Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, the production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogelbaum. Here in Japan, the annual spring explosion of
Speaker 1: blushing pink cherry blossoms has been celebrated for over a
Speaker 1: thousand years, and now there are cherry blossom festivals around
Speaker 1: the world in Sweden, Canada, Spain, and Washington, d C,
Speaker 1: just to name a few. Every spring, some million and
Speaker 1: a half tourists visit d C to witness the fleeting
Speaker 1: flowering of more than three thousand, seven hundred cherry blossom
Speaker 1: trees encircling the tidal basin, a reservoir in the middle
Speaker 1: of the city with West Potomac Park and many monuments
Speaker 1: around its banks. For the article, this episode is based
Speaker 1: on How Stuff Work. Spoke with John Malott, a former
Speaker 1: president of the Japan America Society of Washington, d C
Speaker 1: and a former Director of Japanese Affairs at the US
Speaker 1: State Department who served diplomatic roles in Kobe and Osaka, Japan.
Speaker 1: He said, it's very, very picturesque. You have the blue
Speaker 1: of the water and the blue of the sky. Then
Speaker 1: you have the whitish pang of the cherry blossoms against
Speaker 1: the incredible white of the Jefferson Memorial in the distance.
Speaker 1: It's very beautiful and also very peaceful. The story of
Speaker 1: how and why thousands of cherry blossom trees were gifted
Speaker 1: from Japan more than one hundred years ago and planted
Speaker 1: in America's capital city is fascinating. But first let's learn
Speaker 1: a little bit more about the cherry blossom tree and
Speaker 1: its history. Flowering cherry trees are native to a number
Speaker 1: of places with temperate climates around the world, but in
Speaker 1: Japan these have been cultivated and celebrated since around eight
Speaker 1: hundred CE, which is when they and their blossoms, called
Speaker 1: sukura in Japanese, first began to appear in poetry and
Speaker 1: picture scrolls. They're related to the cherry trees that we
Speaker 1: humans get fruit from, but whereas cherry fruit trees have
Speaker 1: been bred for their tasty fruit, but cherry blossom trees
Speaker 1: have been bred as ornamentals, that is, for those beautiful flowers.
Speaker 1: Most varieties do still grow fruit, but they're small and
Speaker 1: not delicious. The birds and other non human animals will
Speaker 1: eat them, though they are. Flowers range in color from
Speaker 1: white to deep pink, depending on the variety. While they
Speaker 1: typically only live about thirty to forty years. With care
Speaker 1: and good conditions, they can go much longer. More on
Speaker 1: that later. For more than a millennium, people in Japan
Speaker 1: have celebrated the arrival of spring with parties called hanami,
Speaker 1: meaning flower gazing. The idea is to have a picnic
Speaker 1: of varying complexity out under the blooming trees to enjoy
Speaker 1: the blossoms while they last. A cherry blossom tree only
Speaker 1: blooms for about ten days every year, just as the
Speaker 1: weather begins to warm up after the cold of winter.
Speaker 1: So in Japan from about mid March through April, families
Speaker 1: and groups of friends vie for picnic spots under a
Speaker 1: canopy of pink blossoms, and companies throw rowdy, sake fueled
Speaker 1: parties that run laid into the night. Malott said they
Speaker 1: get the lowliest staff member to go out early in
Speaker 1: the morning and stake out a spot under the trees.
Speaker 1: The poor guy has to be there all day, which
Speaker 1: doesn't actually sound all that unpleasant, but I'm sure it
Speaker 1: has its low points. The Japanese Meteorological Agency tracks the
Speaker 1: so called cherry blossom front as bloom worthy warmer weather
Speaker 1: slowly makes its way from southern to northern Japan from
Speaker 1: March through May each year, and offers predictions for when
Speaker 1: the peaks will be in different areas so that people
Speaker 1: can plan their hanami. But okay, so these trees are pretty,
Speaker 1: But how did sakura become such a thing in Japanese culture?
Speaker 1: As with any cultural thing, there isn't a single answer,
Speaker 1: but a number of dovetailing reasons. Their early spring blooming
Speaker 1: coincides with a season of renewal and new beginnings In Japan.
Speaker 1: April is the start of the new school year for
Speaker 1: kids and the start of the new fiscal year for companies,
Speaker 1: and part of the draw of the blossoms is the
Speaker 1: knowledge that they'll soon be gone. That blooming window is
Speaker 1: so short, partially because cherry blossom trees shed their petals
Speaker 1: while they're still springy and colorful, not once they're faded
Speaker 1: or wilted. The bright pet can create lovely clouds in
Speaker 1: the breeze and on bodies of water. This simple fact
Speaker 1: of botany has become symbolic for the beautiful but ephemeral
Speaker 1: nature of all life. A malot said, because they fall
Speaker 1: off the tree and die at the peak of their bloom.
Speaker 1: Whenever you see a cherry blossom in a Japanese movie
Speaker 1: or TV show, that usually means that someone young has died.
Speaker 1: If the heroine is in the hospital getting sicker and
Speaker 1: sicker and they cut to a shot of a cherry
Speaker 1: blossom falling to the ground, you know she's gone. It's
Speaker 1: a symbol that carries a lot of weight. During World
Speaker 1: War Two, the planes flown by Japanese Kamakazi pilots were
Speaker 1: named after another word for cherry blossom Oka. The young
Speaker 1: cadets who piloted the planes were also called cherry blossoms,
Speaker 1: and their uniforms and aircraft were stamped with the image
Speaker 1: of a single pink flower. The Japanese word natsukashi describes
Speaker 1: a nostalgic feeling of happiness tinged with sadness, and is
Speaker 1: associated with cherry blossom season as a whole. In addition
Speaker 1: to being a time of renewal, it's a time of
Speaker 1: endings too. A school graduations, for example, are held in March.
Speaker 1: A Malot reported that they're often accompanied by and I
Speaker 1: quote tear jerker songs about cherry blossom's falling. You can
Speaker 1: still find wild flowering cherry trees around the world but
Speaker 1: most cherry blossom trees grown are cultivated varieties from Japan
Speaker 1: or hybrids grown using trees from Japan. A sum like
Speaker 1: many in Brazil, were brought over by Japanese immigrants. Others,
Speaker 1: like many in Australia and the ones in Washington, d C,
Speaker 1: were gifts from the Japanese government. On March twenty eighth
Speaker 1: of nineteen twelve, a one paragraph article appeared in The
Speaker 1: Washington Post with the underwhelming headline Missus Taft plants a tree.
Speaker 1: The day before, first Lady Nelly Taft, a wife of
Speaker 1: President William Howard Taft, had planted the first two cherry
Speaker 1: blossom trees in Washington, d C. As gifts from the
Speaker 1: Mayor of Tokyo. And that's the story that most people
Speaker 1: know that the entire chair ry blossom tradition in DC
Speaker 1: started with a Japanese gift in nineteen twelve, But that's
Speaker 1: not the half of it. The real story starts with
Speaker 1: what Eliza Skidmore, a photographer and writer who was the
Speaker 1: first woman to sit on the board of the National
Speaker 1: Geographic Society. Skidmore traveled extensively in Japan and came back
Speaker 1: to d C in eighteen eighty five, convinced that cherry
Speaker 1: blossom trees should be planted in Potomac Park. This was
Speaker 1: a then new bit of land that had been under
Speaker 1: the Potomac River until an engineering project to protect the
Speaker 1: city from flooding was enacted earlier in the eighteen eighties.
Speaker 1: It changed the banks of the river, created the title Basin,
Speaker 1: and left the city with this new stretch of land.
Speaker 1: Skidmore later wrote, since they had to plant something in
Speaker 1: that great stretch of raw reclaimed ground by the river bank,
Speaker 1: they might as well plant the most beautiful thing in
Speaker 1: the world, the Japanese cherry tree. Skidmore campaigned tirelessly for
Speaker 1: more than twenty five years, petitioning every president in DC
Speaker 1: official she could get a hold of to plant cherry
Speaker 1: blossom tree, but her idea was ignored. Then one David
Speaker 1: Fairchild came along. A Fairchild worked for the brand new
Speaker 1: US Department of Agriculture as a plant explorer who traveled
Speaker 1: the world looking for plant species that could be cultivated
Speaker 1: in America. While in Japan, he also fell for cherry blossoms.
Speaker 1: In nineteen oh nine, Fairchild showed that cherry blossom trees
Speaker 1: thrived in the temperate climate of the DC area, which
Speaker 1: emboldened Skidmore to write one more letter to the new
Speaker 1: First Lady, proposing to pay for the trees herself. To
Speaker 1: her amazement, Nellie Taft replied two days later, writing I've
Speaker 1: taken the matter up and promised the trees. That's when
Speaker 1: a wealthy Japanese chemist by the name of doctor Jokichi
Speaker 1: Takamine got involved. He was the first person to isolate
Speaker 1: adrenaline by the way. He lived in the US and
Speaker 1: had campaigned for cherry blossom trees in New York City.
Speaker 1: Skidmore told him about the First Lady's promise, and Takamine
Speaker 1: came up with the idea of making DC's cherry blossom
Speaker 1: trees again from Japan. Unfortunately, the first shipment of two
Speaker 1: thousand trees was plagued with insects and disease and had
Speaker 1: to be burned. But two months later, on March twenty
Speaker 1: sixth of nineteen twelve, a shipment of threeenty twenty healthy
Speaker 1: trees arrived. Missus Taft planted the first two the very
Speaker 1: next day, and Skidmore was there to witness the fruition
Speaker 1: of a decade's long dream. Now cherry blossom trees line
Speaker 1: the tidal basin and other parts of the park, as
Speaker 1: well as other areas of the city, and incredibly, a
Speaker 1: few of them have been there this whole time. The
Speaker 1: two original trees planted by Nelly Taft one hundred and
Speaker 1: twelve years ago are still standing, along with a handful
Speaker 1: of others from that shipment. Many others are related to
Speaker 1: those first trees, brought to new life through cultivated clippings.
Speaker 1: The park's arborists keep a database containing the personal health
Speaker 1: record of each tree. If you go, be aware that
Speaker 1: the trees are delicate. It's actually illegal to touch them.
Speaker 1: Just enjoyed with your other senses and from a respectful distance.
Speaker 1: Today's episode is based on the article The Very Short
Speaker 1: Symbolic Life of the Cherryblossom on how stuffworks dot com,
Speaker 1: written by Dave Ruse. A brain Stuff is production of
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio in partnership with how stuffworks dot Com and is
Speaker 1: produced by Tyler klang Afore more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
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