I had a pretty large load of beech from my tree guy. The smaller rounds split alright by hand. Harder than oak, slippery elm, and silver maple, but easier than gum Ended up using a splitter for most of it anyways. The huge rounds for noodled
I remember them in PA. Big ones were almost always good squirrel trees. They nest in the hollow tree. Gramps (in WV.) had one that had a honey bee hive in it.
There's some huge ones in the city, I don't know how old they are but to get to the size some of them are they have to be pretty old. I had some pics but not sure where I put them.