Film: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

16 mm color film showing the explosion of the atomic bomb at Nagasaki, Japan, as seen from an airplane. Norman Foster Ramsey Jr. (1915–2011), the donor, was an American physicist who worked in the Radiation Laboratory at M.I.T. and on the Manhattan Project during World War II. In 1989, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.

Ref: “Norman Ramsey, 96, Dies; Work Led to Atomic Clock,” New York Times (Nov. 7, 2011), p. A23.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: 1945
• maker: Eastman Kodak Company
• Object Name: motion picture film
• Physical Description: steel (can material)
• Physical Description: paperboard (reel material)
• Measurements: overall: 3/4 in x 3 3/4 in; 1.905 cm x 9.525 cm
• Measurements: overall: 2 cm x 9.4 cm; 25/32 in x 3 11/16 in
• Measurements: reel: 9.3 cm; 3 21/32 in
• Measurements: film: 16 mm; 5/8 in
• place made: United States: New York, Rochester
• ID Number: 1995.0003.01
• accession number: 1995.0003
• catalog number: 1995.0003.01
• Credit Line: Gift of Norman Ramsey.
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.