Family: Magnoliaceae, Magnolia view all from this family

Description The tree with the largest flowers and the largest leaves of all native North American species (except for tropical palms) and a broad, rounded crown of stout, spreading branches.
Height: 30-40' (9-12 m).
Diameter: 1 1/2' (0.5 m).
Leaves: 15-30" (38-76 cm) long, 6-10" (15-25 cm) wide. Reverse ovate, broadest beyond middle, mostly blunt at tip; notched with 2 rounded lobes at base; not toothed. Bright green above, with silvery hairs beneath. Stout, hairy leafstalks, 3-4" (7.5-10 cm) long.
Bark: light gray; smooth, thin.
Twigs: stout, hairy; with large leaf-scars at nodes and ending in large buds covered with white hairs.
Flowers: 10-12" (25-30 cm) wide; cup-shaped with 6 white petals with spot at base; fragrant; in late spring and early summer.
Fruit: 2 1/2-3" (6-7.5 cm) long; conelike; elliptical or nearly round; rose-red; composed of many separate short-pointed 2-seeded hairy fruits; maturing in autumn.

Habitat Moist soil of valleys, especially ravines; in understory of hardwood forests.

Range C. North Carolina south to w. Georgia and west to Louisiana; local in s. Ohio, ne. Arkansas, and se. South Carolina.

Discussion Planted as an ornamental north to Massachusetts. However, in windy places the giant leaves become torn and unsightly. The "queenliest of all the deciduous magnolias" was named by the French naturalist and explorer Andre Michaux (1746-1802), who discovered this rare local tree near Charlotte, North Carolina in 1789.