Stream now with KPBS Passport / Watch Tuesday, Aug.12, 2025 at 8 p.m. on KPBS TV
"The Bomb" tells a powerful story of the most destructive invention in human history, outlining how America developed the nuclear bomb, how it changed the world and how it continues to loom large in our lives. Witness the raw power and strangely compelling beauty of rare views of above-ground nuclear tests.
The documentary includes interviews with historians Richard Rhodes, Martin Sherwin, Robert Norris, Sergei Khrushchev and others, along with men and women who helped build the weapon piece by piece. Audiences also hear from former Secretary of State George Shultz and Secretary of Defense William Perry, who reveal how the bomb was viewed inside government circles, as well as those who hold firsthand memories of seeing the first mushroom clouds fill the skies.
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Albert Einstein and Robert Oppenheimer, theoretical physicists.
Courtesy of National Archives/Public Domain
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Atomic Test - Dominic Truckee, 9 June 1962.
Courtesy of Ken Hackman
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Atomic Test - Dominic Bluestone, 30 June 1962.
Courtesy of Ken Hackman
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General Leslie Groves in front of wall map. Groves was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer and director of the Manhattan Project.
Courtesy of National Archives/Public Domain
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General Leslie Groves at Trinity site.
Courtesy of Library of Congress
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“The Gadget” (code name for the bomb) hoisted onto testing tower.
Courtesy of Los Alamos National Library
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The only existing color photo of the Trinity Test.
Courtesy of Jack Aeby/Los Alamos National Library
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"Fat Man" atomic bomb. A Fat Man bomb was dropped over Nagasaki, Japan, on August 9, 1945, near the end of World War II.
Courtesy of Los Alamos National Library
This groundbreaking film provides captivating insights through its masterfully restored footage and its assembly of voices who were there when the atomic age began.
To create the bomb, a vast industrial complex is built with cities appearing out of nowhere. Thousands of workers are recruited, but are told only enough to do their own job, nothing more. Yet despite the urgency of the crisis, a huge pool of potential talent is virtually ignored. Women are typists and secretaries, and run schools and libraries. But scarcely any scientists or engineers are women.
In 1946, fear and faith in science collide. For the first time, Americans begin to learn more about the bomb. One in-depth essay about the experiences of the people in Hiroshima creates a sensation and has enormous impact, causing many to rethink nuclear weapons. At the same time, the new Atomic Age is promising miraculous progress in all areas of life, thanks to the wonders of the atom.
See how a power play by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev backfired, sparking a dangerous confrontation with the U.S. — the Cuban Missile Crisis. Over fifty years later, we still don’t know everything about what happened; many Soviet records are still secret. But this much is clear: October 1962 was the closest the world has ever come to thermonuclear war.
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