Trip 2 summary

Yesterday’s trip was my first time attending the New York Historical Society and for the most part I did enjoy myself. Even though this has nothing to do with the main purpose of the class trip, the first thing that caught my attention was the giant marble statue of a Native man next to the coat check area. Immediately after seeing that work of art, I knew that there would be other works in this museum that would interest me. But as far as the entire experience in its self, I enjoyed the time travel effect when walking through the World War II exhibition. The maze of the exhibition made learning more entertaining, but that’s not all. The way the information of the war was displayed helped bring this devastating moment to life.

The story of the exhibition basically summed up what World War II was all about. It spoke of the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1933-1941, the creation of the nuclear bomb, the Nazi genocide, the March on Washington, and many more. All of these miniature stories combined created what was known as the “most destructive war in history” (N.Y.H.S.).  After walking through this exhibition, I’ve learned that the totally of deaths were an “estimated 60 million” (New York Historical Society).

Some information that I’ve read at the New York Historical Society about the bombing of Pearl Harbor was that Japan attacked U.S. naval base on 12/7/1941. This attack “killed over 2,400” (N.Y.H.S.), “wounded 1,200” (N.Y.H.S.) and damaged “14 ships and almost 300 planes” (N.Y.H.S.).  Japan had the support of Germany and Italy.

I’ve also learned that New York City “contributed about 900,000 citizens to the military” (N.Y.H.S.) and many of those New Yorkers were shipped to battle fields in Europe and North Africa.

On August 6^th and the 9^th, the United Stated of America sent planes to drop atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In Hiroshima, 135,000 people died and 50,000 died in Nagasaki. This led to Japan surrendering on Sept 2^nd of 1945.