Best-selling author Lesley M. Blume spoke to students about a school alumnus who single-handedly unearthed the U.S. government’s cover-up of Hiroshima, revealing the truth of nuclear bombing.
The annual Preston Lecture, endowed by the Preston family, allows the Humanities and Social Sciences department to invite speakers to discuss Western history. This year, the department invited Blume — an award-winning journalist, historian, and New York Times best-selling author. Her work focuses on historical war journalism, specializing in nuclear events and the impacts of war on art.
During the lecture on Tuesday, September 19, Blume discussed her second non-fiction book, Fallout: The Hiroshima Cover-up and the Reporter Who Revealed it to the World, detailing the story behind John Hersey ’32 and his 1946 The New Yorker article “Hiroshima.”
After the Hiroshima bombing, the U.S. government attempted to downplay the damage imposed upon the area and its inhabitants. John Hersey traveled to Japan to find the real story covered by the governments’ positive narrative. Blume said, “Before Hersey’s article came out, the US government had [full] control over the narrative of the story.”
In her speech, Blume made a point to emphasize the unique way Hersey conducted his journalism. He interviewed dozens of bombing survivors, portraying the truth through the lens of everyday Japanese people. He combated racist stereotypes and humanized the victims during a time when American media depicted them as sub-human. Mr. Andrew D’Ambrosio, dean of student life, said, “While we study history academically here and we study things from statistics and facts, there is a real humanity and reality to history that is valuable for students to learn.”
Hotchkiss established The John Hersey Scholar Program in 2022 to honor Hersey and his work. In the program, select rising Seniors conduct archival research in history and politics during a two-week residency at Harvard University. These students then take two courses — one in the fall to study research methods and combat inherent biases and the other in the spring to catalog sources and narrow down topics for the final presentation. Prior to the lecture, Blume met with Hersey Scholars to provide advice for each student and discussed insights on her experiences in research.
Those interested can find Fallout: The Hiroshima Cover-up and the Reporter Who Revealed it to the World and Hersey’s 30,000-word article Hiroshima in the Edsel Ford Memorial Library’s collection.
