THE FIRST FOUR MONTHS

In this exhibit, visitors see a series of ten enlarged, backlit panels bearing images of newspaper front pages highlighting the dramatic string of events that dominated the first four months of Harry Truman's Presidency.

Among others, the headlines include announcements of the end of the war against Germany, the signing of the United Nations Charter, the Potsdam Conference, firebombing Japan, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan, and the end of the war in the Pacific. Also displayed in this area is an American flag that was made at the end of the war by American prisoners of war in Tokyo. The flag was fashioned out of parachutes that were used to drop food and supplies to the POWs in the days immediately following the Japanese surrender but before American troops could liberate the camp.