June 8, 2021 • 9 mins
On this day in 1972, photographer Nick Út took the Pulitzer Prize-winning image that became known as the "napalm girl" photo. / On this day in 1783 a volcanic fissure in Iceland called Laki began erupting.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello everyone, it's Eves checking in here to let you
know that you're going to be hearing two different events
in history in this episode. They're both good, if I
do say so myself. On with the show. Hello, Hello, everyone,
Welcome to this Day in History class, where we bring
you a new tidbit from history every day. The day
(00:26):
was Dune eighth, nineteen seventy two. The Vietnam War, a
particularly deadly conflict, had been going on for nearly two decades.
Associated press photographer Nick Boot was outside of Chong Bong,
a village in southeast Vietnam, when a South Vietnamese aircraft
dropped his payload of napalm. Boot took photos of the scene.
(00:50):
One of those photos became known as the Napalm Girl
photo of black and white picture of a young girl
named Fonti Kim Fuk running naked as other children ran
alongside her and South Vietnamese forces followed. The horrifying picture
became a symbol of the brutality of the war, and
it got Nick Oot a Pulitzer prize. Nick Oot was
(01:14):
born in Vietnam in nineteen fifty one, after his older brother,
who was an Associated press photographer, died in Vietnam. Oot
began to take photos for the A p at age sixteen,
Oot was covering the Vietnam War for the AP when
he captured the photo. Near Chang Bong, a South Vietnamese
(01:34):
Air Force pilot flying a propeller driven American made A
one skywriter carried out the napalm bombing at Chang Bong.
The point of the attack was to get North Vietnamese
units out of their positions at Chang Bong. As witnessed
the aftermath of the attack, he took photos he used
to like a M two camera with a thirty five
(01:55):
millimeter Sumicron Lands TV cameraman Alan Downs had also caught
footage of Kim Fuch and the other children running down
the road away from the napalm attack. At the time
took the photo, called the Terror of War, Kim Fuk
was nine years old. Kim Fuk is just left of
center in the photo, her mouth open in a yell
(02:17):
and her arms outstretched as she runs towards the camera.
The children that surround her are clothed and the South
Vietnamese forces walk behind them as a plume of smoke
rises in the background. The fire caused by the bombs
had burned off Kim Fuke's clothes and burned her skin.
A correspondent gave her water and poured some on her burns.
(02:41):
When realized that Kim Fuke had been burned, he took
her to a hospital in Saigone. Doctor said she might
not survive her third degree burns, and she was sent
to a specialist plastic surgery center. She received many surgical
procedures for her injuries and survived, though some of her
family members died. An editor at the AP rejected the
(03:03):
photo because it showed full frontal nudity. Back then, photos
that included nudity were off limits. Horse Foss, head of
the Saigon photo department, said that they should make an
exception to publish the photo, under the condition that no
close ups of Kim Fuk would be permitted. How Buel,
the New York photo editor, also believed the photo was
(03:25):
worth sharing despite the nudity, so the AP transmitted the photo.
Many newsrooms had to disregard their own policies of nudity
depiction in photographs to publish the image. White House recordings
that were later released showed that then President Richard Nixon
and Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman wondered whether the
photo was authentic or actually staged. At the time the
(03:47):
photo was published, anti war sentiment had already been escalating
in the United States, so the photo did not really
contribute as much to such feelings among Americans as some
media sources have stated. It's also a myth, as some
sources have noted that the photo helped in the war,
which came to a close in nineteen seventy five. In
(04:08):
nineteen seventy three, the United States pulled out of the
Vietnam War. That same year, Oot won the Pulitzerprise for
Spot News Photography and the World Press Photo of the
Year for that image. Boot and kim Fuch stayed in
touch over the years. Nick Oot retired in t seventeen.
Kim Fuch went on to help victims of war around
(04:29):
the world. I'm Eve jeffco and hopefully you know a
little more about history today than you did yesterday. Keep
up with us on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook at T
D I h C Podcast And if you are as
fascinated by history and its resounding effects as I am,
you'd probably love the new podcast Unpopular. It's a show
(04:52):
I host about people who challenge the status quo, even
when they faced the threat of persecution. In the show,
I take a look at what the descent of our
forebears can teach us about protest and contrarian is m. Today,
you can listen wherever you listen to this Day and
History Class. Thanks again for being here and we'll see
you tomorrow. Hey, y'all, I'm Eves and welcome to the
(05:24):
Sand History Class, a podcast where we rip out a
page from the history books every single day. The day
was June three, a volcanic fissure in Iceland called Lacki
began erupting. The eruption, also known as the scoff Towl Fires,
(05:47):
lasted eight months. Lack A gigar, or Lacky It's part
of a volcanic system in the southeastern part of Iceland.
Another nearby volcano, Greenswatin, was erupting at the same time
as the Lucky fissure. At the time of the eruption,
the population of Iceland was at about fifty thousand. Weeks
(06:07):
before the eruption began, people in the area felt earthquakes.
On June three, black A gigar began erupting when lava
began pouring out of more than one d and thirty
volcanic craters. The eruption consisted of ten pulses of activity,
and each pulse had similar phases. There were earthquakes, then
a new fissure, then a short explosive eruption, then violent
(06:31):
explosions with the high rate of magma discharge, then low
level eruptions with lava flows. A priest named Jon Staying
Grimson described the eruption saying, in part quote, first the
ground swelled up with tremendous howling, then suddenly a cry
shattered it into pieces. Volcanic ash from the eruption was
(06:52):
then carried away by the wind and spread over the
land and sea. The lava from the fissures covered nearly
one thousand square miles of land or sare kilometers. Volcanic
gases convert to aerosols in the atmosphere and can't affect
whole regions. The lava flows released sulfur dioxide, which created
acid rains that killed trees and irritated skin. The clouds
(07:15):
of sulfur dioxide and hydrogen fluoride that lay produced turned
into a haze that spread throughout Europe and into Russia
and China. People realized that animals were being affected by
the eruption, getting growths on their bodies and becoming bloated.
As the earth was contaminated, livestock were poisoned. More than
half of Iceland's grazing livestock died due to the Lucky eruption.
(07:39):
Because the poisonous clouds killed crops and livestock, famine and
disease were rampant. This resulted in the depth of somewhere
between twenty and of Iceland's population. Some people have suggested
that the famine and poverty the eruption caused helped trigger
the French Revolution. Most of the lava flows erupted it
(08:00):
in the first five months of the event, but the
eruption wasn't completely over until February of four By the
end of the eruption, the fissures extended for seventeen miles
or twenty seven kilometers. The newly formed chain of volcanoes
was later named Lackey. The eruption had a huge impact
on Iceland in other places in the Northern Hemisphere. It
(08:22):
produced one of the largest basaltic lava flows in recorded history,
but it's direct effect on Earth's climate has been debated.
Some have suggested that the eruption caused regional cooling and
precipitation patterns. I'm Eve Jeff Cote and hopefully you know
a little more about history today than you did yesterday.
And if you have any comments our suggestions, you can
(08:44):
send them to us at this day at i heeart
media dot com. Feel free to leave us a kind
note on social media as well. We're at t d
i h C Podcast on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Thanks
for tuning in and we'll see you tomorrow. M For
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
(09:07):
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hello everyone, it's Eves checking in here to let you
know that you're going to be hearing two different events
in history in this episode. They're both good, if I
do say so myself. On with the show. Hello, Hello, everyone,
Welcome to this Day in History class, where we bring
you a new tidbit from history every day. The day
(00:26):
was Dune eighth, nineteen seventy two. The Vietnam War, a
particularly deadly conflict, had been going on for nearly two decades.
Associated press photographer Nick Boot was outside of Chong Bong,
a village in southeast Vietnam, when a South Vietnamese aircraft
dropped his payload of napalm. Boot took photos of the scene.
(00:50):
One of those photos became known as the Napalm Girl
photo of black and white picture of a young girl
named Fonti Kim Fuk running naked as other children ran
alongside her and South Vietnamese forces followed. The horrifying picture
became a symbol of the brutality of the war, and
it got Nick Oot a Pulitzer prize. Nick Oot was
(01:14):
born in Vietnam in nineteen fifty one, after his older brother,
who was an Associated press photographer, died in Vietnam. Oot
began to take photos for the A p at age sixteen,
Oot was covering the Vietnam War for the AP when
he captured the photo. Near Chang Bong, a South Vietnamese
(01:34):
Air Force pilot flying a propeller driven American made A
one skywriter carried out the napalm bombing at Chang Bong.
The point of the attack was to get North Vietnamese
units out of their positions at Chang Bong. As witnessed
the aftermath of the attack, he took photos he used
to like a M two camera with a thirty five
(01:55):
millimeter Sumicron Lands TV cameraman Alan Downs had also caught
footage of Kim Fuch and the other children running down
the road away from the napalm attack. At the time
took the photo, called the Terror of War, Kim Fuk
was nine years old. Kim Fuk is just left of
center in the photo, her mouth open in a yell
(02:17):
and her arms outstretched as she runs towards the camera.
The children that surround her are clothed and the South
Vietnamese forces walk behind them as a plume of smoke
rises in the background. The fire caused by the bombs
had burned off Kim Fuke's clothes and burned her skin.
A correspondent gave her water and poured some on her burns.
(02:41):
When realized that Kim Fuke had been burned, he took
her to a hospital in Saigone. Doctor said she might
not survive her third degree burns, and she was sent
to a specialist plastic surgery center. She received many surgical
procedures for her injuries and survived, though some of her
family members died. An editor at the AP rejected the
(03:03):
photo because it showed full frontal nudity. Back then, photos
that included nudity were off limits. Horse Foss, head of
the Saigon photo department, said that they should make an
exception to publish the photo, under the condition that no
close ups of Kim Fuk would be permitted. How Buel,
the New York photo editor, also believed the photo was
(03:25):
worth sharing despite the nudity, so the AP transmitted the photo.
Many newsrooms had to disregard their own policies of nudity
depiction in photographs to publish the image. White House recordings
that were later released showed that then President Richard Nixon
and Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman wondered whether the
photo was authentic or actually staged. At the time the
(03:47):
photo was published, anti war sentiment had already been escalating
in the United States, so the photo did not really
contribute as much to such feelings among Americans as some
media sources have stated. It's also a myth, as some
sources have noted that the photo helped in the war,
which came to a close in nineteen seventy five. In
(04:08):
nineteen seventy three, the United States pulled out of the
Vietnam War. That same year, Oot won the Pulitzerprise for
Spot News Photography and the World Press Photo of the
Year for that image. Boot and kim Fuch stayed in
touch over the years. Nick Oot retired in t seventeen.
Kim Fuch went on to help victims of war around
(04:29):
the world. I'm Eve jeffco and hopefully you know a
little more about history today than you did yesterday. Keep
up with us on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook at T
D I h C Podcast And if you are as
fascinated by history and its resounding effects as I am,
you'd probably love the new podcast Unpopular. It's a show
(04:52):
I host about people who challenge the status quo, even
when they faced the threat of persecution. In the show,
I take a look at what the descent of our
forebears can teach us about protest and contrarian is m. Today,
you can listen wherever you listen to this Day and
History Class. Thanks again for being here and we'll see
you tomorrow. Hey, y'all, I'm Eves and welcome to the
(05:24):
Sand History Class, a podcast where we rip out a
page from the history books every single day. The day
was June three, a volcanic fissure in Iceland called Lacki
began erupting. The eruption, also known as the scoff Towl Fires,
(05:47):
lasted eight months. Lack A gigar, or Lacky It's part
of a volcanic system in the southeastern part of Iceland.
Another nearby volcano, Greenswatin, was erupting at the same time
as the Lucky fissure. At the time of the eruption,
the population of Iceland was at about fifty thousand. Weeks
(06:07):
before the eruption began, people in the area felt earthquakes.
On June three, black A gigar began erupting when lava
began pouring out of more than one d and thirty
volcanic craters. The eruption consisted of ten pulses of activity,
and each pulse had similar phases. There were earthquakes, then
a new fissure, then a short explosive eruption, then violent
(06:31):
explosions with the high rate of magma discharge, then low
level eruptions with lava flows. A priest named Jon Staying
Grimson described the eruption saying, in part quote, first the
ground swelled up with tremendous howling, then suddenly a cry
shattered it into pieces. Volcanic ash from the eruption was
(06:52):
then carried away by the wind and spread over the
land and sea. The lava from the fissures covered nearly
one thousand square miles of land or sare kilometers. Volcanic
gases convert to aerosols in the atmosphere and can't affect
whole regions. The lava flows released sulfur dioxide, which created
acid rains that killed trees and irritated skin. The clouds
(07:15):
of sulfur dioxide and hydrogen fluoride that lay produced turned
into a haze that spread throughout Europe and into Russia
and China. People realized that animals were being affected by
the eruption, getting growths on their bodies and becoming bloated.
As the earth was contaminated, livestock were poisoned. More than
half of Iceland's grazing livestock died due to the Lucky eruption.
(07:39):
Because the poisonous clouds killed crops and livestock, famine and
disease were rampant. This resulted in the depth of somewhere
between twenty and of Iceland's population. Some people have suggested
that the famine and poverty the eruption caused helped trigger
the French Revolution. Most of the lava flows erupted it
(08:00):
in the first five months of the event, but the
eruption wasn't completely over until February of four By the
end of the eruption, the fissures extended for seventeen miles
or twenty seven kilometers. The newly formed chain of volcanoes
was later named Lackey. The eruption had a huge impact
on Iceland in other places in the Northern Hemisphere. It
(08:22):
produced one of the largest basaltic lava flows in recorded history,
but it's direct effect on Earth's climate has been debated.
Some have suggested that the eruption caused regional cooling and
precipitation patterns. I'm Eve Jeff Cote and hopefully you know
a little more about history today than you did yesterday.
And if you have any comments our suggestions, you can
(08:44):
send them to us at this day at i heeart
media dot com. Feel free to leave us a kind
note on social media as well. We're at t d
i h C Podcast on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Thanks
for tuning in and we'll see you tomorrow. M For
more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
(09:07):
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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