The new weapon. The Truman Library institute provided this video. What i would like to do tonight is to show you a number of artifacts, objects, photographs, documents, three dimensional related to the 75th anniversary of the atomic bomb. Each of those im going to present to you digitally and have some questions in the chat box at the end. I hope you enjoy the presentation. Im going to go right in and look at our first artifact which is actually not from july of 1945 but from april, shortly after truman became president. Then were going to look at some documents from july. You can see my time line here of the first five documents were going to show you. And then well have another five to finish off as we get into august of 1945 and even some from later into the 60s that connect to this topic. So, the first that president first information that truman has about the Manhattan Project comes in april just 12 days after he becomes president on april 12th. This very famous letter some of you are probably very familiar with is when henry stintson, the secretary of war writes to truman to tell him about this highly secret matter as it mentioned in that first paragraph. Now he mentioned this to truman after his inauguration on april 12th after fdrs death just in passing tells him that they need to talk about it in the future. And just under two weeks later, stimson sends this letter to truman telling them they need to get together quickly so he can tell him about this project. You can see some interesting handwritten notes on here. At the bottom, what i like to point out in Harry Trumans own handwriting he writes matt, put on list tomorrow, wednesday, 25th, hst. Matt is matthew colony, his appointment secretary. Hes obviously telling mr. Colony to get Henry Stimson on his calendar for the next day. Now interesting truman did come across the Manhattan Project when he was a senator in charge of the Truman Committee looking at overspending during world war ii. He didnt really get into much detail as he started to see the budget numbers about the project. But stimson actually is the person that warned him off and said you cant investigate that anymore. Let it go. Now, of course, hes president. And stimson tells him more about the project. Its interesting, too, that in those 82 days as Vice President truman did not know about the Manhattan Project. It takes him becoming president before he is told about the project. Of course, at this point they have not done a successful test. But the work has been going on in two or three different locations actually. As they start to develop the atomic bomb that well hear more about during the rest of this evenings presentation. So this is the first document i wanted to share with you out of the ten artifacts im going to share tonight because it really provides the context of when truman first finds out about the Manhattan Project and those interesting anecdotes that he didnt know while he was Vice President he would come closer to it as a senator and its about two weeks after hes president where stimson sits down and gives him all the detail. Now, stimson, who had actually obviously worked in the fdr administration is really the person thats in charge of the whole operation. Hes the one thats supervising the work of groves who well come across later on with another document. So stimson is the one thats the conduit between the white house and whats going on in new mexico. So hes an important key figure in all of this. The second document were going to look at is from lieutenant groves. And this is and you can see the date at the top of the page, this is from july 16th, 1945. And this is after the first test in new mexico of the atomic bomb. And this is a sketch that was included in a 14page report that groves sends to stimson and then of course that is relaid to truman. Now, were going to learn more about this in a second, but of course, president truman at this time is at the potsdam conference in germany meeting with stalin and initially Winston Churchill before churchill is replaced after the british election. Now this 14page report is very detailed. Its not an official report. And its actually quite casual in its writing as the excitement and the wonderment of the scientists and the military people involved in this First Successful test really comes through in the report. But this sketch is on the last page of that 14page report. On the second page, lieutenant groves actually refers to the mushrooming cloud. Thats the first time that the word Mushroom Cloud is really used in that concept. And they describe the explosion as being beautiful and all the different colors in the sky that they see. Now, looking at this particular document, some of the handwritten cursive might be tricky for some of us to read, but if you go close in on this, underneath where it says cloud drawings, and its a little faint, but it does say first atomic bomb explosion new mexico. Sketches from a b29 flying at 30,000 feet about 50 miles away. In fact, the b29s sent up there for observation couldnt get as close as they would have liked because of the weather. You can also see the time dated there. You can see 5 30, 5 38 and so on and then 5 42 at the bottom the second part of the sketch. And so you can see theyve done this first thing in the morning. It was really dependent upon the weather when they were going to do this test. And then the report itself goes into more detail about the level of destruction and the impact it had. Truman uses those exact words from those reports in some other documents that were going to see a bit later on, namely his diary entries. It also talks about the colors, dark brown, light gray and so on. Then it says see through here in the hole the middle of the cloud. Then it also gives the elevation. So, of course, later on were able to see photographs and other footage of this atomic cloud. This is what truman receives while hes in germany and its relaid to him via stimson to the officials in germany at the potsdam conference. So, hes truman himself, is very excited about the successful test. And they could really start now to plan if and when to use this against the japanese. Just in a few short weeks when we get into two weeks later, of course, its the end of july and were getting close to when that happens on august 6th. Ill let you study that a little bit more. Its a fascinating document and i would encourage you to read all 14 pages of the report. That sounds cumbersome. Its tight. Its easy to read. And its available on the Truman Library website. Its quite fascinating read. And the payoff as you get this sketch on the last page. The next document is what i had mentioned previously trumans diaries. Now here is a number of different diary entries. I could have chosen really one of three that he writes in this time period. This one is july 17th, 1945. So just a day after he gets that report. And of course this is handwritten. And it can be hard to read. Those of us that work at the Truman Library have become familiar over time of trumans handwriting. This, of course, is when hes first meeting Joseph Stalin in this particular diary entry. We do have other diary entries from july 18th, the next day, when he meets churchill. And from july 25th, when he goes into a lot more detail about the atomic bomb testing. But he does mention it in this one page of his diary. And hes talking to stalin about the different negotiations that are going to come up and theyre setting the agenda. So this is very much at the beginning of the potsdam conference. And theyre talking about china and theyre talking about the soviets coming into the japanese war on august 15th, which is one of trumans goals of potsdam to get the soviets to join in there. But he has a cryptic phrase in here. And he asked them about the agenda and he told truman says i told him this is about halfway down. I told him to fire away. He did. And it is dynamite. But then truman says but i have some dynamite, too. Which im not exploding now. He kind of have this cryptic reference to dynamite and not exploding now. Its not too surprising that he mentions this the day after finding out about the successful test. Im just using one of the diary entries today, but in the following day on the 18th he says that he believes the japanese will surrender when the russians come in because stalin does agree to enter the war. And then he has this phrase in the 18th of july entry where he says im sure they will when manhattan appears over their homeland. Now, truman doesnt really refer to manhattan very often in his writings, but on this diary entry on july 18th he talks about manhattan appearing over the japanese homeland. Then he also goes on to say i will inform stalin about it at an opportune time and, in fact, join the potsdam conference he does tell stalin briefly, but not really in detail, about the fact they have a new weapon they can use against the japanese. Truman didnt think that stalin knew anything about that but of course as we know now in 2020, that stalin did, in fact, have spies in new mexico that were passing the information about the Manhattan Project back to him. Then a week later on july 25th, on his diary entry there, he goes into a lot more detail and he talks about how the weapons are to be used against the japanese between now and august 10th. So, those diary entries are really very revealing as truman expounds upon the information that hes been given by lieutenant groves. Now, weve got two contrasting documents here or two documents that one is a little misleading. Were going to do that one second. Im trying to keep them in Chronological Order if i can. This is from the National Archives which the Truman Library is part of rather than the collections of the Truman Library. But this is the closest you would get to the ordering of the use of the atomic bomb. And this is a memo from thomas handy who is the acting chief of staff while marshall is at potsdam with truman. And hes writing to general carl spaatz the commander general of the United StatesArmy Strategic air force. You can see the date on this one is the 25th of july. So things are moving quickly, as you can see. And, you know, you can see this. Its not super sharp but basically its got four points on this single page memo. It talks about the 509 composite group, the 20th air force will deliver its First Special bomb as soon as weather will permit. And so they refer to it as the special bomb without saying using the word atomic. Then it talks about the various targets. And the first one there is hiroshima and the fourth one there listed is nagasaki. The second point says that the additional bombs will be delivered on the above target as soon as they are made ready by project staff. Now, we found out later that in early part of august only two bombs were ready. And they used both of them. The third bomb wasnt probably going to be ready until around the 16th or 17th of august. The third point there is that the dissemination of any information about this is reserved for the secretary of war and the president. So, the military are not going to make any comment about this. And any news stories, any people asking for information they need to refer back to the second war and the president for them to respond to. And then the last point is this is done with the approval of the secretary of war, which i mentioned before, is stimson and the chief of staff. And then it also mentions that a copy has been sent to general mcarthur and a copy has been sent to the admiral. So this is the closest youre going to get to the actual orders for the dropping of the bomb on hiroshima. And thats dated the 25th of july. And it does say after about august 3rd on there. So it does give a date for that. And at that point theyre waiting for a response from the potsdam document to the japanese. Another document that is sometimes used incorrectly talk about the authorization of the bomb is this memo and its response. This is from the secretary of war to truman. And its a few days later. Its the 30th of july. And this one is harder to read. And you know, some of these historic documents can be difficult to read. But if you close in on this one, this is from stimson to the president. And hes talking about the recent ultimatum. Thats the ultimatum made at potsdam and that dramatic results of the test that weve heard about already. And there are suggestions made by the british and of which secretary of state burns is well aware. And so hes giving recommendations of what to do. Im going to talk about the context of this in a minute. This is a twopager because you can see truman writes on the back of this memo he says secretary of war reply on the number of the memo 41011 suggestions approved, release when ready but not sooner than august 2nd. Then again truman liked to use his initials hst. Some people over time thought when he says release when ready hes talking about the atomic bomb. In fact, this is about the statement thats going to be released. Like a pressure release rather than a release of a bombing. So thats why theres confusion. I did want to point out again i meant to do this before, the number of the memo is 41011 and thats what truman used on the back. So this is an interesting document in that theyre preparing the statements. Saying we better get this statement approved because once the bomb is dropped were going to need a statement immediately. So thats why this is a bit of a rush here because theyve been going back and forth in terms of what to say to the world once this bomb is actually dropped. And so, theyre trying to get the suggestions approved by both the british suggestions and suggestions from stimson himself and truman and burns and all of the others in the close circles of president truman at that time. So thats a fascinating one. But it shouldnt be used to mislead. Its more about statement rather than the bomb itself. Okay. So now were going to get closer and closer to that august 6th. The last one were going to look at from july is the letter home to bess. He actually writes a number of letters to bess. Of course it takes about two weeks to get to potsdam by the uss augusta and goes across the atlantic rather than flying. Many people argue hes done that to get ready to prepare to read the materials. But he also used some of that time to rest as well. And play poker and other things in the evening. And so he writes to bess from the uss augusta and then when he gets finally to germany, to potsdam, he continues to write to her. During that time he says very little in his letters about the atomic bomb. Obviously theres some concern about secrecy and letters being intercepted, things of that nature. But in the july 31st letter he does make a rather cryptic reference to that. Then were going to look at some video footage of the newsreel of his announcement. Then were going to look at the artifact of the safety plug. Then the sadako crane and finish with a video on the screen gems footage which ill explain when we get to that footage. So here is the letter to bess. This is just two pajs of this. As i mentioned it was written july 31st. Of course trumans writing is not the easiest to read. The cursive. This is all digitized and on our website. And we have it goes up every time i say these numbers. We have more than 1,300 letters written by harry truman to Bess Wallace Truman over their life time from 1910 to 1957 in most cases including the envelopes which is amazing to have that in our collection. And all of those letters that harry has written to bess are all digitized and available on our website in Chronological Order. You can go straight into july and look at those other letters. This is the only one that really references the atomic bomb. And its rather cryptic when he does so. But if you look at the bottom of the first page on the left and then the beginnings of the second page on the right, he finishes up this bottom of this first page where he says i rather think mr. Stalin is stalling because hes not so happy about the english elections. Just to remind you, wince ston churchill lost the elections in Great Britain during the potsdam conference and hes replaced by the new labour,3ina worked. I think stalin is stalling because hes not so happy. He doesnt know it but i have an ace in the hole and another one showing. Now you know truman loves his card games. So thats the one time that he refers rather cryptically to the atomic bomb in his letters to his wife Bess Wallace Truman. I find that rather fascinating. Sometimes in Historical Documents you learn from things that are not written. So the other seven or eight letters that he writes he really makes no reference to the atomic bomb and the same with letters to his mother and sister at the same time. Either no references are rather cryptic. Moving on. We have a video clip. This is truman announcing the surrender not the surrender, announcing the dropping of the atomic bomb from the uss augusta. You can see the window in the background from the ship. A short time ago an american airplane dropped one bomb on hiroshima and destroyed its usefulness. That bomb has more power than 20,000 tons of tnt. The japanese began the work in the air at pearl harbor. They have been repaid many fold. And the end is not yet. With this bomb we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction. To supplement the growing power of our armed forces. In their present form, these bombs are now in production. And even more powerful forms are in development. It is an atomic bomb. In is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been used against those who brought war to the far east. We are now prepared to destroy more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the japanese have in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories and their communications. Let there be no mistake, we shall completely destroy japans power to make war. It was to spare the japanese people from utter destruction that the ultimatum of july 26th was issued at potsdam. Their leaders promptly rejected that