By Life Stories, August 7, 2024
The Silent Witness: A Survivor’s Story of Hiroshima is a documentary about Tomiko Morimoto West’s experience as a 13-year-old girl in Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, the day the first atomic bomb was dropped. West, now in her 90s, has chosen to share her story for the first time in the hopes of promoting peace in a world rife with conflict. The film has been nominated in the Outstanding Short Documentary category as part of the 45th Annual News & Documentary Emmy® Awards.
This edition of the film has been edited for general audiences.
Tomiko Morimoto West was born in Hiroshima, Japan on January 13, 1932. On August 6, 1945 Tomiko watched from her schoolyard as a low-flying B-29 dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, killing her mother and other family members. After the war she moved to America to study English, at The Stout Institute in Wisconsin. She worked at the post office where she met her husband, an American GI. She went on to become a professor at Vassar College, who taught Japanese language courses for a decade until she retired in 1994. She has only one wish: that world leaders work together for global peace.
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