Page "Liriodendron tulipifera" Paragraph 22

The tulip tree has impressed itself upon popular attention in many ways, and consequently has many common names.

In areas near the Mississippi River it is called a poplar largely because of the fluttering habits of its leaves, in which it resembles trees of that genus.

The color of its wood gives it the name Whitewood.

Native Americans so habitually made their dugout canoes of its trunk that the early settlers west of the Appalachian Mountains called it Canoewood.

It is sometimes called " fiddle tree ," because its peculiar leaves, with their arched bases and in-cut sides, suggest the violin shape.

The external resemblance of its flowers to tulips named it the Tulip-tree.

In their internal structure, however, they are quite different.

Instead of the triple arrangements of stamens and pistil parts, they have indefinite numbers arranged in spirals.