"A Part of Hiroshima in New York" by Ace Preston

Photos

"Shinran Shonin" by Ace Preston | Photo 02

see larger image

uploaded by ACE PRESTON

• 

  uploaded by ACE PRESTON | add comment

• 

  uploaded by ACE PRESTON | add comment

• 

  uploaded by ACE PRESTON | add comment

• 

  uploaded by ACE PRESTON | add comment

• 

  uploaded by ACE PRESTON | add comment

"The Hiroshima Tokuho" published August 6, 1980 reflected on the news collected by 3 reporters and a cameraman who headed toward the hypocenter after the detonation of the atomic bomb. 

Yoshito Matsushige was a news cameraman who took pictures immediately after the bombing 2,270m from the hypocenter west end of Miyuki Bridge about 1100 hrs on August 6, 1945. 

In The Hiroshima Tokuho Mr. Matsushige wrote of his experience:

"...in front of the police box of Senda township located at the west end of Miyuki Bridge, a policeman took off the lid of an oil can and started to give first aid treatment to the people with burns, but the number of the injured increased rapidly. I thought this must be photographed and held the camera in position. The scene I saw through the finder was too cruel. Among the hundreds of injured persons of whom you cannnot tell the difference between male and female, there were children screaming 'It's hot, it's hot!' and infants crying over the body of their mother who appeared to be already dead. I tried to pull myself together by telling myself that I'm a news cameraman, and it is my duty and privilege to take a photograph, even if it is just one, and even if people take me as a devil or a cold-hearted man. I finally managed to press the shutter, but when I looked the finder for the second time, the object was blurred by tears."

At the New York Buddhist Church located between 104th and 105th street Riverside Drive Manhattan New York stands a statue of the Shinran Shonin 1173-1262 who was the founder of the Jodo Shinshu Sect of Buddism. 

The statue depicts Shinran Shonin in his missionary travel robe as he appeared most of his life propagating the doctrine he developed to reveal the one unobstructed way through which one can receive salvation.

The statue had originally stood in Hiroshima 2.5 kilometers northwest from the center of the detonation of the first atomic bomb. It survived the full force of the blast and was brought to New York City September 1955 as a testament to the devastation of the atomic bomb as well as a symbol for hope and world peace.

As ironic as it seems the statue is located a short distance from Pupin Hall Columbia University one of the locations of the Manhattan Project where the Nevis cyclotron was designed.

Also on Riverside Drive Robert Oppenheimer lived at 155 West 88th street on the 11th floor.

On West 20th street off the West Side Highway in Chelsea on it's north side three tall buildings once made up the Baker and Williams Warehouses which held tons of uranium.

At 25 Broadway-the Cunard Building, Edgar Sengier a Belgian had an office who's company mined about 1,200 tons of high-grade uranium ore and stored it on Staten Island in the shadow of the Bayonne Bridge. He suppled 2/3 of all the project's uranium.

At 270 Broadway at Chambers Street southwest corner the Army Corps of Engineers put it's headquarters on the 18th floor for atom research and materials acquisition as well as the building plans for entire cities in Tennessee, New Mexico, and Washington State.

Hiroshima. A spot on the earth. The atomic bomb created an aura.  One doesn't have to travel to Hiroshima to get there. A part of it exists in New York.