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When A Man Survived Two Atomic Bombs · Ebbs of History

• Jason: Welcome to the Ebbs of History, the show where we dive into the strangest, wildest, and sometimes downright creepiest stories the past has to offer. From dancing plagues to pirate queens, you'll laugh, you'll gasp, you'll even groan at my impeccable dad jokes. But most importantly, you'll learn how history is way cooler than your textbook ever told you. We your history loving hosts, Zoe, Gavin. And I'm Jason, and in every episode the three of us will take a quick trip through time and see what lessons we can still learn today. This is the Ebbs of History. A quick heads up before we begin. Today's story is about the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War Two. We will talk about war, serious injuries, and loss of life And we will do it with care and respect. If you're a younger listener, this might be a good one to listen to alongside a grown up. Yeah, Hayden. I'm just joking. I'm leaving that in. yeah. he's been wanting me to do this. Shout out Hayden for my friends and number one listener. Number one listener, that's right. So how's everybody doing? Good. Yesterday we saw the Hades Home Pro shot. Yeah. And it was so good. Good. It was a really good it was probably like one of the best. I've seen it. Yeah. Despite it being one of my favorite musicals, like I've never like seen it. Like I've never watched like a bootleg on YouTube. I wanted to like reserve it for when I go see it or this. And it's the one, the soundtrack doesn't do it justice. And two, you it's a whole different story wick with the sets, with the lights, with the sound. Like it's a it's its own Character. Character. The lighting and the set design is its own character. For sure. I love it. See, when you two were listening to it on the way to school those couple days, like I was kinda listening, but I wasn't listening. But like even with that, like, god, it was just so much better with the sets and seeing who what characters which is just Zoe, what did I say after I listened to it? I wasn't that impressed by the soundtrack. Yeah. When we when I first listened to it. I mean it was okay. Yeah. I started sending you videos on Instagram. And then you're And really wanted to see it and I and I said, I bet you this would be better if I were to see what was going on. There's things that are not on the soundtrack, but they're in the actual show. Yeah. And that i it connects the songs to each other. Yeah. Which made it so much more enjoyable. And then the silences they put in as well. Yeah. Because you can't put silences in soundtracks. I'm like, you can, but you It's not your gripping. And in those silences, I was just like on the edge of my seat, like, my God, that was like because they would place them they're placed in places that were very emotional. Mm-hmm. And so you had this emotional build up and then silence for an extended amount of time and it just it you just sit there and you linger with that emotion that had been built up. I loved it. I absolutely know the story. We all know the story of Orpheus Neuryssey, but it's just it's so different 'cause the show inherently has a loop where like each time it's like, We're gonna do it again. It might ha it might turn out different this time. Will it will it happen this time? We don't know. Yeah, that's one of the themes of it, yeah. Is but I don't know, it's just it's a different experience every time you're listening to it because of that. And the first song it just comes out with a bang. Like that was like one of the best songs on the soundtrack. Yeah, that's it just got me pumped up. It's a banger. It really is. It's a good opener. It's one of the better openers. Just that trombone, the muted trombone. I loved it. I really did. I knew I would. Yeah. But And then like I I forgot to say this last time we were recording, But we saw the Odyssey. We saw the Hayes Town Pro Shot and we also watched the first two Batmans. Christian Bale Batmans. Yeah. Yes. god. Such all all of those movies. Banger. Banger. Banger after banger. Banger. Banger. my god. It's been a good week for movies. Yeah. And we're probably gonna go next week and go see Spider Man. Yeah. yeah, that's kind of Spider Man. I'm really excited for that. The movies are on a generational run. Well no, it's just called summer, so it it it just feels like the world came back to life. All right, there you Yeah. All right. Today we meet Sutomo Yamaguchi, a young engineer whose worst business trip in history put him in two cities on two of the darkest days of the twentieth century. It is a story about terrible luck, astonishing survival, and a man who turned pain into a plea for peace. was his name again? Yamaguchi. Sutomu, which is spelled T-S-U-T-O-M-U. Last name Yamaguchi Y A A G U C H I He's 29 Years Old So, he's an engineer for Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and he designs oil tankers, those gigantic ships that carry fuel across the ocean. And in the summer of nineteen forty-five Near the end of World War II, his company sent him on a three-month business trip to a city called Hiroshima. Well, August 6th, 1945 was finally supposed to be Yamaguchi's last day. His bags were packed. He was headed to the train station dreaming of seeing his wife Hisoko and their baby son. And then he did something that every single one of us has done. He forgot something. Gabin. Take a guess. What do you think he forgot that changed this man's entire life? Hm. So he was going like to the airport, right? Train station, but yeah. Train station to airport. and he forgot something. It see I feel like it's either something super uber important or something like a souvenir. You know? Like, it's two extremes and it's not the middle. Okay. Well, it was his hanko spelled H A N K O. A hanko is a personal name stamp That people in Japan used to sign documents. Sort of like a signature that you can hold in your hand. That's actually kinda useful. It's useful but replaceable. Right? And yeah, I get it. If I forgot it, I would go back and get it too, but it changed his life. Yeah. That's the crazy See he could never predict what was gonna happen, you know. Yeah. Yamaguchi had left it back at the office, so he turned around to go get it. That little detour That one forgotten stamp is where our whole story turns. Worst business trip in the history of business trips. At eight fifteen in the morning he was walking near the docks when he looked up and he saw a plane. An American B twenty nine bomber, and two small parachutes drifting down from it. Then came a flash. Yamaguchi later described it as a flash of magnesium. A great flash in the sky, And it knocked him clean off of his feet. The United States had dropped the first atomic bomb ever used in war. A uranium bomb nicknamed Little Boy on the city of Hiroshima. Yamaguchi was about three kilometers away, a little under two miles from the center of the blast. Think about that. And he's Sara. He's a just under two miles away from It's a it's it's up in the sky. It they 'cause they explode it when it's still up in the sky because that causes the most damage. And it knocked him off his feet two miles away. That's crazy. Mhm. Now this is the part where I have to slow down and be serious because this is not a funny part. An atomic bomb is not like a regular explosion. In a single instant, tens of thousands of people in Hiroshima lost their lives. And the heat and light were beyond anything the world had ever seen. That's just like it's heart wrenching every time I hear it. Yeah. Like I don't think it'll ever not be, you know. Yamaguchi lived, but he was badly burned on one side of his body. His eardrums were ruptured, and for a while he couldn't see. Imagine how frightening it would be to not even understand what had just happened to the entire city. Nobody on the ground even knew what an atomic bomb was yet. In fact, the closest known survivor of the Hiroshima bomb was a man named Aizo Namura, who happened to be down in a basement of a strong concrete building only about a hundred and seventy meters from the center. my god. Or about six hundred feet. He was six football fields. No. Yeah. That's not right. No, that was a yards. Two? No. Two. Tree. Three. Tree. I don't know. No, two. Six hundred feet. Three two. Two two football fields. Yes. That that's crazy. Of the thirty-seven people working in that building, he was the only one who survived. He lived all the way into his eighties, passing away in nineteen eighty-two. Sometimes survival came down to something as simple as which room a person was standing in at the time. Here's something strange and in its own quiet way hopeful. In Hiroshima it was said that nothing would grow for seventy five years. But the very next spring, oleander flowers bloomed in the scorched earth, and certain trees, including tough old ginkgo trees, sent up green shoots from their burn trunks. Today, those survivor trees even have their own name in Japanese Hibaku Jumoku. And many still grow in the city. The oleander became so beloved as a source of strength and hope that Hiroshima later made it the city's official flower, alongside the camphor as the city tree. Yeah. There outside of my school, outside of the main office, there's a little sapling in the ground and it's a tree from I can't remember if it was from Hiroshima or if it was from Nagasaki, but it was from one of the two and it's a little sapling out there. And it's and it's protected by a little fence. And we went out and saw it in history class in freshman year. And it's really, really cool. I never noticed that. Yeah. Next time I'm there I'm gonna have to go look for it. Where it's what office is in here? It's out the main office. Near the main office? Okay. It's in that grass field. It it kinda blends in. it's like if you know about it. Is it inside or outside the gate? It's outside the gate. Outside the gate, okay. Alright, we gotta take a special trip over there then. I'll take a picture next time over there. That's cool. I didn't know that. Yeah. Or it's from some I think it was from one of the bombings though. And it survived and it's here now. And it's really cool. I think it is, 'cause you talking about this reminded me of it. And we went on a little field trip out there and we went to sa see it after we learned about these bombings and we saw it and we all just stood there and we were all like this is so cool. in much male madness, in my sixth grade year, one of the contestants was the Ginkgo tree. And it made it all the way to the final. There you go. Do you understand that a little bit better now? Yeah. Yeah. god, a polar bear barely beat it. But I mean, it getting that far has to be a symbol Yeah, absolutely. That's what it is. It's a symbol of strength and hope. All right, back to Yamaguchi. Wounded and wrapped in bandages, he found two of his co workers. Akira Iwanaga and Kunyoshi Sato, who had also survived. They spent a night in the air raid shelter and the next day they made their way to the station and boarded a train. Where do you think the train was carrying them? Nagasaki Nagasaki. To his hometown, a city called Nagasaki. god. It's like what are the chances? You know? I'll go over that later, actually. There's probably like hundreds of cities in Japan and the two that he goes to or the two that they bombed. And not only that, there's a little twist at the end that I can't wait for you to hear. Yamaguchi got home, saw a doctor, and even though he was covered in burns and bandages, he did something that tells you a lot about the per type of person he was. On August 9th, just three days after living through an atomic bomb, he went back to work. He wanted to do his job. Wow. There he was in his Mitsubishi office, trying to explain to his boss what he had seen. And his boss didn't believe him. His boss basically told him he had gone a little crazy. Because how could one single bomb destroy an entire city? Honestly, at that time I would be in the same shoes as the boss. Because news doesn't travel that fast. News doesn't travel that fast. I mean they heard of it, but like they didn't really have a grasp on the destruction that it had caused at that point. 'Cause this is only three days later. Yeah. And, you know, we have the opportunity to look back and see what it had it had done to both of these cities well at the time, just the one city. You know, and so we have a picture in our mind. And if someone were to tell me today, like if that hadn't happened, if someone were to tell me today that someone, you know, bombed Los Angeles and the entire city is gone, I would not believe them. Yeah. But that's exactly what happened. Yeah. It's just It's just a crazy enough statement where you don't believe it. Yes. Yeah, and it's honestly kinda just grief, kinda like the stages of grief, like denial. Yeah, that's right. You're denying it. It's not we're like, no, that doesn't that didn't happen. Like what are you talking about? It's like valid denial, you know? Yeah. He wasn't saying that it didn't happen. You know, because obviously there's Yamaguchi and he's got you know, bandages on his face and like he he wasn't denying that it happened. He was just denying that it caused that much destruction. Yeah. Which is understandable. Mm-hmm. Yeah. While he's having a conversation with his boss. about how impossible it is. At that exact moment, at eleven two in the morning, the sky lit up again. The same white light, the United States had dropped the second atomic bomb, a plutonium bomb this time nicknamed Fat Man, on Nagasaki. Yamaguchi later said, I thought the mushroom cloud had followed me from Hiroshima. He dropped to the floor as the windows shattered. Once again he was about three kilometers from the center. And once again, against all odds, he survived. Now you may read dramatic versions of this story that say Yamaguchi was protected inside a special stairwell that split the blast the way the front of a boat splits water. That vivid detail comes mostly from one book that was later pulled by its publisher for relying on an unreliable source. So we will not treat that as a certainty that it happened. What we can say for sure is he was in his office roughly three kilometers away and he walked out alive a second time. How how much do you kilometers and just under two miles. Two times from yeah. Wow. Villa Huh. Was this man the luckiest person alive or the unluckiest? People have argued about that for years, and we will come back to it. Now for one of the strangest twists in the whole story, and it's not even about Yamaguchi. The second bomb was not originally meant for Nagasaki at all. Did you guys know that? I think I did. The main target that day was a different city called Kokura. But when the American plane arrived over Kokura, the city was hidden under clouds and smoke, so the crew could not see their target. They circled, ran dangerously low on fuel, and finally gave up and flew to their backup target instead. That backup was Nagasaki. In Japan there is now a phrase, the luck of Kokura, which means escaping a terrible fate without ever knowing how close it actually came. Think about that. A patch of cloud in the sky helped decide which city was spared and which city suffered. Yeah. That's just crazy. The luck. The luck of Kokura. Yeah. That's why they call it that. Here's another small, sad but fascinating detail. The survivors who traveled from Hiroshima to Nagasaki carried knowledge with them. They had learned that after the blinding flash came a punishing blast wave, a bit like how thunder follows lightning. Some Nagasaki families who listened to those Hiroshima survivors dove for cover the very instant they saw the second flash, and that knowledge help save their lives. After the war, Yamaguchi's life was hard, but it was also, in many ways, remarkable. He worked as a translator for the American occupation forces, which is a pretty amazing thing when you stop to think about it. Then he became a teacher. And later he went right back to designing ships at Mitsubishi. He and his wife Hisako decided to have more children, even in a time when no one knew what radiation might do to a family. And that took real courage. For most of his life, Yamaguchi stayed quiet about being a double survivor. He did not want to make a fuss, and he felt that it would be unfair to the people who were far sicker than he was. But as he grew older, his heart changed. He began to write poetry, gentle short poems called Tonka, and he started to speak out. He even traveled to the United Nations in New York to ask the world to get rid of nuclear weapons. He once said the reason he hated the atomic bomb was quote because of what it does to the dignity of human beings. In March of 2009, when he was ninety two, the Nagasaki government added his Hiroshima experience to his official records. Making him the only person that their government formally recognized as a survivor of both atomic bombs. Really? The only one that they recognized. And there might have been more. There is. At least one hundred and sixty five people are known to have lived through both, though some estimates run lower, and Yamaguchi is the single one that his government actually officially recognized. He said, quote, My double radiation exposure is now an official government record. it can tell the younger generation the horrifying history of the atomic bombs even after I die, end quote. Sutomo Yamaguchi passed away on January 4, 2010, at the age of ninety-three. I will share one more thing and I want us to handle it with respect. After Yamaguchi died, a British comedy quiz show called him the unluckiest man in the world and made jokes about his story. His daughter was hurt, and she spoke up, saying the world still does not truly understand the horror her father lived through. The show's network later issued a formal apology. It's fine to feel wonder and even amazement at a survival story. But we never laugh at the suffering itself. Right? Yeah. it's kind of like how we don't make jokes about nine eleven. it's something that just it's it's off limits. Like Yeah. Nobody know like I I feel like everybody generally knows that like that's just something you just don't joke about. It's not well no, there there are jokes about nine eleven, but you're it there are no jokes about the suffering that happened or the victims of Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We can be amazed by Yamaguchi the person while treating what happened to those two cities with all the seriousness that it deserves. Same with nine eleven. Yeah. That's that that's just the first thing where it's like peop people know you don't talk about it in you You're very delicate with the situation. Yeah. It's it's no like j you're not you're not just throwing jokes around about it, you know. It's in bad taste. It's it's classless. Yeah. Historiography How do we know all of this? Yamaguchi told his own story in newspaper interviews, in a memoir, and in his poetry. And he was filmed for documentaries. So we have his words in his own voice. That is historical gold. Still, we have to read carefully. One popular English book about double survivors, called The Last Train from Hiroshima. was withdrawn by its publisher in twenty ten after it turned out to rely on a person who faked his story. So some dramatic details you find online should be treated as read legend rather than fact. Numbers vary too. Sources say at least one hundred and sixty-five people are known to have lived through both bombings, with some estimates lower. Yet Yamaguchi is the only one Japan officially recognized. Even casualty counts differ from source to source because records were destroyed and radiation kept claiming lives years afterward. Good history means holding the confirmed facts firmly and the shaky ones a little bit looser. Lessons we've learned today. So what can we carry with us from Sutomo Yamaguchi? I feel like we've kind of talked about them. Like specifically, like I have started like be very delicate with situations because that's somebody's experience like that actually happened to somebody. Like it may be so f fascinating out of this world to you, but to someone that's just their life. That's their life story. That's just something that happened to them on a random Tuesday in August. Yeah. Always be careful with what you're saying and just think about before you just start saying stuff. What do I say a lot to Gavin specifically? Think before you speak. No no. Yeah, that's it. Read the room. Mm. yeah, he's say a lot. Yeah. Read the room. If you know, you start talking about the bombings the atomic bombings and you know there's somebody in the room that lived through it or, you know, is is connected to it or has relatives Read the room. Be considerate of other people. Yeah. 'Cause I it may not be your life that, you know, it was affected by it, but somebody else's wasn't. You don't know who's in that room with you. 'Cause when we were talking that in history class, it was we talked about it very delicately. We talked about it with like s care and like and compassion. Yeah. Because 'cause like our the teacher was like We I think I don't remember this very clearly, but I remember it was like we talk we don't joke about this. Like I we had a conversation about that. Where it's like we don't joke about this. This is something that seriously happened and we don't know, but there could be relatives in this room right now. Yeah. Like we have to just take we have to take care and just be Mindful of what we're saying and could it could it hurt someone? Could it make someone feel that the experience wasn't good enough? Not good enough. Wasn't Valid. Yeah. That it No, there is there are limits to that. You don't want to be overly Yeah. You know Yeah. Then you kinda just think condescending. Right, exactly. Yeah. So it's a fine line. Yeah. But that's what life is about most things are. Yeah. I've got a couple. Tiny moments matter. Yeah. Forgotten stamp back at his office changed his life forever. It's like the butterfly effect, but in the wrong way. Not in the you know. Or even a cloud over a city changing the lives of all those people in Kokuru. And you know it. You know? Tiny itty bitty moments can affect things greatly. Like the stars need to align for that to happen. You know? The like a cloudy day in the middle of s like the end of summer. That's not common at the end of summer. And the one day that it did happen is the one day that they were planning to drop the bombs. Yeah. And it only happened at Nagasaki because they were running out of fuel. Yeah. Because the clouds wouldn't clear. second, survival of such a tragedy is not the end of the story. Yamaguchi could have stayed silent forever. But he chose to speak out, to warn and to hope. He turned the worst days of his life into a gift for strangers he would never ever meet, including us right here today. Yeah. Time for the Fun Fact Challenge! You guys know the rules? Best three lock in when you're ready. Devon I actually took notes this time, so it might actually be a hell I could. Number one, Yamaguchi turned back toward his office to grab a one small piece of in. I heard Gavin first. I did too. his Hanko. Good job. What's a Hanko? it's a stant that has your signature. Very good. One point for Gavin. Like bonus points. Question two. What was the intended primary target of the second bomb? Kokuro. Kakuro. Correct. Heavy clouds and smoke hid the target, so the crew diverted to Nagasaki. Giving rise to the phrase. the luck of this is not a question, but luck of cucoura. The luck of cucoura. I don't want to say wrong. And the final question, but Gabin's already won. Name one kind of plant that grew in the name both? Sure. Oleanders and ginkgo. Very good. Sweep. Sweep. Sweep. Sweep. Gavin wins. Sweep, sweep, sweep. This day in history! Today is August 6th. That's why we did episode today. It's why we did this episode today. That worked out really well. On this day in 1945, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb ever used in war on Hiroshima, Japan. Tens of thousands of people lost their lives that day. Also on this date, eighteen six, Emperor Francis the Second gave up his crown and dissolved the Holy Roman Empire. wow. A realm that had lasted around a thousand years. He did it partly to keep Napoleon from ever claiming the ancient imperial title for himself. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. That's really interesting. Yeah. That I never even thought about that 'cause I didn't really Realize that the Holy Roman Empire lasted until eighteen six. Yeah, me that honestly. And I had a whole class on it basically. The fact that he could have been a Holy Roman Empire kinda blows my mind. Yeah, that it lasted that long. Yeah. Cause I feel like in my mind at least, Napoleon marks a benchmark of like history for me. Of just like his like before his reign and after his reign. I could see that. So like thinking that the Holy Roman Empire was still active during that time is crazy. Because in my things that I you know that I like to read is is medieval history. Mm-hmm. Starts about eight hundred. Yeah. And that's when the Holy Roman Empire was Yeah. Like your favorite part of history almost connects to my favorite part of history. I never through an empire. Yeah, that's nuts. That's crazy. I mean it wasn't as strong as it was in its height, but it was still there, obviously. and lastly, nineteen sixty-five United States President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law, banning practices that have been used to stop black Americans from voting. It is one of the most important civil rights laws in American history. Being summarily dismantled year by year by our current administration. From a forgotten stamp to a message of peace, Sutomo Yamaguchi's life reminds us that history is stitched together from tiny choices and enormous courage. He walked through the darkest of days twice, and he chose to spend the rest of his life asking the world to be kinder. May we listen. That's it for this episode. Thanks for traveling through time with us on the Ebbs of History. If you like today's story, share it with a teacher, a friend, Or your family on Instagram at Ebbs of History. If you have any show ideas, corrections, or questions, you can contact us at questions at ebbsofistory.com. Signing off, this has been your coast, Gavin, Zoe. And me, Jason, reminding you that history is not just about the dates and battles, it's about the people, curiosity, and the weird, wonderful choices that shaped our world. Until next time. Keep wondering. Keep laughing. And keep learning through the abs of history.