Does our Gilcrease Hills forest vex you? Perhaps it was a little rougher on Washington Irving when he wrote in A Tour on the Prairies: “I shall not easily forget the mortal toil, and the vexations of flesh and spirit, that we underwent occasionally, in our wanderings through the Cross Timber. It was like struggling through forests of cast iron.” Yes, things were definitely rougher in 1832, when Irving joined U.S. Indian Commissioner Henry Ellsworth and a party of mounted rangers on an expedition to the frontier lands of Indian Territory. Turns out, the cross timbers, as the forest in eastern Oklahoma was known, is one of the only remaining uncut old-growth forests in the world—and we live in it! Here’s more about this fascinating ancient woods.