Hiroshima: The Lost Photographs

As a photographer and amateur historian of WWII, I was amazed to stumble across this site on the web.

The fact that things like this still turn up is fascinating -- like the recent story of a GI's dogtag found in a NYC subway tunnel and returned to him 60 years later.

Depending on your views, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were height of barbarism on the part of the U.S., or a brilliant tactical move that saved what some historians estimate would have been a million Allied casualties and bejesus knows how many Japanese lives by ending the war without an invasion of the Japanese home islands.

Some still hotly debate this subject -- but the fact remains that the U.S. is the only country (one might add thankfully) that has exploded not one but two atomic weapons in anger.

It is hard to believe that someone could have been so careless with photographs that bare witness to this monumental moment in history.

The article by Adam Harrison Levy that accompanies some of the photographs starts off in what might be mistaken for a work of fiction. Fascinating stuff. Read it here.

James Nachtway & the XDR-TB pandemic

"Photographers go to the extreme edges of the human experience to show people what's going on. They believe your opinions and your influence matter. They aim their pictures at your best instincts: generosity, a sense of right and wrong, the ability and the willingness to identify with others, the refusal to accept the unacceptable." -- James Nachtway

James Nachtway is considered by many to be the greatest living photojournalist. His work in recent years with victims of a disease known as XDR-TB (extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis) is stark and cuts deeply into those of us who, simply by the luck of the draw, live far more fortunate lives.

A gallery of his XDR-TB work is on the XDRTB.org web site. Take a deep breath and go directly to the gallery page to see these intense photographs. Click on the contact sheet image to begin a slide show.