Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection Collection Number: MS-1 Title: Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection Dates: 1943-2012 Creator: Barbara Reynolds, 1914-1990 Summary/Abstract: The Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection houses a variety of documents, including correspondence, photos, slides, 16mm film, books, magazines, and other documents related to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and global peace activism. The collection includes the papers of Barbara and Earle Reynolds, a Japanese language library of books related to the atomic bombings, and an assortment of publications within the genre of global peace activism, including both religious and secular efforts to end conflict and promote cross-cultural understanding. Quantity/Physical Description: Five 4-tier filing cabinets, total of 86.8 cubic feet. Upstairs room for Japanese language library, 57.5 linear feet. Language(s): English, Japanese, Dutch, German Repository: Peace Resource Center, 51 College Way, Wilmington, Ohio 45177 800-341-9318 Restrictions on Access: There are no restrictions on accessing this collection. Restrictions on Use: Copyright restrictions may apply. Unpublished manuscripts are protected by copyright. Permission to publish, quote, or reproduce must be secured from the repository and the copyright holder. Preferred Citation: MS-1, Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection, Peace Resource Center, Wilmington College, Wilmington, Ohio. Acquisition: The initial collection was gathered and processed by Barbara Reynolds when she created the Peace Resource Center was founded in 1975. Subsequent directors of the center, including Helen Wiegal, added material according to their interests. Separated Material: At this time there are no known separated materials from this collection. Related Material: The Quaker Heritage Center of Wilmington College houses some 16mm films from the collection. Processed by: The collection was processed by Barbara Reynolds. Arrangement: Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection Finding Aid 1 The collection is arranged into five fireproof filing cabinets. Each filing cabinet has four drawers. Each drawer is divided into several subjects, and within each division are materials relating to the subject. For example, Cabinet #1 Drawer 1 houses the subject of Vietnam Files, and included in this section are folders titled Agent Orange, Anti-Personnel Weapons, and others. A full compilation of the archive’s holdings is listed later in this finding aid. The Japanese language library is arranged by subject categories and a complete listing of the holdings of the collection can be found in the Japanese A-Bomb Literature Annotated Bibliography available in the Peace Resource Center. Eventually, a listing the holdings of the Japanese language library will be available on OCLC. Biographical/Historical Note: Barbara Reynolds was an internationally- and nationally-known peace activist who devoted her life to creating awareness about the plight of atomic bombing survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. She was given the key to the city of Hiroshima in 1969 and made an honorary citizen of Hiroshima in 1975. During the late 1950s Barbara and her husband Earle became major national and international figures in an emerging anti-nuclear movement. In 1975, Reynolds founded the Peace Resource Center (PRC) at Wilmington College to hold her extensive collection of historical documents about the Japanese experience of the atomic bombings. The PRC was also intended to be Reynolds’s base for educational outreach about the dangers of nuclear war. Reynolds was born Barbara Doritt Leonard in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1915, and was the only child of Dr. Sterling Andrus Leonard, a well-known English professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In 1930 15-year old Reynolds lost her father when he died at the age of 38 in a canoe accident. In 1935 she married anthropologist Earle Reynolds and over the next decade the couple had three children, Tim (1936-), Ted (1938-), and Jessica (1944-). Reynolds and her family moved to Yellow Springs, Ohio in 1943 when Earle took a position as Associate Professor of Anthropology at Antioch College. Earle also became chair of the Antioch College Fels Research Institute for Human Development. In 1951 Earle joined the Atomic Bombing Casualty Commission (ABCC), a US Military Commission established in 1947 in Hiroshima, Japan to conduct scientific research on atomic bombing survivors. Barbara, Tim, Ted, and Jessica joined Earle in Japan from 1951-1954. Although the military families largely confined themselves to living in the Niji Mura compound twenty miles from Hiroshima, Reynolds took her children out into the local community to shop and visit a nearby orphanage. Unlike many military spouses, she also learned Japanese. Through his research Earle witnessed the scars and trauma of over 4,800 children who survived the atomic bombings, yet still the family did not view itself as politicized in opposition of nuclear weapons or US foreign policy during this time period. Barbara, Ted, and Jessica joined Earle in 1954 (while Tim returned to the United States to complete his high school education) to realize Earle’s lifelong dream of circumnavigating the oceans. Enlisting the aid of Japanese carpenter, the family built the yacht which Earle called the “Phoenix of Hiroshima” Together, with a Japanese shipmate and atomic bombing survivor by the name of Niichi (Nick) Mikami, they departed on their maiden voyage on May 5, 1954 just as the United States began to shift its increased nuclear testing to the Pacific Ocean. Inexperienced sailors, the Reynolds family and Mikami suffered injuries and exhaustion during their maiden voyage, but eventually became so skillful that they were able to complete Earle’s vision, sailing 54,359 nautical miles over four years. During their many stops in ports around the world they gradually became aware of the international perception of the atomic bombings as a global atrocity and also increasingly aware of European and American racism as they visited former colonial holdings, and as their crewmember Nick Mikami was heavily discriminated against when they arrived at ports such as Cape Town in South Africa. Hiroshima/Nagasaki Memorial Collection Finding Aid 2 Their voyage around the world drew to a close in May 1958 when they landed in Honolulu. There the Reynolds family met the crew of the Golden Rule, which had just been arrested for attempting to sail into the United States nuclear test site near the Marshall Islands. The Golden Rule was sailed by Captain Albert Bigelow, Bill Huntington, George Willowby, and Orion Serwood. All four men were pacifists and Bigelow, Huntington, and Willowby were Quakers. Barbara, Earle, Ted, and Jessica were profoundly influenced by the crew’s pacifism and resistance and the family began to move toward the Quaker faith at that time. The Reynolds family agreed to continue the Golden Rule’s voyage into a nuclear test zone. On June 4, 1958 the Reynolds family set sail for a US nuclear test site in the Bikini Atoll of the Marshall Islands. They sailed 65 miles into the test site before encountering the US Military and being arrested at gunpoint. On July 3, they, along with their military companions, witnessed the detonation of the 220 kiloton nuclear bomb, “Cedar.” Earle, Barbara, and Jessica were flown to Honolulu by the military, and Barbara returned to the Phoenix to sail it back to Honolulu with Ted and Nick. The family’s life was in limbo for a period of two years where they waited the outcome of Earle’s trial. He was found not guilty and in 1960 the family returned to Hiroshima. In April 1960 Earle and Barbara became official members of the Religious Society of Friends. In April 1960, the family sailed to Hiroshima. A year later the family attempted to sail to Russia to deliver messages of peace and calls for nuclear disarmament before being turned away by Russian authorities. After returning from this second voyage, Barbara began to work with atomic bombing survivors in earnest. In 1962 Reynolds organized the Hiroshima Peace Pilgrimage and traveled throughout Europe and the United States with two atomic bombing survivors, Miyoko Matsubara and Hiromasa Hanabusa to educate world leaders about the effects of the atomic bomb and the horrors of nuclear war. In 1964 she formed the World Peace Study mission, an ambitious three- month tour with nearly 40 atomic bombing survivors to 150 cities in eight countries. At the end of the tour, Barbara and Earle were divorced. In 1965 Barbara Reynolds formed the World Friendship Center (WFC) which served as a gathering place for atomic bombing survivors to share their experiences and for international visitors to Hiroshima to learn of the atomic bombings and their repercussions. In addition to her work at the WFC, Barbara raised crucial funds to support the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. In 1969 Reynolds began to make plans to return to the United States; there was a sense that her presence had become distracting for the Japanese peace movement, and she was increasingly committed to addressing nuclear problems from the American side. Barbara felt comfortable and familiar with southwest Ohio and through her Quaker connections she learned of an empty home at Wilmington College in Clinton County, Ohio where she could both house her extensive collection of atomic bombing materials (testimonies, documents, films, and photographs) and carry out her educational efforts to make Americans aware of the costs of nuclear weapons through the experiences of atomic bombing survivors. In 1975, Barbara Reynolds founded the Peace Resource Center at Wilmington College with a five-day academic conference. The archive she brought to the Center from Hiroshima was considered at the time the largest collection of atomic bombing materials outside of Japan. Over the years the collection became crucial to American researchers who sought to understand the history of the atomic bombings from the Japanese experience. The five-day founding conference was attended by the Mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, atomic bombing survivors such as Harada Tomin and Morishita Hiromu, as well as famous intellectuals such as historians Robert Jay Lifton and Martin Sherwin.