The Ancient Art of Bonsai

Bonsai Masters: Ben Oki is admired and in high demand worldwide as a Japanese Garden designer, especially for his use of stones in his compositions.

2012-04-30T13:41:00.001-07:00

Japanese-American Ben Oki was born in Sacramento, California, in 1927. At age six, he moved to Japan, where he learned Japanese landscape and stone techniques. In 1950, Ben returned to the United States after graduating from Matsu Moto Business School, and has managed his entrepreneurship in landscape gardening ever since.

Ben is admired and in high demand worldwide as a Japanese Garden designer, especially for his use of stones in his compositions. Ben's design work includes the garden of screen star Cybil Shepard in Memphis, Tennessee, and others in the Pacific Islands and South America. Ben is a curator of the Bonsai Collections at the Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, California.

Ben studied bonsai under world master John Naka, and has assisted him with demonstrations and meetings. Ben has become one of the internationally known bonsai masters, and takes a key role at conventions by conducting workshops, demonstrations, and critique sessions.

Ben has been growing and teaching bonsai since 1958, specializing in California Juniper. He shares his hands-on experience and expertise in his article, "Collecting California Junipers", published in a British magazine. He is well known for his rugged, freeform style, fine detail work, fast wiring, and skillful tree-splitting techniques.

The Satsuki Society in Los Angeles has awarded Ben "Best in Show" in their bonsai competition for four consecutive years. In 1989, Los Angeles Consul General of Japan Seki Hiromoto honored Ben with a prestigious recognition of his RYU NO MAI "Dancing Dragon", a collected California Juniper. In 1991, the tree became a part of the North American Collection at the National Bonsai and Penjung Museum, United States National Arboretum in Washington, DC. Ben's 35-year old huckleberry is displayed as a part of the Pacific Rim Bonsai Collection of the Weyerhaeuser in Tacoma, Washington.

In Indiana, Cheryl and Charles Owens honored Ben with both the Ben Oki International Design Award and the Ben Oki National Design Award -- the awards for excellence in bonsai design quality -- sponsored by Bonsai Clubs International (BCI) and the American Bonsai Society, respectively.
Since 1984, Ben has been leading "Ben Oki's Japan Bonsai Tour" to visit gardens, nurseries, and pottery shops. Ben escorted the "Bonsai and Suiseki Exhibit and an Extended Tour of Japan" at the 10th BCI World Bonsai Convention tour in 1989.

In 2001, Ben Oki received the Ryokuhaku-Juyukosho (Green and White Achievement Award) from the Agricultural Society of Japan, and in 2003 he recieved the GSBF Circle of Sensei Award.
Ben is a former vice president of the California Bonsai Society, and program chairman of the Satsuki Society. Ben is also an active member of other bonsai organizations, including the American Bonsai Society, the BCI, the Nampu Kai, and the Southern California Chapter of tthe Japanese Satsuki Society.

Ben is also an honorary member of the following organizations:

Alabama Bonsai Society
Hotsprings Bonsai Society (Arizona)
Atlanta Bonsai Society
Kofu Kai
Bonsai Society of Cali (Colombia)
Lincoln Bonsai Society (England, UK)
Brandywine Bonsai Society (Pennsylvania)
Marina Bonsai Club
Coastal Carolina Bonsai Society
Memphis Bonsai Society (TN)
Dungeness Bonsai Society of Sequim, WA
Sansui-Kai of Southern California
Greater Cincinnati Bonsai Society
South African Bonsai Society
Greater Kansas City Bonsai Society
Taguchi Bonsai Club (Vancouver, B.C.)
Bonsai Center Ecuador
Montreal Bonsai Society (Canada)

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Bonsai Masters: Toshiji Yoshimura, The Father of Popular Bonsai in the Non-Oriental World.

2012-04-30T13:37:00.001-07:00

On Feb. 27, 1921, a second son (of eventually twelve children) was born to the family of Toshiji Yoshimura. Toshiji was a leader in the bonsai world and one of the top suiseki authorities in Japan.
He thus would be a founder of the Tokyo Bonsai Club, Nippon Bonsai Cooperative, and Japan Suiseki Association. His father had been a samurai and a renowned garden designer.

In 1924, the eldest son of Toshiji died in childhood, and the family bonsai tradition passed on to the three-year old named Yuji, who would one day leave his mark on the art in many places outside of Japan. That year also saw the founding of Toshiji's Kofu-En ("Garden of the Fragrant Breezes") Bonsai Nursery, located in the southwestern Tokyo suburb of Meguro, with the patronage of the Iwasaki family. By this time little Yuji had begun growing tiny plants in containers. He would often grow young perennials and weeds in containers which his father made him hide from customers in the back areas of the garden. 1

"Japanese five-needle pine, Pinus parviflora, trained in the twin trunk style and exhibited
with wildflowers and dwarf bamboo. This distinctive bonsai display was exhibited by
Toshiji Yoshimura in May 1924, noting his well established style."
(International Bonsai, IBA, 1989/No. 3, pg. 15)
Yuji Yoshimura as a youth studied all the related traditional art forms of bonsai. His father raised him with strict discipline, which would go on to foster his unique personality and integrity. Before going to school every day, for instance, Yuji had to weed the entire bonsai. When he was a teenager, he often roamed the mountains, hills, fields, and lakes of the countryside. The views inspired him to use his father's lessons to compress the realm of nature into a small space. He also studied classical music, the guitar and violin. He later used his music knowledge when he demonstrated bonsai. He also trained in the traditional arts of ikebana (popularly known as "flower arrangement" but, literally, "dancing flowers") and the tea ceremony. He was regularly taken to numerous exhibitions to help set up and dismantle.

Yuji graduated from the Tokyo Horticulture School in 1938 where he had studied bonsai, bonkei, and garden art. His family's Kofu-en Bonsai Nursery occupied him until his career was interrupted by five years of army cavalry service, mostly in China as a lieutenant. Upon termination, he returned to his home in Japan and in 1948 established his own bonsai nursery, separate from his father's. He continued his grandfather's landscape gardening work. Then as one of the founders of the Nippon Young Men's Bonsai Association, he often guided foreigners through exhibits of trees and explained the details of bonsai. He made guide books in English for the Kokufu Bonsai Ten, the National Bonsai Exhibition. (See also this background on Toshiji, Aug 27 listing.)

In December 1951 he met Alfred Koehn, a German diplomat who had spent years in China and Japan and was a well-known author of books on Oriental arts and crafts. Through the interactions with foreigners, Yuji seriously conceived to expand bonsai art into the world. Now, in Japan at the time, neither foreigners nor natives could take a bonsai class. The bonsai industry thought that this was a Japanese art whose arcane details Westerners could never understand, whose techniques they could not master, and whose aesthetics they could not appreciate. The Japanese tradition was for one to become an apprentice under an established master for several years of strict discipline in order to learn all this -- not a short-term proposition. Yoshimura didn't believe such thoughts and decided to open classes for foreigners who lived in Japan. The following April 23, Yoshimura and Koehn collaborated to give demonstrations and the first formal bonsai courses were made available to the public and outsiders. Over six hundred foreign visitors were eventually taught by the pair, among them dignitaries, military personnel, businessmen and their wives. 2

"Alfred Koehn, next to Mr. Yoshimura on his left, is explaining rock planting techniques to
Mr. Yoshimura's students in his course in 1952." (Photo by Yuji Yoshimura)
(International Bonsai, 1998/No. 1, pg. 33)

         Yoshimura also decided to write a comprehensive bonsai book in English. He needed many scientific tests and high quality photos, which led him to a life-long study of photography. At last, in 1957, The Japanese Art of Miniature Trees and Landscapes by Yuji Yoshimura and Giovanna M. Halford was published (Rutland, VT and Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Co.). Halford had been one of his first students and assisted him in English phrasing of the material. Although there had been a few earlier books in English by this time, this was the first really comprehensive and practical work on the subject. It was received with excitement by those who were eager to learn classical bonsai.   (Forty-three years later, the thirty-seventh printing would be made of what some have referred to as the "Bonsai Bible in English." The work has twenty-five color and 245 b&w photos and illustrations.) (See also this background on Halford, Nov 2 listing.) Because of his unconventional practice, Yoshimura was effectively ousted by Japan's bonsai society. No one officially talks about Yuji Yoshimura's achievement, even in today's Japan. 3

         The following year, Yoshimura was invited to come to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden by its director, Dr. George Avery. The young bonsai master had been recommended because of his skill, artistry, enthusiasm, and excellent teaching record. While on the 1959 C. Stuart Gager fellowship grant there, Yoshimura extended his teaching and lecturing beyond the East Coast to also the West Coast and Hawaii. He returned to teach at Longwood Garden near Philadelphia. 4

         About the time Yoshimura began visiting the greater San Francisco area, Toshio Saburomaru and several friends took the series of lessons from this newcomer from Japan. Other students were attracted also. Demonstrating an innate expertise on the subject, Tosh began organizing regular classes at his Menlo Park nursery using the new techniques from Japan, and these led to more extensive workshops, demonstrations and soon a number of clubs in the Bay area.

         In 1960 Yuji Yoshimura spent two months in Australia making a lasting impression, assisting the early teachers and students of the nascent art there, and becoming Patron of one of the bonsai groups. 5
         Yoshimura was then giving weekend classes in the New York/Philadelphia area. A lecture at the Cleveland Art Museum in 1960 included an outdoor exhibition of trees by the teacher and some of his students. This year also saw the importation from Japan of an informal twin-trunk upright Sargent juniper which had been struck from a cutting in 1939 by Yoshimura. And the publication took place of a booklet by his Yoshimura Bonsai Company, Bonsai. What? Why? How? 6

"Fumi and Toshiji Yoshimura [Yuji's parents] in their Kofu-
En Bonsai Garden in July 1961."
(Photo by Yuji Yoshimura)
(International Bonsai, 1998/No. 1, pg. 30)
         In 1962 Yoshimura began to teach classes at the New York Botanical Garden, assisted by Edna L. Kane. 7
         (Also this year, five clubs joined to form the Bonsai Clubs Association of San Francisco Bay Area. The BCA newsletter came out in November issued from Tosh Saburomaru's office mimeograph machine. Yuji Yoshimura is credited with the idea of the newsletter. It once and for all broke down any idea of secrecy in bonsai and departed from "the idea of one bonsai master." It made bonsai an art for everyone with great artists and great teachers in an atmosphere of freedom. Bonsai clubs began to work together and encouraged the formation of others. Connie and Horace Hinds, Jr., who had taken lessons from both Tosh and Yoshimura when he was in the area, assisted editor Robert C. Miller, Jr. on that and subsequent issues.   BCA president in 1964, Horace would be the Editor-in-Chief for eleven years beginning in 1966 for the newsletter's next incarnation, Bonsai, Magazine of Bonsai, Japanese Gardens and Suiseki. And he then continued as Editor Emeritus until his death in 1991.) 8

        At the beginning of 1963, the Bonsai Society of Greater New York was founded by Yuji Yoshimura and thirteen enthusiasts. Jerry Stowell was elected the first president. Within three years there were 555 members, including 339 corresponding members in thirty-one states and several foreign countries. The club's first official show was held that October at the New York Botanic Gardens. 9

        In March 1964 Yoshimura's wife and two daughters came from Japan to join him at his American Nursery in Tarrytown, NY. There he had begun importing containers and some bonsai from Japan and would eventually create over a thousand fine quality bonsai from American stock. Muriel R. Leeds began studying under this teacher. A winner of the Horticultural Award of the Garden Club of America, Leeds was trained as an artist and painter. 10

        The December issue of Horticulture magazine included an article by Yoshimura, "The Meaning of Bonsai." With six b&w photos by the author, it gave some of the Japanese history of the art, basic aesthetics and care. 11

        (Tosh Saburomaru served as educational advisor to Lane Books Co. on the Sunset Bonsai illustrated paperback. The book's first printing in March 1965 of 17,500 copies sold out in a month, and six thousand more copies sold in the next few months, the most successful of the magazine's eighteen low-priced gardening books. The tenth printing was made in April 1970).
        The growing interest in bonsai received mention in a January 1966 Wall Street Journal article. By this time there were over twenty clubs in the U.S., half of them started in just the previous three years. Yoshimura's Tarrytown, NY nursery is quoted as offering fully trained trees from $3.50 to $3,000. 12
        Also this year, the Yoshimura Bonsai Company published the fifty page Bonsai Album: In Memory of Six Years in New York.

        (In June 1967, members of the Bonsai Society of Greater New York, seventeen of which had participated in a two week Spring study tour of bonsai in Japan, helped found the American Bonsai Society in Cleveland, Ohio. By the end of the first year, there were ninety-nine individuals and fifteen clubs as charter members. Jerry Stowell was elected its first president.) 13
        (In January 1968 "Bonsai Clubs International" was officially adopted to replace "Bonsai Clubs Association" due to many inquiries from English-speaking countries and associations with members outside of the U.S. Jim Ransohoff -- a student under Peter Sugiwara, Tosh, John Naka, and Yuji Yoshimura -- was elected president of the improved organization. Over 1,100 copies of the Dec/Jan 68 issue of the BCI magazine Bonsai would be distributed.) 14
        As conventions and exhibits became popular, Tosh Saburomaru and Yuji Yoshimura began to be frequent demonstrators and lecturers from Sebastopol to Fresno, California. 15
       The eleven page Bonsai in Sydney booklet by E.N. Marshall in 1970 (Ingleburn, N.S.W.: Combined Bonsai Groups of Sydney) included an article by Yoshimura.
        In the summer of 1971 Yoshimura led a bonsai tour of Japan.
        The following year the first joint convention by BCI and ABS was held in Kansas City, MO. Some four hundred persons attended the July 13-16 event. With an official theme of "Learning Together," the guest artists were Yuji Yoshimura and Toshio Kawamoto, the major promoter of saikei, natural tray landscapes using less developed trees than required by bonsai and which could be enjoyed by a wider audience.
        During this year, Yoshimura delivered a lecture in which he spoke of the "dream of American bonsaists for a place where they could give or will their treasures, knowing that the trees would be cared for and viewed by visitors for years to come." Newly appointed Director of the U.S. National Arboretum Dr. John L. Creech was in attendance. (He had been a frequent visitor to Yoshimura's Tokyo garden in the early 1950s and was actually the one who had recommended the bonsai authority to Dr. Avery of the BBG.) Impressed by his old friend's thoughts and the fledgling Potomac Bonsai Association's first show at the National Arboretum, Dr. Creech then approached his departmental heads with the suggestion that acquiring a major bonsai collection might play a roll in the Department of Agriculture's bicentennial plans. Receiving encouragement, Dr. Creech sought the help of longtime friends in the world of Japanese horticulture.
        In August 1972 the first English edition of the Japan Bonsai Society's Nippon Bonsai Taikan (Grand View of Japanese Bonsai and Nature in Four Seasons) was published. The ninety page English book, translated by Yuji Yoshimura and Samuel H. Beach, included a small b&w photo of each original color one in the 352-page Japanese edition, along with a rendering of most of the text.
        That year Yoshimura sold his Tarrytown nursery for development. He re-located his nursery and the Yoshimura School of Bonsai about five miles to the northeast in Briarcliff Manor, NY. 16
        (On Aug. 27, 1975, Toshiji Yoshimura died at the age of 83. Yuji's brother, Kanekazu, became proprietor of Kofu-En and was active in the Nippon Bonsai Association and Nippon Suiseki Association.)
        The first Australian National Bonsai Convention and Show was held between October 31 and November 2, 1975. The Guests of Honor were John Naka and Yuji Yoshimura.
        Between September 1975 and December 1976, Yuji Yoshimura conducted a series of six one afternoon constructive critique sessions for members of the Yama Ki Bonsai Society at the Bartlett Arboretum in Stamford, CT. There was a single topic for each of the days.
        On July 17 and 18, 1976, a special exhibition honoring twenty-five years of instruction by Yuji Yoshimura was held at his School of Bonsai. The featured trees for this came from the Muriel R. Leeds Collection. A Commemorative Album would be issued the following year with over a hundred photos showing many trees over the course of ten years of development. 17

The National Bonsai Collection Guidebook
was edited by John Naka and Yuji Yoshimura in 1977.
       Yoshimura assisted his student William N. Valavanis, a teacher in his own right, in launching the premier issue in the Spring of 1979 of the quarterly International Bonsai.   The elder sensei also translated its first article -- "Creation of Small Size Satsuki Azalea Bonsai" -- from the Japanese magazine source.
       At the joint BCI-ABS Convention from July 4 to 8 in New York City, Yuji Yoshimura, John Naka, and Frank Okamura were the guest artists. Okamura had been the Brooklyn Botanic Garden's curator and teacher of bonsai for nearly thirty years.
        In 1982 Yoshimura conducted a teaching tour for the bonsai clubs in India.
        A few years earlier, Yoshimura had been talking with Dr. Creech and others about the idea of building upon the Japanese collection. In a letter to bonsai teacher Marion Gyllenswan, he stated "...it really calls for an independent body of bonsai authorities to look at the overall situation with private collections of heirloom quality and develop some kind of a plan for their preservation, either as part of a national collection orby local public institutions." The result was the formation in 1982 of the National Bonsai Foundation, Inc., a non-profit corporation in Washington, D.C. on behalf of the National Bonsai and Penjing Museum of the National Arboretum. John Naka, Yuji Yoshimura, and now former Arboretum Director Dr. John L. Creech were elected as advisors to the Foundation. Mrs. Gyllenswan became its first president. 18

"Three bonsai masters enjoying the banquet at the Mid-Atlantic Bonsai Festival in April
1983 in North Bergen, New Jersey. Left to right -- Yuji Yoshimura, Frank Okamura,
Japanese gardener & bonsai curator at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and John Y. Naka
from Los Angeles, California"
(International Bonsai, IBA, 1998, No. 1,pg. 38)
In 1984 The Japanese Art of Stone Appreciation, Suiseki and Its Use with Bonsai was published by Charles E. Tuttle Co. The authors were Vincent T. Covello and Yuji Yoshimura. (The Spanish and Italian translations would be published in 1994 and a Polish one would see print in 2004!)
        Yuji Yoshimura gave a demonstration and a workshop at the fourth annual Mid-Atlantic Bonsai Festival on April 25 and 26, 1987. The event for eight local clubs was held in North Haven, CT.
        The John Y. Naka Pavilion was dedicated in October 1990 to house the National Collection of North American Bonsai. Connected to the Naka Pavilion is the Yoshimura Center housing a lecture and workshop room. Two of Yoshimura's bonsai are in the National Collection. 19

Photograph from The New York Times, Oct. 5, 1990 by Jim Estrin with the caption:
"A Touch of the East Comes to the Bronx -- Yuji Yoshimura, a master of the ancient Japanese art of bonsai cultivation, tending the New York Botanical Garden's exhibit of the dwarf trees. The five-day exhibit, which opened yesterday, will include lectures and instruction for novice bonsai enthusiasts."
(Copy given to Phoenix Bonsai Society charter member Alice Feffer)
        The Second World Bonsai Convention, "New Horizons," was held in Orlando, FL from May 27 to 31, 1993 in conjunction with the BCI and ABS conventions. Saburō Katō, John Y. Naka and Yuji Yoshimura headlined for the over seven hundred delegates who attended.
        From November 3 to 6, 1994, a joint BCI/GSBF convention took place in San Jose, CA. (The Golden State Bonsai Federation had been founded in 1978 and its conventions alternated between northern and southern sites in the state.) Guests of honor were John Naka, Toshio Saburomaru, and Yuji Yoshimura. Enthusiasts attending were also from nine countries and territories outside the U.S. 20
        In early March 1995, Yuji Yoshimura suffered a mild stroke while on lecture tour to North Carolina. Improving after a short hospital stay and discharged to his daughter's care near Boston, near month end he suffered a major stroke. On April 3, he successfully underwent neurosurgery to clean out a 95% blocked main artery. The following week he had surgery on the other artery which was 85% blocked. By May 6 he was well enough to attend a demonstration at the New England Bonsai Garden. 21
        (In April 1996, Toshio Saburomaru passed away.)

"Bernard Gastrich, President of the Yama Ki Bonsai Society, with Mr. Yoshimura at his
testimonial dinner in September 1997." (Photo by Adam Hume)
(International Bonsai, 1998/No. 1, pg. 44)
        On Christmas Eve, 1997, bonsai master Yuji Yoshimura passed away.
        The National Bonsai Foundation, Inc. established the Yuji Yoshimura Fund as a permanent endowment to keep this great artist's spirit alive for future generations. 22
        Having lived in the Western world for over thirty-five years, he had personally observed the differences in the Eastern and Western cultures as reflected by their arts. Although his students had been primarily of the United States, he taught classical bonsai to thousands of students worldwide. In that Yuji Yoshimura was a Japanese bonsai artist who lived outside of Japan for such a long span of years, he became a direct link between Japanese classical bonsai traditions and the progressive Western approach. The result was an elegant and refined school of bonsai adapted for the modern world. 23

For further information, you are cordially invited to order the 1988/No. 1 issue of International Bonsai magazine which includes William N. Valavanis' "Yuji Yoshimura, A Memorial Tribute To A Bonsai Master & Pioneer" (pp. 29-44). This detailed, wonderful biography is illustrated with forty-seven b&w photos and can serve as a complement to this web page (and vice versa). Valavanis also composed "A Memorial Tribute" which was published in the North American Bonsai Foundation Newsletter No. 3, http://web.archive.org/web/20071022024253/www.bonsai-wbff.org/nabf/newsletter3/yoshimura.htm. See also this story.

NOTES
1 Golden Statements, Golden States Bonsai Federation, September/October, 1994, pp. 23-24; Valavanis, William N. "Yuji Yoshimura, A Memorial Tribute To A Bonsai Master & Pioneer," International Bonsai, IBA, 1998/No. 1, pp. 29-30.
At age 84 in 1974 [sic], Toshiji would recall "having sold the U.S. Ambassador to Japan som young bonsai when he was about 20 years old. The family nursery was then located in the Chiba District [on the east side of the Bay] of Tokyo." The date would have been about 1910 -- Larz Anderson was appointed ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to Japan in November 1912 by Republican President William H. Taft. Anderson resigned the following March with the change in administration (Democratic Pres. Woodrow Wilson). After his post, Anderson bought at least forty trees from the Yokohama Nursery Company, on the west side of Tokyo Bay. These first significant bonsai in the U.S. reached his home in Brookline, Massachusetts on March 6. Was Toshiji involved in some part of that sale? Per Hinds, John "A Greenhorn's View of the Japanese Bonsai World, Part II" Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XIII, No. 5, June 1974, pg. 23; also, Bonsai Book of Days Feb. 7 and April 13; "A Talk on Masterpiece Bonsai and Master Artists, No. 16 - Toshiji Yoshimura (1891-1975) - Kofu-en," Kinbon magazine, October 2011, pp. 44-47, English translation kindly provided to RJB in personal e-mails from William N. Valavanis 12 and 13 Nov 2011; "Great People: Sacrifice and Achievement: Yuji Yoshimura, The First Bonsai Instructor in the U.S.[sic]," The Chicago Japanese American News, Jan. 1, 2012, Vol. 5881, pg. 9.
2     Dillon, Jim "Sokumenzu -- Profile of Yoshimura," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XI, No. 6, July/August 1972, pg. 6; "Great People: Sacrifice and Achievement: Yuji Yoshimura" article, pg. 9; Koehn, Alfred Bonkei: Japanese Tray Landscapes; Tokyo: Foreign Affairs Association of Japan; 1955, pp. 2, 35; Golden Statements, GSBF, September/October, 1994, pg. 24; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pp. 30-32; a personal e-mail to RJB from Christopher T. Adcock, Jan. 14, 2004 mentioned that Mr. Adcock's grandfather had taken the class in the Spring of 1956. Mr. Adcock was gracious enough to share a .pdf of the class flyer, which we have linked above.
3 Golden Statements, GSBF, September/October 1994, pg. 24; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 33.
4      Smith, Jean C. "I.B.C. '83 Bonsai Horizon Headliners," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XXII, No. 5, June 1983, pp. 159-160; Dillon's article, pg. 6; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 34; Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XXXII, No. 3, May/June 1993, pg. 6; International Bonsai Digest Bicentennial Edition, Juyne M. Tayson, Editor and Publisher, 1976, pg. 36.
5      Kosh, Davina "Among the Greatest Joys of Bonsai," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. IX, No. 2, March 1970, pg. 7; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 35, has the date as 1962.
6      Yoshimura, Commemorative Album: The Muriel R. Leeds Collection; Briarcliff Manor: NY: Yoshimura School of Bonsai; 1977. Pp. 12, 48, with four b&w photos of juniper on page 20.   Limited edition of 500 copies.
7      Yoshimura, Leeds, pg. 64; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 35, comments that this "continued until 1994 with the exception of a few years due to illness."
8 Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XI, No. 5, July/August 1972, pg. 22, and Vol. XXXII, No. 6, November/December 1993, pp. 23-24.
9      Dillon's article, pg. 6; Willse, James P. "Bonsai, or Miniature Trees, Become a Fad: Fans Grow Their Own or Pay Up to $3,000," Wall Street Journal, January 4, 1966, pg. 9, states that there were eighteen founding members; Bonsai Journal, American Bonsai Society, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 15-16; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 35, states that "In February 1963 seven of Mr. Y's serious students gathered at his nursery to organize..."; Stowell, Jerald P. Bonsai: Indoors and Out ; Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc. 1966, b&w photo pg. 107;
10     Yoshimura, Leeds, pg. 64; Young, Dorothy S. "History of Bonsai East" in International Bonsai Digest presents Bonsai Gems, Fall 1974, pp. 91-92.
11     Yoshimura, "The Meaning of Bonsai," Horticulture, December 1964, pp. 16+
12    Willse's article, pg. 9;
13     Stowell, Jerald P. The Beginner's Guide to American Bonsai ; Tokyo: Kodansha International, Ltd.; 1978, pg. 7; Bonsai Journal, ABS, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 3-5, Vol. 1, No. 3, pg. 13, and Vol. 21, No. 2 , Summer 1987, pg. 2.
14 Golden Statements, GSBF, July/August 1994, pp. 36-37; Land, Dorothy "Celebrating 35 Years of Progress," Bonsai, BCI, Vol. XXXII, No. 4, July/August 1993, pg. 29, states that in November 1967 the renaming occurred.
15 Golden Statements, GSBF, September/October 1994, pg. 23.
16     "How It All Began," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XXXV, No. 4; July/August 1996, pg. 24; Valavanis' "Memorial Tribute," pg. 34; Yoshimura, Leeds, pg. 64.
17     Personal e-mail from William N. Valavanis to RJB on Feb. 12, 2006; Bonsai Journal, ABS, Vol. 10, No. 2, Summer 1976, pg. 40; Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XV, No. 3, pg. 67; Yoshimura, Leeds, pg. 61; Editor's Note in Yoshimura, Kanekazu "Methods of Bonsai Display nd Appreciaitton," International Bonsai, 19898/No. 3, pg. 12.
18     "How It All Began," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XXXV, No. 4; July/August 1996, pg. 26; Dannett, Emanuel "The National Bonsai Foundation," Bonsai Magazine, BCI, Vol. XXII, No. 3, April 1983, pg. 81.
19     Valavanis, William N. "Profile of an Artist," Bonsai Journal, ABS, Vol. 32, No. 1, Spring 1998, pp. 8-9.
20 Golden Statements, GSBF, November/December 1994, pg. 5.
21     1995 Internet posting
           Date: Tue, 23 May 1995 14:09:05 -0500, from Rick Raygor
            <raygor@TIES.K12.MN.US> which gave this news per Thu, 6 Apr 1995, INT BONSAI;
             rec.arts.bonsai Article 11214, dated Mon., 8 May 1995 07:29:15 EDT, from Gary Bolstridge
             (Newport, RI Bonsai Club) <gary@GAROPA.NPT.NUWC/NAVY.MIL> .
22    Valavanis' "Profile" article, pg. 9.
23     Paraphrased past tense from Golden Statements, GSBF, September/October 1994, pp. 24-25.

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International Bonsai Events.

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This page is designed to list your clubs annual show or a unique event that you want published.

If you want to add details of the special event you want published click on this link and complete the form.
1 2014, BCI, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Australia
2 2013, June, 7-9, Rochester, USA
3 2013, April 13 - 14, BCI - Yangzho, China
4 2012,November, 28-2 December, Makati - Philippines
5 2012 November 23 - 26, Vadodara, India
6 2012,November, 3- 4,Louisiana - USA
7 2012, November, Kansai, Japan
8 2012, November , Tokyo - Japan
9 2012, October 6, Lake Charles, USA
10 2012, October 4 - 7, Grantville,- USA
11 2012, September,17-23 , Crespi - Italy
12 2012, September, 14 - 23, Milan, Italy
13 2012,September,14-16,Portland - USA
14 2012, September,14-16 , Vancouver - Canada
15 2012, September 8 - 9, Brisbane - Australia
16 2012, August,17-19 ,Glenco – USA

17 2012, August 11 - 12, Nashville, USA
18 2012, June, 21-24 ,Denver - USA
19 2012, June, 16-17, Chardon - USA
20 2012, June 15 - 17, Denver, USA
21 2012, June, 9 - 10, Rochester, USA
22 2012, June, 9 - 10, Ohio, USA
23 2012, June 1 - 2,New Orleans, USA
24 2012 - May 30 - June 3, Malaysia
25 2012, May, 24-28, Orlando - USA
26 2012, May,18 - 21, Melbourne - Australia
27 2012, May,18-20, Glencoe - USA
28 2012, May,11 -20, Grand Rapids- USA
29 2012, May,11-13, Slovenia
30 2012, May,5, Fort Walton Beach - USA
31 2012, May 4 - 6, Arco (Trentino) - Italy
32 2012, May, 4-6 , Washington - USA
33 2012, March 25 - June 25, Paris - France - Chinese Scholar's rocks

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