Koko Kondo, now 81, was an infant when the atomic bomb devastated Hiroshima on 6 August 1945. Her mother, Chisa, carried her to the door of the family parsonage, located less than a mile from ground zero. When the explosion occurred, the building collapsed on them, trapping them in rubble. Chisa regained consciousness at the sound of Koko’s screams and managed to excavate an opening large enough to push her daughter through before escaping herself. Both survived, along with Koko’s father, Rev Kiyoshi Tanimoto, who was in another part of the city at the time.
Tanimoto became widely known following a 1946 New Yorker article by journalist John Hersey that documented the bomb’s impact through the experiences of six survivors. The article, considered a landmark example of American journalism, was expanded into a bestselling book. Tanimoto later traveled extensively, raising funds for reconstruction and advocating for peace and nuclear disarmament. For decades, however, Koko rejected her family’s call to public engagement with the tragedy. She left Hiroshima for university in the United States, and later married Yasuo Kondo, a documentary filmmaker. The couple adopted two children and settled in Tokyo, where Koko worked in business rather than pursuing activism related to the bombing.
Koko’s perspective shifted as she matured. A turning point occurred when she encountered Captain Robert Lewis, co-pilot of the aircraft that dropped the bomb, during a television appearance featuring her father. Seeing Lewis weep while reflecting on his role led her to view him as a human being rather than a villain. Another significant moment came when her mother finally revealed how they had survived and showed her the pink dress she wore as an infant. In her 40s, Koko began earnest reflection on Hiroshima’s legacy, particularly after her father’s death in 1986.
She eventually became a renowned peace advocate herself, working with orphaned children and collaborating with international figures including former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, South African anti-apartheid activist Desmond Tutu, and former U.S. president Jimmy Carter. Recently, her father’s previously unknown manuscript has been published. Written as a real-time diary beginning on 6 August 1945 and continuing through November 1947, the document provides a firsthand account of the devastation and Tanimoto’s efforts to locate church members and assist survivors. The manuscript was discovered among papers held at Yale University, where Hersey later became a professor, though the circumstances of its presence there remain unclear.
Koko continues her father’s mission of bearing witness to the bombing’s horrors and advocating against nuclear weapons. She emphasizes that modern nuclear arsenals far exceed the destructive capacity of the weapons that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. She plans to use the surviving pink dress as a tangible symbol when speaking about the bombing and its lessons. Despite suffering significant discrimination as a hibakusha survivor throughout her life, Koko has found meaning in the knowledge that medical data gathered from radiation-affected children in Hiroshima later assisted victims of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster, transforming her childhood suffering into aid for others.
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