Nagasaki

Milton J. Davis, a 37-year employee of the Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. who designed utility service for new communities, died of respiratory failure Aug. 31 at his home in Hamilton. He was 68.A Northeast Baltimore resident nearly all of his adult life, Mr. Davis was deeply involved with church and neighborhood activities in the Lauraville and Beverly Hills communitiesthroughout the 1960s and 1970s."My father believed in community service," said Anne E. Davis, his only child. "He was president of the Beverly Hills Improvement Association for a long time, and I think he held every position on our church council."

Whitney French Morrill, the co-owner of a building maintenance firm that cleaned Baltimore landmarks, died of complications from dementia Saturday at Manor Care Ruxton. The Monkton resident was 87. Born in New York City and raised in Stamford, Conn., he was the son of Evelyn Walker Morrill and Frank Whitney Morrill, whose family made printers ink. As a boy, he raced boats in Long Island Sound. In the 1930s, he moved to Forest Hill in Harford County. He lived with his mother and siblings on the 500-acre Highpoint Farm, where they raised cattle and crops.

Dr. James F. Van Pelt Jr., 76, the navigator of the U.S. plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, in World War II, died Saturday in Corona, Calif. He served in the Army Coast Artillery from 1940 to 1942, then transferred to what was then called the Army Air Forces. He was a member of the 509th Composite Group, which had the mission of dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. After the war, he earned his medical doctor's degree and specialized in obstetrics and gynecology.

Over time, certain operas become sacred, their stories treated like divine revelations, never in the slightest need of fresh interpretations. Puccini's Madama Butterfly is a case in point. For true believers, everything about this tale of love, loss and culture clash in early 1900s Nagasaki is clear and sensible as it stands. So anytime someone considers bringing such a sacrosanct work to the stage, the only proper course of action is to stay the course, to go with the opera you have, not the one you wish you had. Madama Butterfly continues through Nov. 19 at the Kennedy Center, Virginia and New Hampshire avenues Northwest.

Raemer Schreiber,88, a physicist who helped assemble the plutonium cores for the world's first atomic blast and the bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, died Thursday in Los Alamos, N.M.Mr. Schreiber worked on the Manhattan Project, which set off the first atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert July 16, 1945, and built the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki the next month.He belonged to the crew entrusted with one of the most delicate steps leading to the first test blast -- placing the plutonium core into a cylindrical uranium container.

"Rhapsody in August," which plays for one day only at the Charles, is unlikely to add much luster to the legend of the great Akira Kurosawa, but it's a surprisingly gentle, affecting movie.It's very much the movie of a man haunted by history -- or rather, a particular moment in history, 11:15 a.m., Aug. 9, 1945, when an American B-29 dropped a nuke on Nagasaki, Japan. If you ask, I'll defend the bombing of Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, on the grounds that it probably saved a million American and Japanese lives.

To prepare for a possible Allied invasion of Japan, a special detachment of Japanese-American soldiers began training troops at Fort Meade during the last week of July 1945. The 13 soldiers, attached to a U.S. military intelligence training unit, instructed 1,200 soldiers that week on the organization and tactics of Japanese infantry units, in the operation and characteristics of Japanese weaponry, and in the use of simple Japanese phrases. As it turned out, the training was not needed.

Over time, certain operas become sacred, their stories treated like divine revelations, never in the slightest need of fresh interpretations. Puccini's Madama Butterfly is a case in point. For true believers, everything about this tale of love, loss and culture clash in early 1900s Nagasaki is clear and sensible as it stands. So anytime someone considers bringing such a sacrosanct work to the stage, the only proper course of action is to stay the course, to go with the opera you have, not the one you wish you had. Madama Butterfly continues through Nov. 19 at the Kennedy Center, Virginia and New Hampshire avenues Northwest.

A STORY THAT the U.S. government hoped would never see the light of day finally has been published, 60 years after it was spiked by military censors. The discovery of reporter George Weller's firsthand account of conditions in post-nuclear Nagasaki sheds light on one of the great journalistic betrayals of the last century: the cover-up of the effects of the atomic bombing on Japan. On Aug. 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima; three days later, Nagasaki was hit. Gen. Douglas MacArthur promptly declared southern Japan off-limits, barring the news media.

Jacob Beser, the only crew member to fly on both atomic bomb missions over Japan at the end of World War II, died early yesterday of cancer at his home on St. Albans Road in Pikesville. He was 71.Mr. Beser was a young officer in the Army Air Forces on Aug. 6, 1945, when he flew aboard the plane Enola Gay on the bombing mission that devastated Hiroshima; three days later, he was aboard the plane Bock's Car when it bombed Nagasaki.The Japanese surrender came five days after the Nagasaki attack, bringing an end to the global conflict.

A STORY THAT the U.S. government hoped would never see the light of day finally has been published, 60 years after it was spiked by military censors. The discovery of reporter George Weller's firsthand account of conditions in post-nuclear Nagasaki sheds light on one of the great journalistic betrayals of the last century: the cover-up of the effects of the atomic bombing on Japan. On Aug. 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima; three days later, Nagasaki was hit. Gen. Douglas MacArthur promptly declared southern Japan off-limits, barring the news media.

To prepare for a possible Allied invasion of Japan, a special detachment of Japanese-American soldiers began training troops at Fort Meade during the last week of July 1945. The 13 soldiers, attached to a U.S. military intelligence training unit, instructed 1,200 soldiers that week on the organization and tactics of Japanese infantry units, in the operation and characteristics of Japanese weaponry, and in the use of simple Japanese phrases. As it turned out, the training was not needed.

Fred Olivi, 82, a Chicago native who co-piloted the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, died Thursday. He had lived at a rehabilitation center in the Chicago suburb of Lemont since suffering a stroke in August. He joined the Army Air Forces after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. His most famous mission was in a B-29, named Bockscar, that dropped the second atomic bomb on Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the Enola Gay dropped the first bomb on Hiroshima. World War II ended with Japan's surrender six days after the Nagasaki bombing.

The Hiroshima-Nagasaki Commemoration Committee will present a video screening of "Sounder" tonight at 7: 30 p.m. Cicely Tyson and Paul Winfield star in Martin Ritt's classic 1972 drama about a sharecropper family living in Louisiana during the Depression. The video will be shown at the American Friends Service Committee, 4806 York Road. Doors open at 7 p.m. Admission is free, and refreshments will be served. For more information call 410-377-7987.It's `Wonderful' to giveIf it's the holiday season, it must be time for the Senator to dust off a print of "It's a Wonderful Life," Frank Capra's classic Christmas tale starring Jimmy Stewart.

Raemer Schreiber,88, a physicist who helped assemble the plutonium cores for the world's first atomic blast and the bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, died Thursday in Los Alamos, N.M.Mr. Schreiber worked on the Manhattan Project, which set off the first atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert July 16, 1945, and built the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki the next month.He belonged to the crew entrusted with one of the most delicate steps leading to the first test blast -- placing the plutonium core into a cylindrical uranium container.

The former director of the National Air & Space Museum seems at peace with the memory of his own head on a platter. Martin Harwit served it at his boss' request, resigning after a long dispute over a planned exhibit about the atomic bombings of Japan.Some of his adversaries publicly applauded his downfall, others were content to claim a customary spoil of victory: the power to have history told their way.Harwit, an astrophysicist by profession, went home to Washington, disappointed but not bitter.

Fred Olivi, 82, a Chicago native who co-piloted the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, died Thursday. He had lived at a rehabilitation center in the Chicago suburb of Lemont since suffering a stroke in August. He joined the Army Air Forces after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. His most famous mission was in a B-29, named Bockscar, that dropped the second atomic bomb on Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the Enola Gay dropped the first bomb on Hiroshima. World War II ended with Japan's surrender six days after the Nagasaki bombing.

As tears rolled down her cheeks, the woman from Hiroshima told an audience at the New Windsor Service Center about the survivors of the atomic blast that leveled her city in 1945.Nobuko Taguchi, 21, is one of three women from the World Friendship Center in Hiroshima carrying a message of peace to the United States.She apologized for crying and spoke softly of Morihisa Shimomura, whose parents survived the atomic bomb attack on Aug. 6, 1945, but died shortly after his birth from "the atomic sickness."

Dr. James F. Van Pelt Jr., 76, the navigator of the U.S. plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, in World War II, died Saturday in Corona, Calif. He served in the Army Coast Artillery from 1940 to 1942, then transferred to what was then called the Army Air Forces. He was a member of the 509th Composite Group, which had the mission of dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. After the war, he earned his medical doctor's degree and specialized in obstetrics and gynecology.

Milton J. Davis, a 37-year employee of the Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. who designed utility service for new communities, died of respiratory failure Aug. 31 at his home in Hamilton. He was 68.A Northeast Baltimore resident nearly all of his adult life, Mr. Davis was deeply involved with church and neighborhood activities in the Lauraville and Beverly Hills communitiesthroughout the 1960s and 1970s."My father believed in community service," said Anne E. Davis, his only child. "He was president of the Beverly Hills Improvement Association for a long time, and I think he held every position on our church council."