Not sure what it is. When hophornbeam was mentioned, I looked back at the pics. And now with this pic, I'm sure it's not. The bark flakes or strings are too wide. This pic is hophornbeam. It looks like this all the way down to about 2" in diameter
Id say american elm, as i can see some lopsided leaves on the ground. On the otherside its hard to tell as i dont know the place and whatelse trees are standing there.
I have never seen this type of wood in my area, but I do have a good friend from the Knoxville area that now lives here that I'll ask tomorrow. I hope he knows for both our sakes.
I think the bark is wrong for that. I burn a lot of elm, I bet most of the elm I burn is rock elm. Based upon oldspark's link.
Do you know which leaves on the ground belongs to the tree? that would be in my perspective the easiest way to tell what it is.
I hope it's pecan... I've never noticed any pecan nuts from any of the trees before like I do the walnut and hickories . There's no way for me to go through the leaves on the ground with any degree of accuracy . There's hundreds of trees in just a 100 ft radius that could have been blown around and they're a pretty diverse group. I might try to go back and find the top of the tree and see if there's any branches left with possible buds . I know I've seen that bark around scattered about. I can probably find one and stalk it until it gets leaves and then definitively verify what it is.