Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey Brainstuff Lauren Volgebaum here. The first illnesses appeared around nineteen twenty, and initially doctors were baffled. Otherwise healthy young women were suddenly sick with a number of ailments, including anemia and cancer. But the most concerning symptom these working class women had was the crosis of the jaw. Their faces were literally rotting away. So what did these young women have in
common other than their symptoms. They were all factory workers. Every one of them worked in radium dial factories in New Jersey, Illinois, and Connecticut. The women who were falling ill were employed as painters of radium dials. They painted watch dials, clocks, and instruments for ships and aircraft with glow in the dark paint. Eventually, they'd learned that it
was radium poisoning from the paint that was slowly killing them. Later, as lawsuits against their employers mounted, the press dubbed the women the Radium Girls. For the article this episode is based on How Stuff Works. Spoke by email with James stem A, curator of the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History. He explained when Marie Currey and pr Currey discovered radium in eighteen ninety eight. It was only the
third radioactive element discovered. While radium had no practical applications at first, it was soon discovered that the radiation emitted by radium could kill living cells, and doctors began using it to treat cancers. The stem said. A new treatment for cancer obviously created a sensation, and many people concluded that if radiation could cure cancer, then it must be good for you. In general, both legitimate medical practitioners and
frauds grabbed the idea and ran with it. A Radium became a major fat It was promoted as a cure for anything and everything. A company sold devices that infused radium's radiation into drinking water, and Stems said a Radium also appeared in other consumer products, such as cleaning products, disinfectants, and cosmetics. Companies added the word radium to their products simply as a marketing tool, even when there was no radium used. Another industry also began using radium, but not
for its curative abilities On its own. The element glows dimly in the dark. When mixed with a substance like zinc, it takes on a bright green color that can make for a glowing paint. Industrial manufacturers realized that this paint, known as radium paint, could be used to make instruments in clocks visible at night. Demand grew as World War One began. In nineteen fourteen, the United States Radium Corporation, or USRC was founded. USRC hired young women to delicately
apply paint to these instruments. Their small hands were suited to the detailed work, and the jobs paid well and were considered somewhat prestigious, especially considering the lack of employment opportunities for women at the time. A Stem said at the height of the industry in the early nineteen twenties, about two thousand women were employed. Estimates of the total number of women employed in the industry between nineteen seventeen and nineteen thirty five vary, but a number approaching ten
thousand is not unreasonable. The women would mix their own paint from radium dust and other ingredients. They were soon known as ghost girls because the dust made their skin, hair, and clothes glow when they went out after work. Some of the women even used radium paint on their teeth to brighten their smiles, but even those who didn't still often had direct contact with the paint. The Stem explained. Oh once the paint was mixed, the extremely fine detail
painting required very sharply point paint brushes. To ensure a sufficiently sharp point, The women were told to use their lips and tongue to shape the brush, and they had to do this repeatedly throughout the day to keep that fine point. The women's employers assured them that the paint was harmless, but soon many of the women fell ill, some severely with necrosis of the jaw. Stems said this extremely painful and disfiguring condition was the most common of
the diseases suffered by the radium girls. A radium poisoning caused the victim's jaws to disintegrate over time, eventually killing them. By the time the first dial painter died in nineteen twenty three, the medical community had begun to suspect that radium exposure was the cause. By the late nineteen twenties, many of the women had fallen dangerously ill several had died. Although USRC continued to assure the workers that they were safe,
the company knew that working with radium was dangerous. Stem said A report commissioned by USRC in the early nineteen twenties concluded that the total lack of safety precautions was putting the dial painters in danger. The company submitted a falsified version of the report to officials and suppressed its findings, continuing to refute the idea that its radium dial paint was making anyone sick. Stems said, when one of usrc's senior chemists died of a plastic anemia in nineteen twenty five,
it became obvious that there was a connection. Studies by officials in New Jersey proved the women were suffering from radiation poisoning and that it had come from the radium that they were exposed to in their workplace. By the late nineteen twenties, five women sued USRC in Orange, New Jersey, starting with Grace Friar. It took Friar two years to find an attorney to take the case, but once she did, four other women joined. Paper headlines dubbed them the living
Dead and the Radium Girls. Their attorney, Raymond Barry, hired thirty year old physicist Elizabeth Hughes, who used an electroscope to measure radioactivity in the breadth of the five dial painters. Hughes testified that all five women had ingested so much radium that their breath was toxic. Hughes testimony gained worldwide attention. To avoid the bad publicity, USRC agreed to an out
of court settlement. STEM said it was one of the first instances in the United States in which employers were held libel for the health and safety of their employees. It led to the creation of workplace safety regulations and of government oversight organizations like the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. By nineteen twenty seven, more than fifty women had died because of radium paint poisoning. But the Radium Girls story
doesn't end there. Their story saved consumers lives too. They're suffering made the public aware of the dangers of radium a. STEM said. By nineteen thirty five, the use of radium in most consumer products had ended and government regulation banned its use. A Radium was still used in aircraft instruments with a lot more safety precautions in place until the nineteen seventies, but today it's been replaced by technology that's a lot less deadly, and some of the radium girls
lived long lives. Mabel Williams, for instance, worked at USRC at age sixteen. She lived to the ripe old age of one hundred and four. Another may Keene, died in twenty fourteen at the age of one hundred and seven. They are legends in American and women's history. Today's episode is based on the article The Radium Girl's Dark Story Still Glows with Death End Deceit on houstuffworks dot com,
written by Cape Morgan. You'd like to hear more about the Radium Girls story, check out the first episode of my other podcasts, American Shadows. Brainstuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership withhoustuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.