Left: Minoru Hataguchi, Director of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum

Hosted by the Asian Studies Program of Bowling Green State University, Ohio., the Atomic Bomb Exhibition was held at the university from November 9 to 16, 2001 with the help of the Japan Foundation (an auxiliary organ of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. As part of the event, Miyoko Matsubara, a Hiroshima survivor, conducted a long-distance PicturePhone class, linking the multimedia classroom of the university and an IT laboratory seminar room of the Hiroshima office of NTT, a major Japanese telecommunications company. The aim of the class is to convey the horror of the atomic bomb and the reality of the disaster from Hiroshima to other areas at home and abroad via PicturePhone. This was the second long-distance class conducted as an activity of the ‘Spirit of Hiroshima' . The event was set up through talks between Miyoko Matsubara and the president and chancellor of Hiroshima Jogakuin University, Tsugikazu Nishigaki. When the university held the Japan-US Universities Joint Seminar on May 24, 2001, Matsubara asked Mr. Nishigaki to help realize a long-distance PicturePhone class, as an opportunity to give her testimony as an A-bomb survivor. This approach is important because the people who were exposed to the A-bomb are getting older each year and find it increasingly difficult to go overseas to give their testimonies. Fortunately, Osamu Shinohara, associate professor of Hiroshima Jogakuin University, was staying at Bowling Green State University as a guest researcher from April 2001. He was informed of Matsubara's wish, and then the event turned into reality. Starting from nine o'clock in the morning at the NTT office in Hiroshima, the long-distance PicturePhone class was conducted for more than one hour, attended by about seventy students at Bowling Green State University, and presided by Fujiya Kawashima, director of Asian Studies and professor of history.

Prof. Kawashima presiding over the class(U.S.)

Staff of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum attending the（PicturePhone）class  (Hiroshima)

At the beginning of the class, John Quinn, mayor of Bowling Green City gave a welcome speech, saying that the United States is making strenuous efforts toward disarmament and that the Atomic Bomb Exhibition is significant, in the face of world nuclear proliferation, to let people know the horror of nuclear weapons. In Hiroshima, Minoru Hataguchi, director of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, read a message from Tadatoshi Akiba, mayor of Hiroshima. After this, Miyoko Matsubara, exposed to the atomic bomb in Hiroshima under a mile from the hypocenter, gave her testimony. In English, she told how her body got severely burned, how she lost two hundred out of two hundred and fifty classmates, and that she has continued to be afflicted by the after-effects of exposure to the atomic bomb. She also expressed her hope to the students in an impassioned way that while hibakusha are still alive, the young generation will take up the ‘peace torch’ of her wish for the abolition of nuclear weapons and for the realization of ever-lasting peace. Then, abruptly, one of the American students asked her, “There is a belief in the U.S. that many American soldiers' lives were saved thanks to the dropping of the atomic bomb. What do you think of that?” Her answer was that nuclear weapons must never been used for whatever reason. Another student expressed his impression, saying “I could really identify with your story, thinking how we would have been exposed to radiation if an airplane had dived into a nearby nuclear power plant.” Since Professor Kawashima, who is deeply interested in Hiroshima, assumed the role of translator during the question time, there was a lively and successful exchange of opinions. Later he reported to Matsubara that there were many students who came to express their thanks as they were inspired by the communication via PicturePhone. The long-distance PicturePhone class was meaningfully realized via a teleconferencing system using ISDN digital lines linking Hiroshima with Ohio, over ten thousand kilometers away. We are hoping to expand this project and conduct more peace education. Please feel free to contact us if you are interested in conducting a long-distance Picturephone class.