25 Monument of "Zensonpo"
(Abbreviation of "All Japan Casualty Insurance Labor Union")
Completed : August 6, 1965
Established by : the All Japan Casualty Insurance Labor Union, Hiroshima Regional Conference
At the time of the bombing, 200 people worked at 14 insurance companies in the city. Of these, 89 were killed.
The Hiroshima branch of the union made this monument through donations solicited from fellow union members around the country. They also solicited ideas for the inscription and the monument's design.
Immediately after the war, when messages written on monuments were often constrained by occupation policy, this monument somehow was engraved with, "Why did it happen? Why does it continue? Never forget, neither that hatred, nor this vow." This pointed accusation that dropping the atomic bomb was a crime and call for the new generation to inherit the movement to build peace in the world make this monument quite significant.
