The end of an era

I took down my old tree fort today. This fort was my first large engineering/design project. It was built out of scrap lumber, salvaged nails, and small trees. A lot of the wood had rotted and I didn't think it was still structurally sound. But it turned out to be sturdier than I expected. I guess I over built it a bit. 

The front first level is about 24 years old.

The back half and second floor were built between 24 and 15 years ago.
This was a long term project. With a lot of design changes.

I expected the who thing to come down when we pulled on the main tree.
Instead the tree snapped in two places and the fort just held it up.

After I pulled the two front supports on the same side as the tree.

I pulled out one of the back supports. The chain slipped off the other one...
Surely if we pull out the other support it will topple over.

Nope. Still standing with no supports at all on the north side.
Safety factor >> 2 :)

It finally fell over after we cut the middle tree and three of the four trees on the south side.

All gone.