Documenting Hiroshima of 1945: Late September, Fukuromachi National School faces difficult path to reopening
Sep. 20, 2024
by Minami Yamashita, Staff Writer
Even after mid-September 1945, the steel-reinforced west building of Fukuromachi National School (present-day Fukuromachi Elementary School, in Hiroshima’s Naka Ward), which remained standing after the fires caused by the atomic bombing, still had its windows covered with straw mats as well as severely wounded soldiers admitted there for treatment. The Hiroshima Prefectural government had ordered all schools to reopen on September 15, but the school was far from being able to do so.
On August 6, a total of around 160 students, teachers, and staff are considered to have been in the Fukuromachi National School, located 460 meters southeast of the hypocenter, and most were killed in the bombing. Because the school was near the hypocenter, students who had been evacuated out of the city prior to the bombing had lost family members. After their return to Hiroshima following the end of the war, they were adopted by relatives and ended up being dispersed in different locations. According to a commemorative magazine published on Fukuromachi Elementary School’s 130th anniversary, teachers and staff who had been demobilized after their service in the military walked around the school district in October, putting up notices announcing the school’s reopening. Despite that, not a single student showed up.
Amid a debate on whether the school should be closed, Shoso Tsubota, the school’s vice principal who had been laid up sick in bed after experiencing the atomic bombing on the west building’s first floor, returned to the school in November to help with work on its reconstruction. According to the Chugoku Shimbun’s evening edition dated July 28, 1963, Mr. Tsubota had said, “A thin child asked me ‘Where did the school building go?’ Helpless, we held each other and cried.”
Three students who survived the bombing while in the basement of the school’s west building and became known as “the basement miracles” also dispersed to different places after the war. Tsunehiro Tomoda, 88, who now lives in Kadoma City, Osaka Prefecture after returning from the Korean Peninsula, where he had moved after the bombing, is the only one of the three students alive today. Recalling his memories of the school, Mr. Tomoda said, “I was a bad kid at school.” After being scolded by his homeroom teacher, he splashed water in the corridor to make the teacher slip and fall. He and his brother Yukio, who was two years younger, would fly handmade gliders from the rooftop of the school building together.
On August 6, he was hit by the A-bomb’s blast while in the basement of the west building changing his shoes near the shoe storage case. When he went out into the schoolyard, he found the charred bodies of other children, including his younger brother, lying on the ground.
As indicated in the commemorative magazine for the school’s 130th anniversary, classes resumed in the west building starting on May 1, 1946.
(Originally published on September 20, 2024)
Even after mid-September 1945, the steel-reinforced west building of Fukuromachi National School (present-day Fukuromachi Elementary School, in Hiroshima’s Naka Ward), which remained standing after the fires caused by the atomic bombing, still had its windows covered with straw mats as well as severely wounded soldiers admitted there for treatment. The Hiroshima Prefectural government had ordered all schools to reopen on September 15, but the school was far from being able to do so.
On August 6, a total of around 160 students, teachers, and staff are considered to have been in the Fukuromachi National School, located 460 meters southeast of the hypocenter, and most were killed in the bombing. Because the school was near the hypocenter, students who had been evacuated out of the city prior to the bombing had lost family members. After their return to Hiroshima following the end of the war, they were adopted by relatives and ended up being dispersed in different locations. According to a commemorative magazine published on Fukuromachi Elementary School’s 130th anniversary, teachers and staff who had been demobilized after their service in the military walked around the school district in October, putting up notices announcing the school’s reopening. Despite that, not a single student showed up.
Amid a debate on whether the school should be closed, Shoso Tsubota, the school’s vice principal who had been laid up sick in bed after experiencing the atomic bombing on the west building’s first floor, returned to the school in November to help with work on its reconstruction. According to the Chugoku Shimbun’s evening edition dated July 28, 1963, Mr. Tsubota had said, “A thin child asked me ‘Where did the school building go?’ Helpless, we held each other and cried.”
Three students who survived the bombing while in the basement of the school’s west building and became known as “the basement miracles” also dispersed to different places after the war. Tsunehiro Tomoda, 88, who now lives in Kadoma City, Osaka Prefecture after returning from the Korean Peninsula, where he had moved after the bombing, is the only one of the three students alive today. Recalling his memories of the school, Mr. Tomoda said, “I was a bad kid at school.” After being scolded by his homeroom teacher, he splashed water in the corridor to make the teacher slip and fall. He and his brother Yukio, who was two years younger, would fly handmade gliders from the rooftop of the school building together.
On August 6, he was hit by the A-bomb’s blast while in the basement of the west building changing his shoes near the shoe storage case. When he went out into the schoolyard, he found the charred bodies of other children, including his younger brother, lying on the ground.
As indicated in the commemorative magazine for the school’s 130th anniversary, classes resumed in the west building starting on May 1, 1946.
(Originally published on September 20, 2024)
