Hiroshima (The Book)

Title: Hiroshima

Type of book: Non-Fiction

Summary:

The book, Hiroshima, is the story of six individuals who experienced the true effects of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, August 6, 1945. Miss Toshinki Sasaki, a clerk in the East Asia Tin Works factory, just sat down in the plant office and was turning to converse with the girl at the next desk when the bomb exploded. Dr. Masakazu Fujii, a physician, was relaxing on his porch, which overlooked the Kyo River, where he was reading the morning periodical when the shell detonated. Before the eruption, Mrs. Hatsuyo Nakamura was observing her neighbor destruct his house as part of a fire lane in preparation of an American attack. Previous to the attack, Father Wilhelm Kleinsorge, a German priest, was reclined on a cot in the Society of Jesus mission house reading his Stimmen der Zeit. Dr. Terufumi Sasaki, a young surgeon for the Red Cross, was walking along the hospital corridor carrying a blood sample for a Wassermann test when he was thrown off his feet by the discharge. The pastor of the Hiroshima Methodist Church, Reverend Mr. Kiyoshi Tanimoto, was about to unload a cart of clothes at a prosperous associate's house in the suburbs when the flash consumed the structure. All were unaware of the blast considering an all-clear siren had just sounded.

After the bomb had exploded, the six individuals had there own predicament from which to escape from. Miss Sasaki was trapped under the ceiling, books, and bookshelves of the Eat Asia Tin Works factory. Dr. Fujii's house collapsed on top of him leaving Dr. Fujii squeezed between two long timbers in a V-shape across his chest. Luckily, Dr. Fujii had his head protruding out of the Kyo River, but his torso and legs were in the river. Mrs. Nakamura was buried in timber, however lightly because she could free herself. As soon as she was emancipated, she initiated in digging throughout the debris looking for her children. Father Kleinsorge regained consciousness a few minutes after the explosion. Father Kleinsorge did not reminisce how he got out, but the first thing he does evoke is walking around the mission garden in his underwear.

After the initial explosion, dead and wounded remained everywhere, fires reduce buildings to ashes and persist out of control, leaving the city in utter chaos. Dr. Fujii, Father Kleinsorge, and Mr...

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...as heater turned on but not burning. They did everything they could to revive him but he remained comatose. On January 4, he made what seemed to be a remarkable recovery but this lasted only a few days. Then on January 25th he again

lost consciousness and for the next 11 years lived as a vegetable. He died on January 12, 1973.

Kiyoshi Tanimoto began preaching again about a year after the bombing. He did this with four other Protestant ministers on a box where houses once stood. Because there was no building, he soon realized how futile his efforts were. He attempted to restore the church in the city but funds and supplies were limited. In October 1948, he left for San Francisco to raise funds for this new church. Over the next few years, he returned to the U.S. for many speaking engagements. He began to make plans for a peace center. In 1955, he went with the girls to New York for their plastic surgery. He was soon rushed to the West Coast for another fundraising tour. He even appeared on an episode of "This Is Your Life". Tanimoto made 3 more speaking trips to the United States in 1976, 1981, and 1982. He retired from the pulpit in 1982 when he was over seventy years old.