Lost in all this is the historical significance, that the trees were gifts from Japan to welcome peace between our countries. The first tree was planted by President Taft’s wife. Most of the original 1,800 Yoshimi Cherry trees are still alive, but more were propagated from the original trees to fill in along the rest of the Tidal Basin.

In fact, the original grove in Japan that our Cherry trees were taken from was damaged in WWII, so Japanese Arborists took cuttings from the DC trees to rebuild the grove in the early 1950s.

The Japanese gave another gift of cherry trees in the 1960s, and after a flood in the 1980s, DC gave more cuttings back to Japan. Cuttings are consistently passed back and forth from the original lineage of trees in order to ensure their genetic purity.