"DRESSED UP LITTLE GIRL. After offering this child and her mother candy, I asked why the little girl was so dressed up. Through signs and a few English words, the mother explained that it was a special day and they were going to the shrine. She also told me that the child couldn't hear. When American bombers were sighted, mothers would run to their children to stuff cotton or soft cloth in their ears to protect them from the sounds of explosions. Unfortunately, this mother didn't get to her daughter in time."

From: O'Donnell, Joe. Japan 1945: A U.S. Marine's Photographs from Ground Zero. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2005; 72.