From Oak Ridge to Hiroshima: One family’s memories of the Atomic Age

Courtesy of the (U.S. Naval Institute Photo Archive

Today is the 80th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and the first use of an atomic bomb in war, in this case by the United States against Japan. That bomb, and one dropped days later on Nagasaki, brought a swift end to World War II but also ushered in the Cold War and a long proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Houston psychologist Dr. Leslie Schover explores the emotional and ethical weight her family carried during the war and in the decades later in a book slated for release in 2026 called Fission: A Novel of Atomic Heartbreak . Both of her parents were involved in the Manhattan Project, which developed the bombs.

For those like her parents, the scientific achievement was remarkable, but it also raised grave ethical quest