By: Chuck Hagee

Think you know about the Cherry Blossom Festival? How the trees first came to Washington? Why they came? That the Tidal Basin display is the only festival? Think again!

Let's start with what everyone -- or nearly everyone -- considers THE Cherry Blossom Festival. You know -- all those beautiful trees edging Washington, DC's Tidal Basis. Or as the less politically correct refer to that body of water -- Fanny Fox's private pool. If you know what I'm referring to your showing your age.

According to the official explanation the Tidal Basin trees came to Washington in 1912 "as a gift of friendship to the People of the United States from the people of Japan." But, they were not the first to grace this area.
Actually the first flowering Japanese cherry trees, or "Sakura," arrived in 1906. And, not in the District of Columbia, but in Chevy Chase, MD.

"Dr. David Fairchild, plant explorer and U.S.Department of Agriculture official, imported 75 flowering cherry trees and 25 single-flowered weeping type from the Yokohama Nursery Company in Japan," according to the National Park Service. He planted them on his Chevy Chase property in order to test them for hardiness.

But, Dr. Fairchild was not the originator of the idea to bring the flowering cherry trees to the nation's capital. That distinction belongs to Mrs. Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore who in 1885, upon her return from a visit to Japan, proposed that the beautiful trees "be planted one day along the reclaimed Potomac waterfront."

Unfortunately, her desire, as conveyed to the U.S.Army Superintendent, Office of Public Buildings and Grounds, met with the same response as often experienced by many a Boot Camp enlistee from a Drill Sergeant -- disdain and rebuke. Yet, she persevered for 24 years.

All the while Dr. Fairchild, after determining the trees' hardiness in a new climate, "began to promote Japanese flowering cherry trees as the ideal type of tree to plant along avenues in the Washington area," according to the Park Service. A group known as Friends of the Fairchilds became interested in his experiment and, in conjunction with Chevy Chase Land Company 300, oriental cheery trees were ordered in 1907 for planting throughout the Chevy Chase area.

The next year, 1908, Dr. Fairchild gave saplings of the new trees to children from each the District's schools to be planted on their school grounds in observance of Arbor Day.

During his Arbor Day lecture that year he also proposed that the drive, then know as the "Speedway," around the Tidal Basin "be transformed into a "Field of Cherries." Attending that lecture was Eliza Scidmore.

In 1909 Mrs. Scidmore sent a letter to the nation's new First Lady, Helen Herron Taft, laying out a plan to raise funds to buy cherry trees and donate them to the District. Mrs. Taft, having lived in Japan, was well aware of the trees' beauty and heartily agreed.

The next day, April 8, 1909, Japanese chemist, Dr. Jokicki Takamine was in Washington with Japan's New York Consul, Mr. Midzuno. When told that the city was to have Japanese cherry trees planted along the so-called "Speedway" he offered Mrs. Taft an additional 2,000 trees "to fill out the area" around the entire Tidal Basin.

Midzumo suggested the trees be given as a donation from the City of Tokyo to the City of Washington. He and Dr. Takamine met with Mrs. Taft who accepted the offer.

On December 10, 1909, at the Port of Seattle 2,000 trees arrived. However, upon their debarkation in Washington on January 6, 1910, a U.S. Department of Agricultural inspection team determined they were "infested with insects and nematodes." On January 28 the trees were burned to protect American growers.

After some diplomatic correspondence, Dr. Takamine "again donated the money for new trees." This time he upped the number to 3,020. On February 14, 1912 those trees were shipped from Yokohama on board the S.S.Awa Maru. Upon arrival in Seattle they were transferred to insulated freight cars for shipment to Washington.

On March 26,1912, the 3,020 trees arrived. There were 12 varieties ranging in numbers from 1,800 to 20. The next day Mrs. Taft and Viscountess Chinda, wife of the Japanese Ambassador, planted two Yoshino cheery trees on the north bank of the Tidal Basin.

After the planting Mrs. Taft presented Viscountess Chinda with a bouquet of "American Beauty" roses. Thus began a tradition that would become part of the Washington Cherry Blossom Festival. Those two original trees remain several hundred yards west of the John Paul Jones Memorial at the end of 17th Street, SW.

As noted by the Park Service, between 1913 and 1920 workmen continued planting the Yoshino trees around the Tidal Basin. The other 11 varieties, plus the remaining Yoshino trees, found a home in East Potomac Park.
It was not until 1935 that the first official "Cherry Blossom Festival" occurred. By 1938 the trees had become so popular as a national tourist attraction that a group of women chained themselves to the trees located on the spot proposed for the Jefferson Memorial.

They sought to stop the workmen who were preparing to clear ground for the memorial and make a political statement against President Franklin D. Roosevelt, according to the Park Service. Ultimately a compromise was reached and more trees, replacing those cleared, were planted along the south side of the Tidal Basin serving as an elegant, natural frame for the memorial.

Ironically, the first Cherry Blossom Pageant took place in 1940, just 20 months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. On December 11, 1941, four of the cherry trees were cut down "in suspected retaliation" for that attack. And, there was some sentiment throughout the nation that the trees be destroyed as a result of the World War II.

In order to defuse some of this anger, the trees were referred to as the "Oriental" flowering cherry trees throughout the duration of the war. The Pageant was reinstituted in 1948 with Cherry Blossom Princesses selected from each State and federal territory.

But, Washington is not the only U.S.city to have a Cherry Blossom Festival. There are festivals in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Philadelphia. And, there are numerous festivals throughout Japan that take place from January through May depending on the climate in a particular location. Okinawa's is in January while in Hokkaido blossoms usually don't appear until late May.

Southern California's Cherry Blossom Festival was co-founded in 2002 by Wendy Fujihara Anderson and Michael Motoyasu to focus on Japanese American cultural events and "bridge generations," according to Festival literature. Pasadena, Anderson's home, was the original location of the Festival.

It was officially moved to Los Angeles' Little Japan District in 2007. The Festival, now in its ninth year, will be held April 10 and 11. Last year's attendance topped 45,000.

Nearly 400 miles north, the Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival, now celebrating its 43rd year, will take place in San Francisco on Saturday and Sunday April 10-11 and 17-18. It annually draws in excess of 150,000 people to San Francisco's Japantown.

In addition to food booths, cultural performances, martial arts demonstration, live bands, and the annual Queen Program, there is the Grand Parade to be held this year on April 18. It all began in 1967 just as the nation was beginning to fixate on the Vietnam War.

Some 3,000 miles due East, on the Atlantic seaboard, is the Subaru Cherry Blossom Festival of Greater Philadelphia. It runs from March 5 through April 17 this year with events in venues across the Philadelphia area.

Phillie's Festival centerpiece is Sakura Sunday, April 11. It features a day of picnicking and performances from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Fairmont Park's Horticultural Center.

This extravaganza concludes with the Gala of the Subaru Cheery Blossom Festival on April 17 at the newly renovated Please Touch Museum. It features a saki barrel-breaking ceremony which is a Japanese tradition to mark special occasions or important events.

The Festival benefits the Japan American Society of Greater Philadelphia's Community Tree Planting Project whose mission it is to beautify the city landscape by annually planting and maintaining cherry trees throughout Philadelphia parks. The Society finished planting 1,000 trees in 2007 to compliment the 1,600 trees donated by Japan "as a gesture of friendship in 1926."

Although New York City does not have an actual festival, citizens celebrate the Japanese tradition of "Hanami" to mark the cherry blossom season from April 3 to May 4 at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Hanami is the Japanese custom of "enjoying the beauty of the flowers" -- in this case, as in Japan, that almost always refers to the cherry blossoms.

The "Cherry Watch" at the Garden tracks the gradual blooming of Garden's several hundred cherry trees. A highlight of the event, Sakura Matsuri, is scheduled for May 1 and 2 this year.

So why limit your "Cherry Watch" to the Tidal Basin? Flowering cherry trees, with their pink and white blossoms, can be found from sea to sea, on both sides of the Potomac, and throughout not only the District itself but also throughout the Greater Washington Metropolitan Area. Dr. Fairchild's originals are still there and flowering.