8:15 AM ...

At 8:15AM, August 6, 1945, Hiroshima was vaporized by Little Boy, the first of two atom bombs used against Japan in order to end the war. When reading  John Hershey's extraordinary account of this event from the personal perspectives of people who survived the bombing, one comes away forever shocked and dismayed as to just how quick and devastating this kind of warfare truly is.

Little Boy

I—A Noiseless Flash

As Mrs. Nakamura stood watching her neighbor, everything flashed whiter than any white she had ever seen. She did not notice what happened to the man next door; the reflex of a mother set her in motion toward her children. She had taken a single step (the house was 1,350 yards, or three-quarters of a mile, from the center of the explosion) when something picked her up and she seemed to fly into the next room over the raised sleeping platform, pursued by parts of her house.

John Hersey, 1958,

photographed by Carl Van Vechten

Read Hiroshima in its entirety, it's the right thing to do.