What plant is this?? - Tulip Poplar

I just found this plant and the root smells like ginger

Hi Wyatt, welcome to Permies!  Do you have a picture you can share?  If so, reply to the post and below the text area is a tab for "Attachments".

Also, roughly where in the world are you?  Different regions will lead us to different answers.

Is your plant either of these?

Here are pictures of wild ginger:





https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asarum

According to Wikipedia

The plant is called wild ginger because the rhizome tastes and smells similar to ginger root, but the two are not particularly related. However, the FDA warns against consuming Asarum, as it is nephrotoxic and contains the potent carcinogen aristolochic acid.

Culinary ginger (Zingiber officinale) is a very different plant:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginger

Ginger (Zingiber officinale) is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or simply ginger, is widely used as a spice or a folk medicine.[2]

It is a herbaceous perennial which grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of leaves) about a meter tall bearing narrow leaf blades. The inflorescences bear pale yellow with purple flowers and arise directly from the rhizome on separate shoots.[3] Ginger is in the family Zingiberaceae, to which also belong turmeric (Curcuma longa), cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum)

I'm in South pa

The only leaves I find that look similar is sassafras, it's root smells like licorice or rootbeer.  It will be interesting to find out what it is.

I have an unidentified tree that has leaves like that... It is 30 feet tall now, and I do not have the energy to dig up a root and smell it! I'll try to get a pic posted later tomorrow though.

That's my first impression too ... sassafras.

I am not certain about root fragrance, but the leaves look like tulip poplar to me.

I think Daniel is right:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liriodendron_tulipifera