserved.

"Instead of butchering it," they took off a couple of branches here and there," says Bower.

"I care very much that this tree will be saved," says Hunter. "It's a win-win for everyone."

Footnote: A neighborhood tradition claims President James Buchanan visited tanner Hartell's house to purchase saddles for his horses.

Possible, but not provable.

Contact The Scribbler: jbrubaker@lnppnews.com or 291-8781.