Where We First Blew Up the Bomb

This week is the 79th anniversary of two nuclear weapons used on a human populace. In remembrance, I look to the region where the first bomb was set off as a test, less than a month before it was used against the Japanese people.

Where this devastation begins is hard country, Jornada del Muerto, which means journey of the dead. The name came before “Trinity Site,” and was taken for the bones of a horse and rider found there by a Spanish party more than 350 years ago, as if some poor...