Other Name: Ash leaved Maple.

 Medium tree up to 60 feet tall; trunk diameter up to 4 feet, crown wide‑spreading.

 Light brown, ridged when young, becoming deeply furrowed with age.

 Smooth, green, glaucous, or rarely purplish, shiny, usually with white lenticels; leaf scars opposite, U-shaped, with 5to9 bundle traces.

Rounded, white hairy, up to 1/4 inch long.

 Opposite, pinnately compound, with 3 to 7 leaflets; leaflets elliptic to ovate, up to 4 inches long, about half as broad, pointed at the tip, tapering or rounded at the sometimes asymmetrical base, smooth or usually coarsely toothed along the edges or even shallowly lobed, light green and smooth on the upper surface, paler and smooth or hairy on the lower surface.

 Starninate and pistillate borne on separate trees, several in a cluster, greenish-yellow, appearing as the leaves begin to unfold.

Borne in pairs, in drooping clusters, composed of a curved wing with a seed at the base, greenish-yellow, up to 2 inches long. 

 Found through out park

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Tree species facts from Robert Mohlenbrock , Forest Trees of Illinois , 1996

The Box Elder most nearly resembles ashes, but differs by its green twigs and its paired fruits The three leaflet type of leaf strongly resembles poison ivy leaf.  A photo below shows a Box elder leave being held near poison ivy plants.