The incident helped build support for the Plant Quarantine Act of 1912. Every spring, Washington, D.C., turns pink and white, and crowds gather along the Tidal Basin to take photos. Few know that the first cherry trees Japan sent to the capital ended up in a bonfire. U.S.
Because of an insect infestation, customs and Border Protection says the trees had to be destroyed.
He wanted to turn Washington into a city of cherry trees. Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore heard his speech and began a campaign to bring cherry trees to the capital, writing to First Lady Helen Taft, who supported the plan. Japan learned of the proposal through diplomatic channels, and chemist Jokichi Takamine enlisted his friend Yukio Ozaki, the mayor of Tokyo , to help. The first shipment reached Seattle on Dec. A team of scientists led by Charles L. Marlatt found scale insects and root gall and recommended destroying the trees. President William Howard Taft approved the plan on Jan. Scidmore’s interest in the project went back decades. Taft accepted, and the gift was to be made in the name of the city of Tokyo. Those trees reached Washington on Jan. The National Park Service’s historical account records that the secretary of state wrote to the Japanese ambassador to express deep regret. The Japanese side responded with determination and goodwill. Ozaki and other officials then proposed a replacement donation, which the Tokyo City Council approved. Agriculture officials treated the destruction as a warning about the risks of importing plants. Secretary James Wilson and his staff used the incident to highlight the dangers that imported insects and plant diseases posed to American agriculture. Their scientific findings added weight to concerns raised by state officials. The Plant Quarantine Act took effect Aug. It established the Federal Horticultural Board and provided a framework for federal plant quarantines. The replacement donation took shape over the next two years. They were then grafted onto rootstock grown in Itami City, Hyogo Prefecture. Awa Maru on Feb. The next day, First Lady Taft and Viscountess Chinda, the wife of the Japanese ambassador, planted two Yoshino cherry trees on the Tidal Basin’s northern bank. Only a few people witnessed the ceremony. A bronze plaque near the trees commemorates the occasion.
The story begins with David Fairchild of the Department of Agriculture, who in 1908 gave cherry saplings to every school in the District to plant on Arbor Day. 10, 1909, and continued to Washington by train. 28, 1910, and the trees were burned. The National Park Service’s history of the cherry trees says she returned from her first trip to Japan in 1885 and proposed planting cherry trees along the reclaimed Potomac waterfront. Her request went unanswered, as did her appeals to successive superintendents of public buildings and grounds over the next 24 years. Her breakthrough came in April 1909, when Helen Herron Taft, who had lived in Japan, answered her note within two days. The day after the first lady’s letter, Takamine, the chemist known for discovering adrenaline, offered to donate 2,000 cherry trees to fill out the area. 6, 1910, but were destroyed within weeks. The new gift eventually grew to 3,020 trees. By then, 39 states had passed their own plant quarantine laws, and calls for a national law dated back to at least 1898. 20, 1912. In December 1910, scions were cut from a well-known collection of cherry trees along the Arakawa River in Adachi Ward, a district of Tokyo. A shipment of 3,020 trees representing 12 varieties left Yokohama aboard the S.S. 14, 1912, and arrived in Washington on March 26 after crossing to Seattle and traveling east by rail in insulated freight cars. The National Park Service traces the National Cherry Blossom Festival to that planting, although the first festival was not held until 1935.
The friendship endured beyond the ceremony. U.S. Customs and Border Protection records that the replacement trees were fumigated before shipment. The next time a cherry blossom photo scrolls past, remember that the scene owes part of its history to a pest inspection and a diplomatic gesture that survived a difficult start.
About 11 years after the planting, Ozaki and his family visited the grove.
