The Hiroshima Maidens (Japanese: 原爆乙女 (Genbaku Otome); lit. 'atomic bomb maidens') were a group of 25 Japanese women who were disfigured by the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and subsequently went on a highly publicized journey to obtain reconstructive surgery in the United States. Originating from a support group organized by Methodist minister Kiyoshi Tanimoto, the Maidens attracted widespread media attention in Japan, with some undergoing surgeries in Tokyo and Osaka. After these surgeries failed, Tanimoto worked with the editor of The Saturday Review of Literature, Norman Cousins, to bring the Maidens to the United States for surgery. They traveled there in 1955. While in the United States, a team of surgeons at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York performed 138 operations on the Maidens while they stayed at the Pendle Hill Quaker Center for Study and Contemplation and with Quaker host families. One Maiden, Tomoko Nakabayashi, died during surgery. The Maidens returned to Japan in 1956 to mixed reception from the Japanese people. Some viewed them as tools of Cold War propaganda and cultural assimilation, while others praised them for improving Japan–United States relations. After their experience in the United States, the Maidens were portrayed in various dramatic productions and in the 1988 movie Hiroshima Maiden.
Origins
Raising support in Japan On 6 August 1945, an American plane dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Survivors of the bombing called themselves hibakusha. Numerous people experienced deep flash burns from heat rays, as well as hair loss and purpura from the radiation. Many of the flash burns developed into keloid scars. Methodist minister Kiyoshi Tanimoto, inspired by hibakusha Shigeko Niimoto, helped create a support group consisting of about 40 unmarried hibakusha women in his church basement. Radiation sickness sufferers were stigmatized in Japanese society, and hibakusha's injuries were often seen as shameful. Many of the women had been hidden away by their families, who feared that their disfigurements would damage their family's reputation. Tanimoto faced resistance when he tried to seek medical care for the women in Hiroshima, where they were known as "Tanimoto's Keloid Girls". However, with the assistance of a journalist for the widely-circulated Yomiuri Shimbun, he took several of the women on an all-expenses-paid trip to Tokyo, Japan, where they drew the attention of the press, who called them the "Genbaku Otome" (lit. 'atomic bomb maidens'). As part of this trip, the women visited Sugamo Prison. While there, they met with Japanese war criminals, expressing sympathy for them and claiming that while they once held a grudge against them, since so much time had passed since the war ended, they had "[begun] to realize that the war criminals' plight was the same as theirs". This visit proved controversial, with fellow hibakusha Kiyoshi Kikkawa, who was also present for the visit, finding the women's behavior "disturb[ing]". Soon after, some of the women returned to Tokyo to undergo reconstructive surgery. Others were treated at the Osaka University Medical Center. These surgeries, undertaken by Japanese doctors inexperienced in reconstructive operations, failed to achieve the desired results and in some cases exacerbated the women's injuries.
Raising support in America In 1951, Tanimoto began working with the editor of The Saturday Review of Literature, Norman Cousins, to promote the women's cause, convincing him that the best course of action for the women was to take them to the United States to receive surgery there. It was Cousins who first used the English name "Hiroshima Maidens" for the women. Cousins consulted Dr. William Hitzig, his personal physician at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, about the feasibility of reconstructive surgery, asking him to assemble a team of doctors to perform them. Then he arranged for lawyer Alfred Rose to pay for hospitalization costs. Due to their pacifist beliefs, Cousins asked the Quakers to provide lodging for the maidens. They agreed to volunteer their homes as "retreats" for the Maidens. Activists Bill and Yuri Kochiyama also raised support for the project in the New York Japanese American community, and it was arranged for Japanese American Helen Yokoyama to accompany the Maidens to the United States as their "den mother". With the aid of Kiyoshi Togasaki, the editor of The Japan Times, Cousins also convinced general John E. Hull to provide air transportation for the Maidens. While the United States Department of State initially opposed the project, fearing that it would be interpreted as an admission of wrongdoing on the part of the United States for dropping the atomic bomb, they eventually acquiesced to it after Marvin Green of the Hiroshima Peace Center convinced them that it would have a positive effect on Japan–United States relations. 43 women were initially selected as candidates to travel to the United States, and when Hitzig and his team traveled to Japan to perform preliminary examinations, it was determined that 25 met the surgery criteria. The Maidens left for New York in April 1955.
Time in America
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