Explore History

2025 marks the 80th anniversary of the moments when those bombs changed millions of lives across multiple generations — and survivors still feel the impacts.

The facts of what actually happened cannot be changed. But the lessons from events, individuals, and actions of the past can help identify choices we might make to shape our individual and collective futures.

From the the Manhattan project to the Trials of J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Cold War, explore dozens of shows on WWII and its aftermath.

Emperor Naruhito has repeatedly stressed the importance to remember and keep telling the tragedy of the war to younger generations.

B-29's also carried a non-lethal payload over Japan: leaflets urging the Japanese people to surrender.

Learn more about the world's greatest war by those who lived through it.

The press statement issued when Truman informed the nation that an atomic weapon was detonated in Japan.

A multimedia timeline of the key events during and that lead up to US involvement in World War II.

A written timeline covering the June 1944 to the war's final weeks.

For 35 uncertain days in 1939, the MS St. Louis traversed the Atlantic – from Europe to North America and back – carrying more than 900 passengers, most of them Jewish refugees seeking a haven from Nazi persecution.

Civilians and combatants share their memories of the conflict, including a B-29 co-pilot, tank battalion officer and 18-year-old student nurse.

In 1936, Waitstill and Martha Sharp left their children behind in the care of their parish and boldly committed to a life-threatening mission in Europe.

Read excerpt of President Truman's diary as he considered how to end the war.

After the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, it was another year before first-hand accounts emerged. Journalist John Hersey helped expose the bomb’s lasting damage.

As American forces won territory ever nearer to Japan, military planners on both sides used casualty figures to construct their strategies.