Kim Phuc Phan Thi, ‘Napalm Girl,’ to receive Randolph’s Pearl S. Buck Award this fall

Kim Phuc Phan Thi

Kim Phuc Phan Thi, known worldwide as the “Napalm Girl,” will receive Randolph College’s 2025-2026 Pearl S. Buck Award this fall.

Phuc was 9 years old in 1972 when she was immortalized in the Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph, The Terror of War, an image that depicted her running naked in agony following a napalm strike during the Vietnam War.

“The photograph is the iconic image from that war,” said President Sue Ott Rowlands. “Kim’s tenacity and compassion as she recovered from her injuries and built a life for herself is a testament to  the human spirit. She is a marvelous advocate for the rights of children and victims of war. She is, indeed, a most worthy recipient of the Pearl S. Buck Award.”

The ceremony, which is free and open to the public, will be held Sept. 10 at 5 p.m. in Smith Hall Theatre. A book signing is scheduled after the event, and she will visit campus alongside Huynh Cong Ut, known professionally as Nick Ut, who took the photograph.

Nick Ut, posing with his famous “Napalm Girl” photograph.

Once a living symbol of the atrocities of war, Phuc is now a world-renowned speaker and advocate for peace.

She has spent 30 years as a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for the Culture of Peace and is the founder and president of The KIM Foundation International, a nonprofit dedicated to helping child victims of war, violence, and poverty.

She holds eight honorary doctorates and has been honored with many awards, including the 2004 Order of Ontario and the 2019 Dresden Peace Prize.

Her 2017 memoir, Fire Road, has been translated into 10 languages.

Phuc and Ut, who took her and other wounded children to the hospital on that fateful day in 1972, have remained friends.

Ut, who joined the Associated Press (AP) in 1965, won both the Pulitzer for Spot News Photography and the World Press Photo of the Year for The Terror of War. He spent 51 years with the AP, eventually moving to Los Angeles, where he covered wildfires, riots, earthquakes, the O.J. Simpson case, the Olympics, and the Pope’s visit, to name a few.

He’s still an active photographer who teaches and holds exhibitions.