Hiroshima Peace Ceremony

Hiroshima Peace Ceremony

August 6

This ceremony has been held each year since 1947 at the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima, Japan, in memory of the victims of the atomic bomb that devastated the city in 1945. (The day was Aug. 5 in the United States, Aug. 6 in Japan.) It was the first time in history that a weapon of such destruction had been used. The American B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay carried the bomb, called "Little Boy." The day is sometimes called Atomic Bomb Day, but this refers more accurately to the anniversary of the first atomic bomb test on July 16, 1945, at Alamogordo Air Base in New Mexico.
In announcing the bombing, President Harry S. Truman said, "The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East." The immediate death toll was 60,000, at least 75,000 more were injured, and the bomb wiped out more than four square miles—60 percent of the city. One man on the mission described its explosion as a bright, blinding flash followed by a "black cloud of boiling dust" and above it white smoke that "climbed like a mushroom to 20,000 feet." Three days later, on Aug. 9, a second A-bomb, called "Fat Man," was dropped on Nagasaki, razing the center of the city and killing 39,000. On Aug. 15, Japan surrendered, ending World War II.
The peace ceremony is held in the evening, when the city's citizens set thousands of lighted lanterns adrift on the Ota River and prayers are offered for world peace. Other memorial services are also held throughout the world at this time.

CONTACTS:
Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum
1-2 Nakajimama-cho, Naka-Ku
Hiroshima, 730-0811 Japan
81-8-2242-7798; fax: 81-8-2247-2464
www.pef.city.hiroshima.jp/top_e.html

SOURCES:
AmerBkDays-2000, p. 564
AnnivHol-2000, p. 134
DictDays-1988, p. 56
HolSymbols-2009, p. 363

Celebration day: Aug 6