This is a little known fact, but these pretty little things were actually to blame for the chaos in the pacific theater in WWII.

Ok, ok, just kidding, but that would be... interes...well, stupid. The real story about the cherry blossoms is that we banked about 3,000 from a dude named Yukio Ozaki, mayor of Tokyo, in 1912. It was a gift to strengthen the growing friendship between Japan and the United States, but as everyone knows, ended up being a fairly futile gesture in the buddies department, twenty-some years later.

However, the US did send Flowering Dogwoods to Japan in 1915 as a reciprocal gift, but this is where I'm thinkin' we had some problems. Nowhere in my 10-minute research could I find the number of trees sent to Japan. Hm. Maybe we short-changed the Japanese and THAT's where they said, hey, this sucks, maybe this Hitler guy isn't so bad... he has a lovely garden... and as I write this, I'm really hoping none of my former history professors read this, especially you, Jenkins.

Anyway, today, more than 3,700 cherry trees are planted around the Tidal Basin, bringing countless visitors to DC for the two weeks in late March and early April for the annual Cherry Blossom Festival - all because the Japanese wanted to be pals.