Documenting Hiroshima of 1946: Around January, devastated Hondori shopping street recorded on film
Jan. 7, 2025
by Minami Yamashita, Staff Writer
Around January 1946, Nobuichi Yoshioka, who died in 1966 at the age of 71, captured Hondori shopping street (in Hiroshima City’s present-day Naka Ward), which had been destroyed in the atomic bombing, using 8mm film. With a home that doubled as a retail shop there, Mr. Yoshioka had filmed a variety of scenes in his neighborhood from a fixed position before the atomic bombing.
The film footage taken by Mr. Yoshioka also shows scenes around his burned-down house and the remains of an iron bathtub. Making an appearance in his film footage are the Shimomura Clock Shop, whose exterior barely remained standing, the Hiroshima Branch of the Obayashi-gumi construction company, and a person clearing away debris. In footage taken from the West Drill Ground on the north side of the street can be seen the exteriors of the Chugoku Shimbun building and the Fukuya Department Store. The film footage also shows his oldest son, Hiroo, who died in 2019 at the age of 93, standing amid the incinerated ruins wearing his school cap.
Mr. Yoshioka ran a retail store called the Yoshiya Fabric Shop, located in the area of Kawaya-cho, east of the present-day Hondori streetcar stop. He was one of the first in his neighborhood to purchase an 8mm camera and projector, and he began filming around 1937.
Mr. Yoshioka shot film footage of the lives of people in the city from time to time. Examples include a sale during the Ebisu Grand Festival, children doing calisthenics in front of the Hiroshima Branch of Mitsui Bank (present-day Hiroshima Andersen bakery), and residents taking part in a bucket brigade during an air-raid drill. However, he stopped taking film footage when the Pacific theater of World War II broke out.
On August 6, 1945, Mr. Yoshioka, who was at a relative’s house on the outskirts of Hiroshima, was unaffected by the bombing, but he lost his wife and employees. He had moved the film collection he put together before the war to the relative’s place on Kurahashijima Island (in present-day Kure City). When Hiroo, a student at the Army Reserve Officer Academy, located in Toyohashi City, Aichi Prefecture, returned to Hiroshima, Mr. Yoshioka headed to Hondori shopping street with his film equipment.
Hiroo held on to the film collection that his father had put together before and after the bombing and, in 2009, donated it to the Hiroshima Municipal Archives. He said his father’s hope was that “people living today could learn, even if only a little, about that time.”
(Originally published on January 7, 2025)
Around January 1946, Nobuichi Yoshioka, who died in 1966 at the age of 71, captured Hondori shopping street (in Hiroshima City’s present-day Naka Ward), which had been destroyed in the atomic bombing, using 8mm film. With a home that doubled as a retail shop there, Mr. Yoshioka had filmed a variety of scenes in his neighborhood from a fixed position before the atomic bombing.
The film footage taken by Mr. Yoshioka also shows scenes around his burned-down house and the remains of an iron bathtub. Making an appearance in his film footage are the Shimomura Clock Shop, whose exterior barely remained standing, the Hiroshima Branch of the Obayashi-gumi construction company, and a person clearing away debris. In footage taken from the West Drill Ground on the north side of the street can be seen the exteriors of the Chugoku Shimbun building and the Fukuya Department Store. The film footage also shows his oldest son, Hiroo, who died in 2019 at the age of 93, standing amid the incinerated ruins wearing his school cap.
Mr. Yoshioka ran a retail store called the Yoshiya Fabric Shop, located in the area of Kawaya-cho, east of the present-day Hondori streetcar stop. He was one of the first in his neighborhood to purchase an 8mm camera and projector, and he began filming around 1937.
Mr. Yoshioka shot film footage of the lives of people in the city from time to time. Examples include a sale during the Ebisu Grand Festival, children doing calisthenics in front of the Hiroshima Branch of Mitsui Bank (present-day Hiroshima Andersen bakery), and residents taking part in a bucket brigade during an air-raid drill. However, he stopped taking film footage when the Pacific theater of World War II broke out.
On August 6, 1945, Mr. Yoshioka, who was at a relative’s house on the outskirts of Hiroshima, was unaffected by the bombing, but he lost his wife and employees. He had moved the film collection he put together before the war to the relative’s place on Kurahashijima Island (in present-day Kure City). When Hiroo, a student at the Army Reserve Officer Academy, located in Toyohashi City, Aichi Prefecture, returned to Hiroshima, Mr. Yoshioka headed to Hondori shopping street with his film equipment.
Hiroo held on to the film collection that his father had put together before and after the bombing and, in 2009, donated it to the Hiroshima Municipal Archives. He said his father’s hope was that “people living today could learn, even if only a little, about that time.”
(Originally published on January 7, 2025)
