20 November 2006
A 'Victory over Japan' exhibition was opened in London by the Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, on August 21st 1945, shortly after the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima on 6th August and the surrender of Japan on VJ Day (15th August in the UK). The exhibition ran for four months and closed on December 23rd, after it had been visited by over one and a half million people; that's nearly 400,000 a month, over 10,000 a day on average.
Despite its massive popularity, I can find no mention of the exhibition in any books about post-war Britain, or on Anglo-Japanese relations. It is remarkable how events, which were massively popular in their day, fade away from memory.
The Times reported on August 21st that on entering the exhibition "visitors will find themselves experiencing jungle conditions." Giant cobwebs "brush against the face as one passes, and spiders, the size of a man's hand, are seen curled up in the web. One hears the sound of running water, the noise of insects and the wails of jackals and hyenas." To add further realism "the temperature is kept at an artificial heat of 120 degrees."
Cecil Taylor, director of the Displays and Exhibitions Division at the Ministry of Information, wrote to LR Bradley, the director of the Imperial War Museum, inviting him to attend the exhibition, but warned that the exhibition was "drawing the public to an extent exceeding all our expectations. I suggest 10 a.m. is the only feasible time any day for an examination of the show; after that hour it is so crowded as to make detailed assessment practically impossible."
Bradley was interested in acquiring some of the exhibits for the Imperial War Museum collection, and in due course the museum did receive a few items including dummy figures, model aircraft, munitions and weaponry.
My own in interest in this exhibition arose because it was held at the same "10,000 square feet" venue in London, on Oxford Street, near Tottenham Court Road, where the 'Germany under Control' exhibition was held six months later (see earlier postings). I thought it would be interesting the compare the two exhibitions, to see how the British Ministry of Information presented victory over one enemy, Japan, and the post-war occupation of the second, Germany.
Unfortunately it seems that there is not enough material available about the 'Victory over Japan' exhibition to make a useful comparison possible. It will have to stay as a footnote in history, with a few interesting items in the archives. (This posting is based on material from The Times on 21 August 1945, 22 August 1945 and 24 December 1945 and a file at the Imperial War Museum).
I have discovered more about the 'Germany under Control' exhibition and will write about this in future postings.
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