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Hiroshima A-bomb museum head Hataguchi to retire+
(Japan Economic Newswire Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)HIROSHIMA, March 29_(Kyodo) _ Minoru Hataguchi, head of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, will leave the museum Saturday, the Hiroshima prefectural government said Wednesday.
When the United States dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima during World War II, Hataguchi was exposed to radiation in his mother's womb.
After becoming the 10th manager of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in April 1997, Hataguchi arranged museum tours for celebrities and leading figures visiting Hiroshima from both abroad and other parts of Japan. He told visitors of his Hiroshima experience and showed them articles left by his father, who succumbed to the atomic bomb.
When the United States and Britain conducted a joint subcritical nuclear experiment in Nevada on Feb. 23 this year, Hataguchi, 60, reset to zero the clock displaying the number of days since the last nuclear experiment on the Peace Watch Tower in the museum.
"It makes me feel as if the nightmare is coming back," Hataguchi said then.
Koichiro Maeda, 57, who heads the Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims, will succeed Hataguchi, the Hiroshima government said.
The atomic bomb exploded over Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, and an estimated 140,000 people were killed by the bomb or its aftereffects by the end of that year.
A second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945, and World War II ended six days later.
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