help identifying wood

I have found 5 or six trees that were downed in the wind a few weeks back. I got permission from the owner cut and haul all I wanted. The guy didn't mention what kind of trees they were, I thought they might be oak. After bucking and hauling about 3/4 cord of 16" rounds it dawned on me that I didn't have strain once when picking up thes 18" across 16" long pieces. It seemed way to light to be an oak or maple. I have attached 2 pictures of a couple of sticks taken from a limb from the tree. The trees came from one tree, 5 or 6 trees growing from the same ground without an above ground trunk that I can see. The trees are quite tall and large 18" across. Deep grooves in the bark. I can't find any leaves since it is winter in southern maine and we have some snow cover. they were growing next to a train track in a pretty wet spot judging by the water loged bases of the trees. Any help would be appreciated before I expend much more energy on wood that may not be worth the bother.

Thank You

post a larger pic of a split too

My first thought is that it looks elm, but I don't know what is really native to your area. Bigger pic would help...max out that 200KB!

Corey

What area do you live in? I had some that looked like that. Turned out to be basswood. Very white wood when split, not much grain, light, easy to split, held water like a terry cloth. When dry, burned OK, but smelled strong. Hard to tell without a clean cut or a split to look at.