The Story of a Beloved Tree and the Mother Who Gifted it to the Garden
By Will Lerner, Communications Manager for Portland Japanese Garden & Japan Institute
In Portland Japanese Garden there stands one tree rooted in the significance of both what it means to be Asian in America and the strength of a mother’s love: its weeping cherry. The story of this tree in the Flat Garden is especially appropriate to tell as May approaches, when we celebrate both Mother’s Day and Asian American Native Hawai’ian Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Heritage Month.
Approaching the Weeping Cherry
There are three approaches to the Garden’s weeping cherry—the first that many take is a southerly route, past the Nezu Gate and toward the Pavilion, where a line of trees and shrubs break into a view across a veranda and the raked gravel and mossy islands of the Flat Garden. The eye is immediately drawn to the cherry down this view’s corridor. Approximately 15 feet in height, the distance the trunk travels from its roots is quickly interrupted by a burl from which sturdy limbs reach out in jubilation to the sky before their further reaches level out and then curve back to the land from which it grows. The branches only move in wind, but the weeping cherry has a feeling of being in continuous motion like kelp on a coastline.
Like so many of Portland Japanese Garden’s most revered trees, the weeping cherry lived elsewhere before it arrived here in the early 1960s. Planted in the front yard of a home on Portland’s San Rafael Street, a mid-century street widening project necessitated the tree’s removal lest it be destroyed or damaged in favor of asphalt and concrete. Simultaneous to this infrastructure work was a request broadcasted out by the Garden for donations of plant life. “For the Flat Garden—which is the [organization’s] first project—we are going to rely on donations, and our first concern are trees,” the Garden’s first Board President Philip Englehart told the Oregon Journal in 1963.
The Marumoto family would be among several that answered the call. More than 60 years later, I spoke with Kerry Marumoto over Zoom from his home in Ketchum, Idaho. Marumoto was around ten years old at the time his family made this generous gesture. The conversation revealed that the only thing that could make the weeping cherry more beautiful were details about the mother who cared for it first.
The Marumoto Family of Portland
Kerry’s mother Montana, or “Tana,” was fittingly born in Montana in 1919. After Tana’s parents passed away when she was only a teenager, she wound up in Minnesota alongside her younger sister Betty. It was in the American Midwest that she met a young man from Portland’s Japantown named George Marumoto. George and Tana married within months of meeting but whatever wedded bliss they may have enjoyed was quickly curtailed when George was deployed during World War II.
Tana’s family, well inland from the Pacific Coast, avoided incarceration. For George’s family, it was a different experience. It didn’t matter that his family was American. It didn’t matter that George was a member of the U.S. Military Intelligence Language Service. All that mattered to the government was that they were of Japanese ancestry. The Marumoto family would be among those from the Portland area that were arrested and incarcerated at Minidoka War Relocation Center in Idaho.
Related: The Experience of Oregon’s Japanese Population Before the Garden
When the war ended, George and Tana reunited after several years of separation and moved to Portland. George began his career as an optometrist, a field of study he had earned a doctorate in upon his return home. Tana, who had worked as a welder on cargo ships, continued welding past the war but devoted most of her time to being a homemaker. The pair would then have three children: Philip, the eldest son, Georgia, a daughter, and then Kerry, the youngest boy.
The Marumoto family would wind up in a house on San Rafael Street. “The home I grew up in was at the time surrounded by apple orchards,” Kerry remembers. “It was agricultural land that eventually saw more population move eastward into the area. A less developed part of the city suited Kerry’s parents. “My parents loved the natural world,” Kerry shares. “We spent a lot of time camping. My father was an avid fly fisherman. When we were too young to fish, we’d just play in the river. My mother loved forests and plants—she was an avid gardener.” Kerry described how his nature-loving mother “…would sometimes go deep into the forest to bring back plants.”
Care Throughout History
Weeping cherry trees have a long history of reverence in Japan—the first known cultivation of cherry trees likely occurred during the Heian Period (794-1185) and it is believed to have been a Prunus itosakura, or “Edohigan” tree. Journalist Naoko Abe writes in her book The Sakura Obsession, “Aristocrats were enchanted by the way in which the thin, supple branches bent over towards the ground, giving the illusion of tears when the tree blossomed, and so they propagated this mutation by collecting seeds and planting them in their gardens.” The weeping cherry at the Garden itself is a Prunus subhirtella ‘Pendula.’ Also commonly called a “Higan cherry” in the U.S., it is a hybrid of the Edohigan and P. incisa, or “Fuji cherry.”
“I have a faint memory of going to a garden center with my mom and buying it,” Kerry offers. “It was just a little tree when she got it. When we went fishing or camping on weekends, we’d look for pretty rocks in rivers. My mom collected small ones that were about the same weight and would tie them to the tree’s branches when it was mature enough to hold them. As the tree grew and branches became thicker, she eventually used heavier rocks to shape the limbs.”
“I remember that one of my chores was to mow the lawn—we had one of those old rotary lawn mowers you had to push. I had to get underneath that tree and try to mow the lawn with all these rocks hanging down from strings. It was my least favorite part of the yardwork.”
When the City came to further develop the land around San Rafael and better accommodate its growing population, the Marumotos learned their cherry was in a perilous spot. “The tree was planted on the street corner of our property. We might have been able to keep it, but the roots were going to be underneath a sidewalk. It wouldn’t have been healthy for the tree. I believe my Aunt Mary suggested that the Garden might be interested in it.”
Kerry is referring to Mary Nakadate, his father’s sister, who was a longtime member of Portland Japanese Garden’s Board of Directors (now named the Board of Trustees) from 1978 to 1994. A respected teacher of ikebana, she also served on the Garden’s now defunct “Women’s Activities Council,” which among other important endeavors led the way on the organization’s 10th anniversary celebration. She was among those members of George’s family incarcerated at Minidoka.
It wasn’t easy for Tana to give the tree away. Kerry feels it’s likely his mother cried to part ways with a creature she had tended to with such care and attention. While Tana may have been saddened to see her tree move, Kerry notes that its placement in Portland Japanese Garden brought her joy.
Remarkable Vision
The two other ways to approach the weeping cherry are by heading north from a path that hugs that outer perimeter of the Flat Garden or by crossing the gravel of the Mount Hood Overlook on the eastern side of the Pavilion. Pathways in Japanese gardens are rarely straight—they bend around plantings that mask what lays beyond. And then, past the apex of curve, a new and stunning sight. The weeping cherry up close looks almost like an ocean wave made of woody limbs crashing over its hozue, or support beams. In spring, the weeping cherry nearly screams in neon pink and insists you stop and remember life’s capacity for spectacular beauty.
Professor Takuma Tono of the Tokyo University is Portland Japanese Garden’s original designer. Like the lineage of Japanese-born garden experts who have maintained and expanded upon his vision, Professor Tono’s intentionality is embedded in the landscape. He approved the addition of the weeping cherry, but on the condition that it be the only of its kind in the Garden because of its highly dramatic blooms. It also interplays with his decision to create two islands in the Flat Garden. Once covered in ruby dianthus flowers, they are now only covered in moss and are symbolic.
“The sake cup and gourd [referring to the mossy islands] always suggest a happy or cheerful mood in this Garden,” Tono wrote in a letter to the Board in the 1960s.* “In Japan, when the spring comes, Japanese people usually go out for cherry viewing. Under the cherry blossoms, we enjoy their beauty but at the same time, drink sake and sing songs. This makes us happy, especially after a long and weary winter. Therefore, the circle suggests a sake cup and the gourd looks like a “bottle” like that which was used in old Japan—they didn’t have [glass bottles] but gourds were handy and could keep sake warm for a relatively long time.”
Related: Read More Thoughts From Professor Tono
Perhaps because its new host showed such obvious care and because she herself was a generous spirit, Tana Marumoto was satisfied with the weeping cherry’s new home. “She loved sharing,” Kerry shares. “She was a very generous woman. I think she appreciated that it found a home where it was enjoyed, respected, and cared for, a place where other people could appreciate it too. I think that [Professor Tono’s] vision on the setting was remarkable.”
Kerry and his family would make repeated visits to the Garden to see their family tree. “I have memories of being a teenager coming here with my mom,” he says. “We always try to visit it in March and April when it was in bloom. But she loved the tree in all seasons.”
A Foreign Culture
Aside from creating an urban oasis of beauty and serenity, the founders of Portland Japanese Garden created a place of cross-cultural understanding. Often, it is perceived as a place where people unfamiliar with Japanese aesthetics, traditions, and values can come to learn about a nation too expensive to travel to for many. But, it has also served a purpose in helping those of Japanese ancestry keep connected with their heritage. “I am Japanese, and my kids grew up in Japan till they were five, ten and 13,” Yuki Wallen, Program Manager for the Japanese Garden Training Center shares. “It is important for me that they do not forget where they come from. Portland Japanese Garden being an immersive experience is essential because they feel the sense of Japan while strolling the gardens—they do not have to be ‘told’ or ‘taught.’”
Kerry shares that he can personally understand this value. There is still much to do to overcome the bigotry those of Japanese ancestry experience today. But the time surrounding World War II, including the years after, were an especially challenging time with many still deeply bitter and wrongly assigning blame to their neighbors, just as American as they, for the wartime actions of a foreign nation. Many of those who were unjustifiably incarcerated and placed in concentration camps** sought to fit in and not call into question their patriotism.
“My childhood was a very conventional American childhood,” Kerry recalls. “I think that’s what my parents’ generation really attempted to do post-incarceration—make their kids as American as possible so they’d be accepted even if the facial features never allowed that. I did things like Boy Scouts.”
“My experience of Japanese culture was every Sunday attending Epworth Methodist Church,” he says, referring to the Portland-based and predominantly Japanese American house of worship. “The Issei [first generation immigrants from Japan] women would make all these delicious dishes for potlucks after services ended. But we didn’t live near many [people of Japanese ancestry].”
“I’ve traveled to Japan a number of times for business. It was the first time I fit into the appearance of the population, though the culture was still foreign to me. I would say my experience of Japan and its culture really opened my ability to experience the Garden in a deeper way. It represents many sides of Japanese culture—quiet beauty, the elegance of architecture, being mindful of how spending time in natural beauty helps the human nervous system.”
Following a career as a marketing executive, Kerry now works in experiential breath work for the purposes of personal exploration and healing from trauma. Portland Japanese Garden’s mission of Inspiring Harmony and Peace is something he’s able to connect to. “You feel peacefulness and harmony when walking through the grounds. If you can cultivate those feelings within in a conscious way, that would hopefully be something you can extend out to the next person you meet, whether they’re a loved one or stranger.”
The Small But Mighty Tana Marumoto
“My mother was only 4’11,” Kerry shares. “I remember that when we had her memorial, we accessed her high school yearbook online. Each student had a little quote. Hers was, ‘Small but mighty.’ Even at a small size and a young age she would break horses bareback.”
“The last time we visited the Garden, her health was declining and she also had early stage Alzheimer’s. We spent some minutes standing there. She couldn’t walk the whole park, she couldn’t do the steep steps anymore, but it was just that last outing for her to see her tree.”
Tana Marumoto passed away on December 4, 2005 at the age of 86. But looking at the kinetic energy of the weeping cherry that bends the way she asked it to, and speaking with Kerry who would often speak of her in the present tense almost 20 years later, it feels inaccurate to say she’s gone. Nobody who gave their care is ever really gone.
“I don’t get back often now,” Kerry concludes. “I don’t have much family there, but every time I come back to Portland, I want to visit. I always spend time with my mom’s tree and I always walk through the entire garden and just enjoy it. I take it in.”
*Thoughts From Tono
While Professor Tono did speak and write in English, his busy schedule often prevented him from editing his letters for grammar and spelling. He once wrote, “…you may find some trouble with my words. Please use your nice imagination.” In that spirit, we have edited his writing for clarity.
**Language Matters
There is no universal agreement on what we call the camps or the process that created them — ‘incarceration,’ ‘internment,’ and ‘concentration’ are a few of the terms that were interchangeably used. While some might find ‘concentration’ misleading because these were not extermination camps, the term predates the Holocaust and is by definition a place where large numbers of people are detained or confined under armed guard. We believe that awareness of the historical import of these words, as well as care in using them, is an important way to respect the collective memory of the victims and grants us greater power to confront injustice and cultivate peace.
“A concentration camp is a place where people are imprisoned, not because of the crimes they committed, but simply because of who they are. During World War II, America’s concentration camps were clearly distinguishable from Nazi Germany’s. Despite the difference, all had one thing in common: that people in power removed a minority group from the general population and the rest of society let it happen.” – Joint Statement by Japanese-American National Museum and the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors at the 1994 exhibition, America’s Concentration Camps: Remembering the Japanese American Experience.