April 15, 2026 • 12 mins
The Japanese Cherry Blossom is a sight to behold. But how did they get to Washington D.C.?
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's Chuck and this is short stuff, and we're gonna
take a little tour, a little trip around the world
and do a little Washington, DC, and do a little Japan.
And that's mostly it.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
I think everyone knows what we're talking about then, because
we're talking about cherry blossoms and the Japanese cherry tree,
which does not produce actual, like edible cherries that we
know and love. It does provide a little fruit berry
for animals and such, but it's not that kind of
cherry tree, So just stop asking. It's better.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
It is better. I mean, I like my cherries for sure.
But if you've ever seen a cherry blossomed tree in
full bloom, is it's such a sight to behold that
Japan essentially created an entire cultural season around it with
its own emotions and songs and all sorts of stuff.
It is really moving. If you're American or North American,
(01:02):
or you just like traveling to the United States and
happen to be here in the spring and go to Washington,
d C. There's a good chance that you've seen the
cherry blossoms on the title basin blooming, and this is
about the time they're going to start. I think in
twenty twenty six. It's predicted the whole seasons from March
twenty it's to April twelfth. Yeah, but if you really
(01:24):
want to make sure that you're there for the peak,
they usually say like the last day, last couple days
maybe in March is usually when they peak.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, for sure. Brooklyn Botanical Garden, by the way, shout
out to them. I know DC gets all the press
here in the United States for cherry blossoms, but they
do pretty good on their own. That's where I've seen them.
But in Japan is where the real show is. They've
been cultivated there and really beloved since eighth century CE,
(01:53):
and they first started appearing in poetry and in books
and in pictures and things like that. They have a
word for the cherry blossom, which is sakura. They have
quite a few words for this, as it turns out,
because it's Japan. And then they're flower gazing when the
time rolls around where they're in bloom is called hanami,
And it's sort of a mixed bag in Japan because
(02:15):
it's definitely you know, spring and new beginnings, they start
the new school year, then it's the start of their
fiscal year. But it's also a little bittersweet because it
also symbolizes like the ending of things, right.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Yeah, And the reason why is because cherry blossoms just
stop all of a sudden at their peak. They don't
like grow and peak and then fade. They grow and peak,
and that's that, they just fall off and die. So
there's this idea, this concept of something dying in its prime,
which is in and of itself quite bittersweet. Now they
(02:51):
have a word for that, this kind of nostalgic bittersweet
feeling that's kind of associated with cherry blossoms is not
which means exactly what I just said.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah for sure. And I was sort of laughing on
the inside there because they I got this from a
lot of different sources. But this may have been someone
how Stuffworks interviewed. The last name is Malot, and this
guy was like, if you're watching a Japanese movie or
TV show and it's some like awesome young person that
is the central character, and they're walking around and you
(03:25):
see the cherry trees blooming like that means they're going
to die in this movie.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
For sure right. That was a John Malot. He organizes
the Sakura Matsuri Japanese street festival in DC every April.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Yeah, so that's the I guess, the Japanese version of
what we have in the United States, which is somebody
costs into a napkin and there's blood in it.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Oh. Yeah, that's always a bad sign, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
You're always gone.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, that never just becomes this thing that just happened
and the movie moves on.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
That would be a fun red herring to put in
a movie.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Though, sure, I think that would be a mcguffin.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Oh God, the emails. This is the new haiku.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Oh I forgot about haiku. I wonder somebody could write
a haiku about what a mcguffin is.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
It's coming.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You asked for it, so you said that. There's other
words for cherry blossoms, and Japanese one of them is
okahka and tying into the idea of something dying young
and it's prime. That's what Japanese Kamakazi pilots were called
in World War Two Oka, and that's what they're planes.
(04:34):
They're essentially human driven missile planes were called Oka as well,
and they had like cherry blossoms painted on the side
of the plane.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
That symbolism all over the place. So let's take a break.
We've covered some of Japan, and now we're going to
talk about DC right after this.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Josh and.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
South here, all right, So we promised talk of Washington,
d C. The most famous purveyor provider rather of cherry
blossoms here in the United States. And it all started
on March twenty eighth, nineteen twelve, when the Washington Post
(05:48):
ran a little story with the headline, missus Taft plants
a tree. And that is when Helen Nellie Taft, wife
of William Howard Taft, the President, planted a couple of
cherry blossom trees that were gifts from Tokyo. But the
story is a little more interesting than that, right.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Well, apparently the Washington Post journalist left in the middle
of it just a plant's a treat, So it's not
even a correct ineffective headline. Yeah, but yes, that is
just the broad stroke. That's the end result of decades
of organizing and campaigning by a woman named Eliza Skidmore.
She was the first board member of Sorry, the first
(06:29):
woman board member of the National geographic Society. She was
very well traveled. She loved to go to Japan, and
so having traveled to Japan, she had been exposed to
the cherry blossoms and was like, these are the greatest
things ever. We should get some of these back in Washington, DC.
And I'm sure that she thought this would be no
problem whatsoever. Well, fast forward almost thirty years and she
(06:51):
finally gets this thing done, but it's thanks to the
intervention of two other people who just also happened to
be men.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Yeah, for sure, I do love this quote though. I
want to read it because it just shows how enchanted
she was Potomac Park there on the river, they were
reclaiming it at the time, and this was an eighteen
eighty five and she wrote that basically like they had
to plant something there in this space, and she said
they might as well plant the most beautiful thing in
the world, the Japanese cherry tree. Yeah, it's very sweet.
(07:19):
But yeah, you mentioned a couple of dudes. One guy
was named David Fairchild. And it's kind of cool when
you look back at how all these convergent things kind
of take place to make something happen. I love stories
like this, but This was a guy who was the
He worked at the USDA, which is a new thing
at the time for our Department of Agriculture. Is a
(07:39):
job that I want. I don't if they still have it.
But he was a plant explorer, so he would travel
all over the world looking for plants that they could
cultivate in the United States.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
They do not still have that, man, I.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Can't imagine anything better.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
They had it until like last year.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
I think, yeah, and I wish told me so.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
David Child was like, Hey, these actually can work in Washington,
d C. I think he transplanted a few and showed
that they could live. Skidmore found out about this, and
she was like, Okay, I'm going to try one last time.
I'm going to get in touch with this new first lady,
Nellie Taft, and I'm going to say, please, for love God,
hear me out about these cherry trees. Everybody thinks it's
(08:22):
a good idea. Please, let's start planning cherry trees in DC.
She got a reply two days later after she sent
the letter, and Nellie Taff said, I have taken up
the matter, and the promised the trees, and all of
a sudden things just started looking up for Eliza Skidmore's idea.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Yeah, I mean, after twenty five years, can't imagine how
she felt. She got in touch with a guy named
doctor Takamini who was a wealthy Japanese chemist, and he
had been beating the cherry tree drum for New York
City for a while and she knew this. They were
fellow enthusiasts. So she said, hey, missus taff said, like,
she's going to try to make this thing happen. He
(09:00):
was like, well, I'm a wealthy Japanese chemist, so I
can pull some strings. Why don't we make this like
an official, like state gift from Japan to the United States.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
The great idea. So Japan said, here are two thousand
cherry blossom trees, and also here's a bunch of insects
and disease in that.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Fortunately they're lousy with Japanese beetles and god knows what
disease that cherry trees get. Yeah, so they had to
burn them. And Japan was like, did you have to
like take a photograph and send it to us of
all the cherry trees burning. Yeah, So they send them
three thousand more and those are the ones that included
the two that missus Taff planted. The next day after those,
(09:40):
that second shipment of three and twenty healthy trees arrived.
That's right.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I guess they hedge their bets and sent the extra
thousand plus twenty, which is kind of funny. They line
the title basin there in DC Potomac Park kind of
right there around was it the Jefferson Memorial? I think, yeah, yeah,
it's gorgeous. If you've ever been there, I know you
lived in DC, right, so she's probably all over that.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
I bet oh, all over she would roll in them.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Park rangers would be like, please, you're not allowed to
do that again. I can't help myself.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
So yeah, that's DC. You know peak bloom you can,
Like Josh said earlier, you never know exactly when it's
going to happen. So it's kind of one of those things.
It can be heartbreaking if you, you know, have to
book your ticket ahead of time and you have no
flexibility in your schedule. There have been plenty of people
that missed the Cherry Bloom in DC when they have
(10:39):
gone just for that, So yeah, I know it's it's
super sad when that happens. So maybe don't aim. This
is my advice, maybe don't aim for peak bloom. Just
try and be there at some point during that that timeframe.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
And it is something to see. You're just surrounded by
blooming cherry trees.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Gorgeous.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
But you can also I mean, if you can't make
it to DC, or you made it and you miss
your mark, you can plant a cherry tree. They're really beautiful.
I would recommend the autumn analysis because they're not only
blooms in the spring. It blooms in the autumn. Two
do you have one? No, I planted plenty of them,
but I do not. We have a weeping cherry. It
only blooms once a year. Is that why it's said, Yeah,
(11:20):
it was like an autumn.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Oh man, I have not. Oh man, have I seen
the DC. I don't know if I've actually seen the
DC bloom. I feel like I did one time visiting
my sister years ago. But I also think I would
have known it because there's so many more trees than
even the ones in Brooklyn.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Yeah. Yeah, I've not seen the DC ones unless I
just don't remember them. But we were in Japan around
this time, but a little before it was, so there
was some sporadic blooming.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
But the thing I do remember is that the Starbucks
there had a sakura like coffee latte. Oh, they just
made up a taste because obviously cherry blossoms don't have
a taste. But it's one of the best tasting lattes
I've ever had, and of course it was right.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Can you recall a note an e flat wiseacre?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
You got anything else?
Speaker 2 (12:17):
No, Just you know, it's not just DC and Japan.
These things grow and temperate climates all over the world,
and they're certainly planted a lot for you know, tourism
and the wow factor, so you can you can see
them all over the place. So just if DC and
Japan are off the map for you, you can probably
find some nearby.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Sure. I think that's it for short stuff, right, Yeah,
that means we're out.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's Chuck and this is short stuff, and we're gonna
take a little tour, a little trip around the world
and do a little Washington, DC, and do a little Japan.
And that's mostly it.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
I think everyone knows what we're talking about then, because
we're talking about cherry blossoms and the Japanese cherry tree,
which does not produce actual, like edible cherries that we
know and love. It does provide a little fruit berry
for animals and such, but it's not that kind of
cherry tree, So just stop asking. It's better.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
It is better. I mean, I like my cherries for sure.
But if you've ever seen a cherry blossomed tree in
full bloom, is it's such a sight to behold that
Japan essentially created an entire cultural season around it with
its own emotions and songs and all sorts of stuff.
It is really moving. If you're American or North American,
(01:02):
or you just like traveling to the United States and
happen to be here in the spring and go to Washington,
d C. There's a good chance that you've seen the
cherry blossoms on the title basin blooming, and this is
about the time they're going to start. I think in
twenty twenty six. It's predicted the whole seasons from March
twenty it's to April twelfth. Yeah, but if you really
(01:24):
want to make sure that you're there for the peak,
they usually say like the last day, last couple days
maybe in March is usually when they peak.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, for sure. Brooklyn Botanical Garden, by the way, shout
out to them. I know DC gets all the press
here in the United States for cherry blossoms, but they
do pretty good on their own. That's where I've seen them.
But in Japan is where the real show is. They've
been cultivated there and really beloved since eighth century CE,
(01:53):
and they first started appearing in poetry and in books
and in pictures and things like that. They have a
word for the cherry blossom, which is sakura. They have
quite a few words for this, as it turns out,
because it's Japan. And then they're flower gazing when the
time rolls around where they're in bloom is called hanami,
And it's sort of a mixed bag in Japan because
(02:15):
it's definitely you know, spring and new beginnings, they start
the new school year, then it's the start of their
fiscal year. But it's also a little bittersweet because it
also symbolizes like the ending of things, right.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
Yeah, And the reason why is because cherry blossoms just
stop all of a sudden at their peak. They don't
like grow and peak and then fade. They grow and peak,
and that's that, they just fall off and die. So
there's this idea, this concept of something dying in its prime,
which is in and of itself quite bittersweet. Now they
(02:51):
have a word for that, this kind of nostalgic bittersweet
feeling that's kind of associated with cherry blossoms is not
which means exactly what I just said.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah for sure. And I was sort of laughing on
the inside there because they I got this from a
lot of different sources. But this may have been someone
how Stuffworks interviewed. The last name is Malot, and this
guy was like, if you're watching a Japanese movie or
TV show and it's some like awesome young person that
is the central character, and they're walking around and you
(03:25):
see the cherry trees blooming like that means they're going
to die in this movie.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
For sure right. That was a John Malot. He organizes
the Sakura Matsuri Japanese street festival in DC every April.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Yeah, so that's the I guess, the Japanese version of
what we have in the United States, which is somebody
costs into a napkin and there's blood in it.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Oh. Yeah, that's always a bad sign, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
You're always gone.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, that never just becomes this thing that just happened
and the movie moves on.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
That would be a fun red herring to put in
a movie.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Though, sure, I think that would be a mcguffin.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Oh God, the emails. This is the new haiku.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Oh I forgot about haiku. I wonder somebody could write
a haiku about what a mcguffin is.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
It's coming.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You asked for it, so you said that. There's other
words for cherry blossoms, and Japanese one of them is
okahka and tying into the idea of something dying young
and it's prime. That's what Japanese Kamakazi pilots were called
in World War Two Oka, and that's what they're planes.
(04:34):
They're essentially human driven missile planes were called Oka as well,
and they had like cherry blossoms painted on the side
of the plane.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
That symbolism all over the place. So let's take a break.
We've covered some of Japan, and now we're going to
talk about DC right after this.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Josh and.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
South here, all right, So we promised talk of Washington,
d C. The most famous purveyor provider rather of cherry
blossoms here in the United States. And it all started
on March twenty eighth, nineteen twelve, when the Washington Post
(05:48):
ran a little story with the headline, missus Taft plants
a tree. And that is when Helen Nellie Taft, wife
of William Howard Taft, the President, planted a couple of
cherry blossom trees that were gifts from Tokyo. But the
story is a little more interesting than that, right.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Well, apparently the Washington Post journalist left in the middle
of it just a plant's a treat, So it's not
even a correct ineffective headline. Yeah, but yes, that is
just the broad stroke. That's the end result of decades
of organizing and campaigning by a woman named Eliza Skidmore.
She was the first board member of Sorry, the first
(06:29):
woman board member of the National geographic Society. She was
very well traveled. She loved to go to Japan, and
so having traveled to Japan, she had been exposed to
the cherry blossoms and was like, these are the greatest
things ever. We should get some of these back in Washington, DC.
And I'm sure that she thought this would be no
problem whatsoever. Well, fast forward almost thirty years and she
(06:51):
finally gets this thing done, but it's thanks to the
intervention of two other people who just also happened to
be men.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Yeah, for sure, I do love this quote though. I
want to read it because it just shows how enchanted
she was Potomac Park there on the river, they were
reclaiming it at the time, and this was an eighteen
eighty five and she wrote that basically like they had
to plant something there in this space, and she said
they might as well plant the most beautiful thing in
the world, the Japanese cherry tree. Yeah, it's very sweet.
(07:19):
But yeah, you mentioned a couple of dudes. One guy
was named David Fairchild. And it's kind of cool when
you look back at how all these convergent things kind
of take place to make something happen. I love stories
like this, but This was a guy who was the
He worked at the USDA, which is a new thing
at the time for our Department of Agriculture. Is a
(07:39):
job that I want. I don't if they still have it.
But he was a plant explorer, so he would travel
all over the world looking for plants that they could
cultivate in the United States.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
They do not still have that, man, I.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Can't imagine anything better.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
They had it until like last year.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
I think, yeah, and I wish told me so.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
David Child was like, Hey, these actually can work in Washington,
d C. I think he transplanted a few and showed
that they could live. Skidmore found out about this, and
she was like, Okay, I'm going to try one last time.
I'm going to get in touch with this new first lady,
Nellie Taft, and I'm going to say, please, for love God,
hear me out about these cherry trees. Everybody thinks it's
(08:22):
a good idea. Please, let's start planning cherry trees in DC.
She got a reply two days later after she sent
the letter, and Nellie Taff said, I have taken up
the matter, and the promised the trees, and all of
a sudden things just started looking up for Eliza Skidmore's idea.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Yeah, I mean, after twenty five years, can't imagine how
she felt. She got in touch with a guy named
doctor Takamini who was a wealthy Japanese chemist, and he
had been beating the cherry tree drum for New York
City for a while and she knew this. They were
fellow enthusiasts. So she said, hey, missus taff said, like,
she's going to try to make this thing happen. He
(09:00):
was like, well, I'm a wealthy Japanese chemist, so I
can pull some strings. Why don't we make this like
an official, like state gift from Japan to the United States.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
The great idea. So Japan said, here are two thousand
cherry blossom trees, and also here's a bunch of insects
and disease in that.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Fortunately they're lousy with Japanese beetles and god knows what
disease that cherry trees get. Yeah, so they had to
burn them. And Japan was like, did you have to
like take a photograph and send it to us of
all the cherry trees burning. Yeah, So they send them
three thousand more and those are the ones that included
the two that missus Taff planted. The next day after those,
(09:40):
that second shipment of three and twenty healthy trees arrived.
That's right.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
I guess they hedge their bets and sent the extra
thousand plus twenty, which is kind of funny. They line
the title basin there in DC Potomac Park kind of
right there around was it the Jefferson Memorial? I think, yeah, yeah,
it's gorgeous. If you've ever been there, I know you
lived in DC, right, so she's probably all over that.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
I bet oh, all over she would roll in them.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Park rangers would be like, please, you're not allowed to
do that again. I can't help myself.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
So yeah, that's DC. You know peak bloom you can,
Like Josh said earlier, you never know exactly when it's
going to happen. So it's kind of one of those things.
It can be heartbreaking if you, you know, have to
book your ticket ahead of time and you have no
flexibility in your schedule. There have been plenty of people
that missed the Cherry Bloom in DC when they have
(10:39):
gone just for that, So yeah, I know it's it's
super sad when that happens. So maybe don't aim. This
is my advice, maybe don't aim for peak bloom. Just
try and be there at some point during that that timeframe.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
And it is something to see. You're just surrounded by
blooming cherry trees.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Gorgeous.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
But you can also I mean, if you can't make
it to DC, or you made it and you miss
your mark, you can plant a cherry tree. They're really beautiful.
I would recommend the autumn analysis because they're not only
blooms in the spring. It blooms in the autumn. Two
do you have one? No, I planted plenty of them,
but I do not. We have a weeping cherry. It
only blooms once a year. Is that why it's said, Yeah,
(11:20):
it was like an autumn.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Oh man, I have not. Oh man, have I seen
the DC. I don't know if I've actually seen the
DC bloom. I feel like I did one time visiting
my sister years ago. But I also think I would
have known it because there's so many more trees than
even the ones in Brooklyn.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Yeah. Yeah, I've not seen the DC ones unless I
just don't remember them. But we were in Japan around
this time, but a little before it was, so there
was some sporadic blooming.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
But the thing I do remember is that the Starbucks
there had a sakura like coffee latte. Oh, they just
made up a taste because obviously cherry blossoms don't have
a taste. But it's one of the best tasting lattes
I've ever had, and of course it was right.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Can you recall a note an e flat wiseacre?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
You got anything else?
Speaker 2 (12:17):
No, Just you know, it's not just DC and Japan.
These things grow and temperate climates all over the world,
and they're certainly planted a lot for you know, tourism
and the wow factor, so you can you can see
them all over the place. So just if DC and
Japan are off the map for you, you can probably
find some nearby.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Sure. I think that's it for short stuff, right, Yeah,
that means we're out.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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