June 8, 1972 (a Thursday)

Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of a naked 9-year-old Phan Thị Kim Phúc running down a road after being burned by napalm.

On this date, an iconic Pulitzer Prize–winning photograph of the Vietnam War was taken by AP photographer Huyng Cong Nick Ut. The photo shows Phan Thị Kim Phúc at about nine years of age running naked on a road in the village of Trang Bang, screaming from burns to her skin. Trang Bang had just come under attack by South Vietnamese planes, which mistakenly dropped napalm on a Buddhist pagoda in an area where the North Vietnamese were infiltrating. While running for safety with other children, Kim was severely burned by the napalm.

Kim suffered many years of painful burn therapy, but she always longed to reach out and help other children who were victimized by war.

Kim Phuc today.

In the 1980s, Kim got a chance to study medicine in Cuba, where she met her future husband, Bui Huy Toan. In 1992, the couple asked for political asylum in Canada during their honeymoon trip.

Half a century later, she lives in Ajax, Ontario, with her husband and two children. She established Kim Phuc Foundation International, with the aim of providing medical and psychological assistance to child victims of war.

Phan Thị Kim Phúc is the living symbol of the suffering of innocent war victims. Her image of being burned by napalm during the Vietnam War raised worldwide awareness of the horrors of the War, and indeed of all wars, and made her the bearer of the message of forgiveness, reconciliation, and tolerance.