EVERETT, Pa. -- Roots, powerful and unyielding, are the problem.

When a young woman tripped and broke her wrist on the Main Street sidewalk of this Bedford County borough last year, the roots of a large ginkgo tree were to blame, as they had buckled the sidewalk into a hazard.

But both the tree -- which has stood sentry over the center of Everett for the past century and a half -- and the residents of this two-stoplight town have shown a stubborn refusal to give up their roots.

Faced with the prospect of losing the 65-foot landmark, the Everett Free Library, which owns the property on which the tree stands, circulated a petition that quickly gathered more than 600 signatures, nearly a third of the borough's population.

The library board of directors then launched a $15,000 fund-raising campaign to cover the costs of redoing the sidewalk, sprucing up the area, and trimming and reinforcing the tree to make sure it presides for another half dozen generations. The group is about halfway to its goal, having enlisted the help of local organizations such as GiveBack and Good Vibes, which is putting on a ginkgo benefit concert Saturday at the Old American Legion Home.

In a town with three active historical societies, the tree represents a living connection to the past.

"I think the foundation, the interest in the tree is definitely the community," said Mary Stanley, the president of the library board of trustees.

"This community is not going to give up their roots -- who they are, where they came from, what this community is about."

Everett, then known as Bloody Run, was founded in 1795 by a man named Michael Barndollar. When three of Mr. Barndollar's great grandsons left in 1862 to fight for the Union in the Civil War, they were presented with three ginkgo trees, planted outside of their houses. The fates of the other two have faded into history, leaving only James Barndollar Williams' tree, his old house now occupied by the library.

It was an exotic gift. Known as "living fossils," modern ginkgoes are almost identical to ones that stood alongside dinosaurs millions of years ago. Once the dominant tree in North America, the ginkgo was wiped out in the most recent Ice Age, though some survived in Asia. A German botanist named Engelbert Kaempfer found ginkgoes in Japan in the late 17th century and brought seeds to Europe. By the early 18th century, the tree had been re-established in North America. The ginkgo is known for its resiliency and longevity -- big reasons why Everett has embraced its ginkgo.

Stationed in the middle of downtown, between the two stoplights, Everett's ginkgo is visible in old photos of parades and other events. That includes a black-and-white shot of the tree standing in several feet of water during a 1936 flood; it was one of the deluge's few arboreal survivors.

Almost everyone in town has some connection to the tree. Schoolchildren have taken field trips to study it for decades, and it is an annual event when the leaves drop -- rapidly and all within a day or two, a curious quirk of the ginkgo.

Kitty Dunkle, 77, recalled her days as a Cub Scout den mother in the 1950s and '60s, when she would have her scouts gather the ginkgo's leaves for arts and crafts projects.

"I'm surprised it's still living," Mrs. Dunkle said. "Most of the time you're lucky to see a tree grow in your lifetime. To have one that's so old, that's amazing."

Mrs. Dunkle signed a petition to save the ginkgo the last time it was threatened -- during a Main Street upgrade in the early 1980s.

The street and sidewalks were to be widened, and the ginkgo was in the way, facing death by chainsaw. But Elizabeth Steckman, a local resident in her 70s, started a petition and went to the borough council to threaten drastic measures.

"She used the old adage, 'I will chain myself to yon ginkgo tree,' " recalled Paul Price, lifelong Everett resident and advertising sales director of the Bedford County Shoppers Guide newspaper.

"And they thought she was serious enough to do it."

The council capitulated, agreeing to build the sidewalk around the tree, a sidewalk that has buckled and cracked in the years since.

Last April, when the woman tripped and broke her wrist, the tree faced another threat. The injured woman didn't threaten litigation -- even apologizing for perhaps sealing the fate of the beloved tree -- but the sidewalk was in blatant violation of borough code.

The library board hired a forester to inspect the tree, and his report was bleak. With depressions at the bottom that look like rot and an awful gash about 20 feet up -- from when a limb was torn away, likely by a passing truck -- it appeared the ginkgo was unhealthy, and the forester recommended chopping it down.

But Mrs. Stanley, treating the ginkgo almost as a sick family member, sought a second opinion and found local arborist Benjamin Tresselt.

After inspecting the damage and conducting core samples of the ginkgo, Mr. Tresselt found that the tree's rotting was limited, as it had an impressive ability to seal off and compartmentalize its wounds.

"The tree had compartmentalized better than any tree I'd ever seen, and I've been in this business for 46 years," he said. "For all intents and purposes, that tree was in excellent structural condition."

But there still was the small matter of funding the operation, including fixing up the area with a state-of-the-art flexible platform to allow the roots some room to maneuver. Plans also call for organic mulch, decorative red stones and a toddler- and skateboarder-proof fence around the tree.

Mrs. Stanley has applied for several grants, and efforts large and small have helped add to the tree's coffers. In addition to Saturday's concert tickets, ginkgo crusaders are selling T-shirts as well as bowls and wine stoppers made from branches trimmed off the tree.

Mrs. Stanley expects to raise enough money to station a plaque next to the ginkgo to tell its tale, and she hopes the area will be fixed up in time to hold a dedication ceremony at Everett's annual Fourth of July parade.

"Because that tree has seen a lot of Fourth of Julys," Mrs. Stanley said, grinning at the thought of it seeing a lot more.