The beauty and menace of the Japanese cherry trees

In 1909, 2,000 ornamental cherry trees that had been presented to the US by Japan were burned because Charles L. Marlatt, acting chief of the Bureau of Entomology of the USDA, claimed that the trees were infested. The recommendation by Marlatt to burn the trees was political--his campaign for plant quarantine legislation was one element of a larger struggle within the USDA over the relative importance of introducing valuable "plant immigrants" and excluding "alien crop enemies."