and helen taft, who had actually lived in japan for a while. she had a great appreciation of japanese culture, jumped on the idea so suddenly these two women are partners in this project. so it was very exciting for me to find some documents in my research that i hadn't seen published anywhere else that told me eliza scidmore was the intermediary between mrs. taft and the japanese, who eventually offered to donate several thousand trees to the project. so there were letters that showed where eliza's writing to the the japanese consul in new york city and saying, i just came from a meeting at the white house with mrs. taft, and she would love to accept your offer of these trees. so, of course, if you know the story at all, you know that the first batch of trees came, they were found to be infested. 2000 trees and they ended up destroying the entire batch. they were burned on the grounds of the light of the washington monument, where the usda had had storehouses. but the japanese were gracious. they came back and they said, we will send a replace