Washington Holds a Festival, Maine Names a Princess
WASHINGTON, April 6- This town is infested with tourists, worse than anything seen on Mount Desert in August. Some 700,000 people have descended on the capital from across the country and around the world to take part in the 71 st annual National Cherry Blossom Festival.
One of the best places to see the cherry trees and their blossoms is the Tidal Basin, which the Jefferson Memorial sits beside and which is within walking distance of many of the Smithsonian museums and the Washington Monument. The banks of the large pool are lined with thousands of the trees.
The trees themselves are short, no taller than 20 feet and about as wide. Before the blossoms bloom, they are pink buds. When they open up into the five-leaf flowers they gradually turn white and fall to the ground after a few days.
During the two-week festival, which is set to wrap up on Sunday, there are more tourists than cherry trees lining the Tidal Basin. Some of the tourists are pushing baby carriages, others are snapping pictures and some are taking advantage of the 50 paddle boats that are for rent there, running them into the dock and getting a duck’s eye view of the blossoms.
American families blend with Japanese ones and their next-generation video cameras. There are a lot of Japanese tourists here. The cherry trees-3,000 of them-were a gift from Mayor Yukio Ozaki of Tokyo in 1912.
According to the festival’s Web site, the United States returned the gift in 1915, giving Japan flowering dogwood trees. In 1965, Lady Bird Johnson, the president’s wife, accepted 3,800 more cherry trees.
The two weeks of the festival are sprinkled with events, from a Japanese lantern lighting festival to a parade and to the crowning of the Cherry Blossom Queen.
The queen is chosen from the princesses. Each state is eligible to have a princess, but in reality only states with active state societies in Washington name a princess. Maine has one of the most vibrant state societies, with some 1,000 members in Washington and around the country.
This year’s Maine Cherry Blossom Princess is Melissa C. Danforth of the Berwicks in York County. The 24-year-old lives in Washington, working in the executive office of the president as the deputy associate director of the Office of Strategic Initiatives.
Danforth did not want to talk too much about her experiences working for the President, but she did say that her long title meant that she worked on presidential events and that it was a great experience.
The princess graduated from Northeastern University in Boston in 2004 with a degree in political science. At Northeastern, Danforth was showered with honors and got her first experiences in politics, working for a Massachusetts Senate member and as a research assistant to a health committee in the Irish National Parliament in Dublin.
Danforth said that she was chosen to be the princess after submitting an application with biographical information, a résumé and an essay.
“It’s very exciting,” Danforth said. “I’ve known a variety of past Cherry Blossom Princesses from other states, and their experiences really led me to pursue the possibility.”
Dee Dee Thibodeau Fusco was Maine’s Cherry Blossom Princess in 1981; she was at the state society’s dinner in honor of Danforth on Wednesday at the Officers’ Club in Fort Myer, Va. Fusco lauded the new princess.
“She’s a fabulous representative,” Fusco said. “She’s intelligent, well-spoken and clearly represents the state of Maine in a good way.”
Danforth was honored at the Maine State Society’s dinner, receiving a commemorative plate, a mug and a flower. More than 40 people were there, most from Maine but with a small contingent from the Massachusetts State Society, which piggy-backed onto Maine’s event because their society did not have enough members to host its own.
There was a raffle with such Maine prizes as a six-pack of Poland Spring water, a can of B & M Brown Bread and a bag of redeye beans.
Chris Fortier, a 26-year-old Aroostook County native who is a Virginia contract lawyer, did not win any of the reminders-of-home prizes, but he did enjoy the dinner.
“It’s a fantastic event to honor the state of Maine and the accomplishments its peoples have brought,” he said.
Wayne Hanson, a Bangor native whose mother, Myrna, wrote for the Daily News, said that the Maine State Society has a number of other events throughout the year. In May there is a lobster dinner and a day to clean up Maine sites at Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania. In December they also lay out wreaths at Arlington National Cemetery thanks to a generous gift of more than 4,000 wreaths donated by Morrill Worcester of Harrington over the past 14 years.
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