History Buffoons Podcast, We Are Buffoons! Now on YouTube!
Oct. 1, 2024

The Status Quo Remains the Same

The Status Quo Remains the Same
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Season 1

Ever wondered how a superhero movie soundtrack could compete with the likes of "Dazed and Confused"? Find out as we kick back and chat about the new Deadpool and Wolverine flick, and its awesome soundtrack. Plus, we share some laugh-out-loud moments as we try (and sometimes fail) to open cans of some of our favorite beers, including Sierra Nevada's Cool Little Thing IPA and Pet Skull Brewing's Gumskull Sea Salt and Lime Lager. If you're a beer aficionado, you'll definitely appreciate our brewery tales and flavor discoveries.

But the mood shifts as we dive into the haunting history of the Radium Girls, young women who suffered tragic consequences due to radium exposure. We discuss everything from the misleading assurances they received from their employers to the devastating health impacts they faced. This chapter paints a vivid and heartbreaking picture of industrial negligence and the brave women who fought for justice despite overwhelming odds.

We'll take you through the harrowing legal battles these women endured, the systemic failures that allowed such tragedies, and the eventual closure of the United States Radium Corporation. But don't worry, we lighten things up with some amusing stories about Marie and Pierre Curie, and even throw in a fun idea involving glow sticks. This episode promises a rollercoaster of emotions, blending lighthearted moments with a sobering look at a dark chapter in industrial history. Tune in for a captivating blend of humor, tragedy, and resilience.

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Chapters

00:09 - Radium Girls and Beer Chat

10:20 - Radioactive Products and Radium Workers

18:34 - Radium Poisoning in the Workplace

29:00 - The Radium Contamination Investigation

41:53 - The Fight for Radium Victims' Compensation

55:19 - The Radium Girls Settlement Negotiation

01:08:24 - Radium History and Casual Conversation

Transcript
WEBVTT

00:00:09.984 --> 00:00:14.487
oh hey there, oh hey there, jesus.

00:00:15.407 --> 00:00:24.891
Maniacal laughter so I just came from not, but I just watched the Wolverine movie.

00:00:25.532 --> 00:00:25.832
Deadpool.

00:00:25.853 --> 00:00:26.393
Deadpool.

00:00:26.393 --> 00:00:28.114
Deadpool versus.

00:00:28.653 --> 00:00:28.873
And.

00:00:29.333 --> 00:00:31.414
Yep, deadpool and Wolverine.

00:00:31.414 --> 00:00:33.176
Yep, that's the title of it.

00:00:33.195 --> 00:00:34.057
It's kind of boring.

00:00:34.057 --> 00:00:34.936
What?

00:00:34.936 --> 00:00:35.656
Why is it boring?

00:00:35.656 --> 00:00:36.557
Just the title.

00:00:37.637 --> 00:00:37.938
I don't know.

00:00:37.938 --> 00:00:40.488
It could be like something much cooler.

00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:44.890
Could be Deadpool slash Wolverine because he's got claws.

00:00:46.880 --> 00:00:47.923
Let's see what you did.

00:00:48.564 --> 00:01:03.283
Anyway, I just came from it and one of my favorite parts of the Deadpool movies is the soundtrack yeah, he, he does pretty well with the, with the soundtracks, and they just see what works right for that character.

00:01:03.302 --> 00:01:05.069
I know, and it's just so good.

00:01:05.560 --> 00:01:05.760
Like.

00:01:05.760 --> 00:01:07.266
Was it him sitting on the?

00:01:07.266 --> 00:01:11.266
Was it the first one where he's sitting on the bridge, in the very beginning, where he's listening to Shoop?

00:01:11.841 --> 00:01:12.864
by Salt-N-Pepa.

00:01:13.466 --> 00:01:14.489
Okay, we didn't ask for that.

00:01:14.489 --> 00:01:18.128
That is unnecessary.

00:01:18.920 --> 00:01:20.045
Yeah, no, I think.

00:01:20.045 --> 00:01:22.347
Yeah, all of the soundtracks are pretty awesome.

00:01:22.700 --> 00:01:25.103
I like how you said yeah, no because, yeah, all of the soundtracks are pretty awesome.

00:01:25.123 --> 00:01:27.948
I like how you said yeah, no, because that is such a Midwest thing to do.

00:01:27.968 --> 00:01:28.209
No, yeah, yeah.

00:01:28.209 --> 00:01:31.034
There's literally two ways to say it yeah, no and no yeah.

00:01:31.034 --> 00:01:35.509
And they both mean something individual, so that's pretty funny how that works.

00:01:35.509 --> 00:01:38.810
But anyways, we're from the Midwest.

00:01:39.460 --> 00:01:41.128
Do you have a favorite soundtrack?

00:01:41.459 --> 00:01:43.206
Do I have a favorite soundtrack?

00:01:43.206 --> 00:01:48.903
Oh boy, I haven't really thought of soundtracks in a while.

00:01:48.903 --> 00:01:51.111
I mean, the soundtrack for the movie Dazed and Confused is fan-fucking-tastic.

00:01:51.171 --> 00:01:52.215
Well, I've never seen that movie.

00:01:52.379 --> 00:01:53.283
Oh, it's such a great movie.

00:01:53.283 --> 00:01:56.210
It's directed by Richard Linklater.

00:01:56.210 --> 00:01:58.444
That was Matthew McConaughey's first role.

00:01:58.444 --> 00:02:06.353
Oh, and that's why, if you ever see him or a lot of people do and he's like, all right, all right, all right, because that's where he did that in the movie.

00:02:06.353 --> 00:02:10.568
But yeah, ben Affleck was in it.

00:02:11.480 --> 00:02:12.707
Are we still talking about a movie?

00:02:13.280 --> 00:02:21.610
Yes, we're still talking about the movie that has one of the best soundtracks, because it was set in 76.

00:02:21.610 --> 00:02:33.710
Yeah, and so obviously a lot of 60s and 70s songs and stuff, aerosmith and all that whatever, yeah, so it's not just instrumental oh god, no, it's all just rock music really.

00:02:33.911 --> 00:02:43.609
Yeah, um, but yeah, they had some pretty, pretty big names in there that were relatively unknown at the time and I think it came out in like was it 94-ish?

00:02:43.609 --> 00:02:47.316
Give or take if I had to guess somewhere around there.

00:02:47.316 --> 00:02:52.912
But uh, yeah, that soundtrack is fantastic, yeah, so if I had to pick one off the top of my head, I would.

00:02:53.032 --> 00:03:00.986
I would probably pick that okay, so I've got this beer sitting next to me and I keep like reaching for it and you're like, and I'm like, oh crap, it's not open yet.

00:03:00.986 --> 00:03:02.860
And I've reached for it like four times already.

00:03:02.860 --> 00:03:04.246
So we both got a beer.

00:03:04.246 --> 00:03:06.623
Hold on, hold on, ready, ready.

00:03:06.623 --> 00:03:12.383
Yeah, mine just squirted all over, oh gosh, okay.

00:03:12.383 --> 00:03:14.246
At least it's not on my computer.

00:03:14.986 --> 00:03:15.768
No, that's a good thing.

00:03:16.109 --> 00:03:16.889
Okay, what you got.

00:03:17.389 --> 00:03:25.010
I have a Sierra Nevada cool little thing, ipa, which is a Cryo Fresh.

00:03:25.032 --> 00:03:25.737
Az IPA Cryo fresh.

00:03:25.777 --> 00:03:30.692
Yeah, so it's like I'm not extremely familiar with the cryo part because I've only had a few.

00:03:30.692 --> 00:03:34.610
It's funny to actually I've had one before.

00:03:34.610 --> 00:03:35.671
It was from Hop Valley.

00:03:37.242 --> 00:03:38.293
Is it nice and crisp.

00:03:38.818 --> 00:03:44.031
Yeah, it's a little more on the crisp side instead of the more juicy side for a hazy.

00:03:44.031 --> 00:03:45.682
Oh, okay, I think because of that.

00:03:45.682 --> 00:03:50.229
Maybe I'm not sure, but I do love me some Sierra Nevada.

00:03:50.819 --> 00:03:52.066
Yeah, you do, that's your favorite.

00:03:52.066 --> 00:03:53.443
Well, one of your favorites.

00:03:53.824 --> 00:03:55.751
It's my favorite brewery, is it yeah?

00:03:56.281 --> 00:03:57.284
Oh, so close yeah.

00:03:57.466 --> 00:04:09.709
And I've been to both of their breweries, so they have the original one in Chico, california, where Aaron Rogers is from, and they also have one now because aaron rogers are you kidding me?

00:04:09.889 --> 00:04:11.734
no, yes, I am kidding you no.

00:04:12.722 --> 00:04:31.026
The funny thing is, I believed you when you said no he was a packer, that's all I know now he plays on the jets anywho, um, and then I've also been to the Anywho, and then I've also been to the one they built a few years back in North Carolina, in Asheville, which was pretty cool.

00:04:31.026 --> 00:04:34.807
So that was a pretty neat trip though, but they had some good beers.

00:04:34.807 --> 00:04:37.689
In my opinion, celebration my favorite beer of the year.

00:04:38.089 --> 00:04:40.990
Well, I've got the Gumskull.

00:04:41.992 --> 00:04:42.552
Numbskull.

00:04:43.473 --> 00:04:44.892
It's G-U-M-B.

00:04:44.892 --> 00:04:47.514
Wouldn't numbskull be like K-N-U-B?

00:04:47.653 --> 00:04:49.035
Yeah, can I see the label?

00:04:49.035 --> 00:04:51.495
Cool, I see the G-U, g-u-m-b.

00:04:51.495 --> 00:04:54.338
Keep turning it, so wouldn't it be gumskull.

00:04:54.538 --> 00:05:03.595
That's what I said gumskull, gumskull, but it's gumskull, sea salt and lime lager and I like Modelo, so I kind of chose this one.

00:05:03.595 --> 00:05:05.579
Um, and it's, it is really good.

00:05:05.619 --> 00:05:06.201
I really like it.

00:05:06.281 --> 00:05:12.853
It's by um Pet Skull Brewing Company there you go but I don't know, like, where it's from.

00:05:12.853 --> 00:05:14.687
I guess I could have looked that up beforehand.

00:05:14.968 --> 00:05:16.694
That would have been probably ideal.

00:05:16.694 --> 00:05:19.000
Yeah well, I don't think about such things.

00:05:19.182 --> 00:05:24.528
I know and, but it's delicious, um, and I would recommend it if you like, modelo.

00:05:24.870 --> 00:05:27.153
Is it really limey?

00:05:27.934 --> 00:05:28.814
No, it's not Good.

00:05:28.814 --> 00:05:30.704
Yeah, it's nice and subtle.

00:05:30.785 --> 00:05:34.149
Good, because I think that would be overpowering as is the sea salt.

00:05:34.300 --> 00:05:37.244
I just put a dent in my can and now I can't get it out.

00:05:37.244 --> 00:05:39.125
Jesus, no, it's subtle, okay.

00:05:39.146 --> 00:05:39.526
Yeah, very delicious.

00:05:39.547 --> 00:05:43.291
Good Okay, very delicious, good Okay.

00:05:43.291 --> 00:05:44.853
So I've got a story for you.

00:05:45.495 --> 00:05:46.035
You do.

00:05:46.375 --> 00:05:49.425
Yeah, and I don't remember if I've talked to you about it yet or not.

00:05:49.485 --> 00:05:49.987
You haven't.

00:05:51.149 --> 00:05:52.713
Oh goody, oh goody.

00:05:52.713 --> 00:06:02.007
So I read this book over quarantine, actually, so 2020, if you recall.

00:06:02.870 --> 00:06:03.372
Who doesn't?

00:06:04.641 --> 00:06:14.432
Probably my daughter, because she's only two but, um, and I really enjoyed the story and it's always stuck with me so I decided to do an episode on it.

00:06:14.432 --> 00:06:34.571
All right, so this is about the radium girls oh, I've heard of that yes, yes, so most of my information I received from the book the Radium Girls the Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore.

00:06:34.571 --> 00:06:39.408
Okay, and I already had it in my Kindle library and everything.

00:06:39.588 --> 00:06:45.487
Well fantastic, I know Are you going to reference that in the show notes so people can read it?

00:06:45.487 --> 00:06:46.970
Yes, find it if they want to read it.

00:06:47.071 --> 00:06:49.295
Yes, all right, good, okay.

00:06:49.295 --> 00:06:51.307
So do you know anything about radium?

00:06:52.761 --> 00:06:55.689
Isn't it like toxic A little bit?

00:06:55.689 --> 00:06:59.189
I mean you don't want to have it for breakfast Dinner's.

00:06:59.189 --> 00:07:03.487
Okay, maybe put some on your Wheaties.

00:07:07.819 --> 00:07:08.500
Wheaties are underrated.

00:07:08.500 --> 00:07:09.221
Actually I like raisin bran.

00:07:09.221 --> 00:07:09.661
Okay, redirect.

00:07:09.661 --> 00:07:19.613
So radium was first discovered by 1898 by pierre and marie curie.

00:07:19.613 --> 00:07:29.514
Yep, yes, so do you know how many numbers are on the periodic table, or how many elements are on the periodic table?

00:07:30.120 --> 00:07:33.930
Isn't there like 52 or no, that's not right.

00:07:34.050 --> 00:07:34.891
No, there's quite a few.

00:07:34.891 --> 00:07:37.007
Yeah, there's way more than that, but I don't know either.

00:07:38.543 --> 00:07:40.310
But this was fantastic.

00:07:42.161 --> 00:07:43.927
But radium is number 88.

00:07:44.319 --> 00:07:45.464
Well, fucking A-rated is.

00:07:46.307 --> 00:07:51.767
So there's at least 88 on the periodic table oh, my word okay.

00:07:51.767 --> 00:07:54.396
Do you know what the chemical symbol is for radium?

00:07:54.396 --> 00:07:55.017
I do not.

00:07:55.017 --> 00:08:02.690
This one, you could probably guess fairly easily r e what?

00:08:04.012 --> 00:08:05.834
because that that was a really weird sounding A.

00:08:06.399 --> 00:08:10.281
That's because I was trying to pretend like I was from Amos.

00:08:10.281 --> 00:08:12.389
Stop eating bubble wrap.

00:08:15.541 --> 00:08:17.127
Is he eating it or is he popping it?

00:08:17.127 --> 00:08:17.990
That's the question.

00:08:18.740 --> 00:08:20.446
Is he anxious or is he hungry?

00:08:20.446 --> 00:08:21.370
Well, he's always hungry.

00:08:21.370 --> 00:08:26.983
Amos Amos, amos Amos, no Amos.

00:08:29.853 --> 00:08:36.070
Amos, amos, amos, no Amos, I see an ear, that's about it, though I'm going to keep the snort in there.

00:08:38.279 --> 00:08:39.666
So the chemical symbol is RA.

00:08:39.666 --> 00:08:47.703
Radium is a radioactive metal which is fairly soft, it's shiny and it's silvery.

00:08:47.703 --> 00:08:59.692
In the natural environment, radium occurs at trace levels in virtually all rock, soil, water, plants and animals.

00:09:00.113 --> 00:09:01.094
Oh my God, it's like everything.

00:09:01.173 --> 00:09:01.774
It's everywhere.

00:09:02.235 --> 00:09:03.895
I mean it's called planet Earth.

00:09:03.975 --> 00:09:04.976
Does that mean, I'm toxic?

00:09:08.859 --> 00:09:08.919
Yep.

00:09:10.140 --> 00:09:20.154
We finally know why so chronic exposure to high levels of radium can result in an increased incidence of bone, liver or breast cancer.

00:09:20.154 --> 00:09:29.700
Sure can as radium decays, it creates a radioactive gas called radon.

00:09:29.700 --> 00:09:32.241
Radon is common in many soils and can collect in homes and other buildings.

00:09:32.241 --> 00:09:35.385
Radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer in the United States.

00:09:35.865 --> 00:09:37.288
Oh shit, really yeah, I didn't know that.

00:09:37.288 --> 00:09:38.349
I know what's the first.

00:09:40.272 --> 00:09:40.873
Probably smoking.

00:09:42.014 --> 00:09:42.453
Are you sure?

00:09:42.453 --> 00:09:44.035
Nope, you didn't look that up.

00:09:44.059 --> 00:09:46.446
This is not a health podcast, not even close.

00:09:46.446 --> 00:09:48.191
Let's have a beer, let's have a beer.

00:09:48.191 --> 00:09:51.328
She's going to say cheers, cheers to that.

00:09:51.328 --> 00:10:08.826
So the Curies managed to extract one milligram of radium from 10 tons of the uranium ore, which is a considerable feat given the chemical methods of separation available to them.

00:10:09.168 --> 00:10:09.769
Sure, what did you say?

00:10:09.769 --> 00:10:10.770
1890?

00:10:10.770 --> 00:10:11.933
Is that what it was?

00:10:13.181 --> 00:10:15.868
It was 1898,.

00:10:15.868 --> 00:10:16.730
Yes, oh 98.

00:10:16.750 --> 00:10:17.532
Yeah, 98, yeah.

00:10:17.532 --> 00:10:19.908
So I mean that's a long time ago.

00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:28.115
So a single gram of radium back then sold for $120,000.

00:10:28.399 --> 00:10:33.791
I'm going to ask, and you're probably going to tell me no, do you have what that would equal today?

00:10:33.791 --> 00:10:36.485
I do, oh my God, you are learning.

00:10:39.061 --> 00:10:40.023
Do you want to take a guess?

00:10:40.745 --> 00:10:40.926
No.

00:10:42.009 --> 00:10:43.513
Go ahead $12?

00:10:43.513 --> 00:10:43.513
.

00:10:43.513 --> 00:10:50.586
Afflation goes up $120,000 for a single gram.

00:10:50.707 --> 00:10:56.365
Oh shit, with the inflation these days it's got to be like a billion dollars $2.2 million Wow.

00:10:56.546 --> 00:11:02.409
Yeah that's a lot, that's crazy and why would you sell radium?

00:11:02.409 --> 00:11:05.769
Because it glows in the dark.

00:11:06.240 --> 00:11:11.496
Didn't she glow in the dark by the end of her life because she was around it so much and experimenting with it, marie Curie.

00:11:11.618 --> 00:11:13.765
Yeah, yes, yeah, she was like crazy.

00:11:13.765 --> 00:11:17.029
So radium was called liquid sunshine.

00:11:17.480 --> 00:11:18.846
Liquid sunshine.

00:11:18.865 --> 00:11:19.368
Wow.

00:11:19.368 --> 00:11:23.409
So radium gained significant media attention.

00:11:23.409 --> 00:11:26.229
There were radium clinics and spas.

00:11:26.229 --> 00:11:38.114
They put it in water bottles like a tonic, yeah, and they had a recommended dose of five to seven glasses a day because they thought radium was going to be the cure all.

00:11:38.114 --> 00:11:39.884
So why did they think that?

00:11:39.884 --> 00:11:45.472
Because they didn't have the internet to research the facts.

00:11:46.041 --> 00:11:50.089
I understand that the internet came out a hundred years later.

00:11:50.379 --> 00:11:57.467
I realized that tumors actually shrunk with radio, yeah, so they thought it was a cure-all Gotcha.

00:11:59.020 --> 00:11:59.745
Wow, are they wrong.

00:12:00.120 --> 00:12:03.311
So a bottle of that tonic was $200.

00:12:03.539 --> 00:12:05.326
Holy fuck, but I bet they sold a bunch of them.

00:12:06.380 --> 00:12:08.326
And today it would be $3,700.

00:12:08.326 --> 00:12:09.530
Holy shit yeah.

00:12:10.820 --> 00:12:12.727
Here death in a bottle.

00:12:13.019 --> 00:12:14.403
Yeah, you're welcome.

00:12:14.966 --> 00:12:15.908
Do you want some lung cancer?

00:12:15.908 --> 00:12:16.510
I got you.

00:12:17.639 --> 00:12:21.143
Radium was promoted as a health booster, leading to its use in various products.

00:12:21.143 --> 00:12:23.705
Leading to its use in various products.

00:12:23.705 --> 00:12:31.671
So radium could destroy human tissue and it was quickly put to use to battle cancerous tumors.

00:12:31.671 --> 00:12:36.495
Okay, and apparently it could also treat hay fever, constipation and gout.

00:12:37.416 --> 00:12:38.057
Not the gout.

00:12:38.697 --> 00:12:45.187
Yeah Huh, Radium clinics, spas and companies selling radioactive products emerged.

00:12:45.187 --> 00:12:47.470
Get this Jock straps.

00:12:47.970 --> 00:12:48.090
Oh.

00:12:48.149 --> 00:12:52.875
God, lingerie, butter, milk, butter, mm-hmm.

00:12:52.875 --> 00:13:00.073
Milk, toothpaste, face creams, powders, soaps, even bug repellent.

00:13:00.073 --> 00:13:02.691
They're like let's just put radium in everything.

00:13:03.072 --> 00:13:04.419
No kidding, good Lord.

00:13:04.780 --> 00:13:06.768
But you want to know the funny thing.

00:13:07.168 --> 00:13:07.389
Yes.

00:13:07.679 --> 00:13:09.889
Not even all these products contain actual radium.

00:13:09.889 --> 00:13:13.547
They just said they did Yep Because it was too expensive.

00:13:13.779 --> 00:13:15.826
So snake oil kind of crap yeah.

00:13:15.826 --> 00:13:17.208
That's bullshit.

00:13:18.010 --> 00:13:29.413
Yeah, so Marie Curie developed mobile radiology units she called it radiology cars for medical treatment on the battlefield during World War I.

00:13:29.413 --> 00:13:38.090
So when America became involved in World War I in April of 1917, this is actually when our story starts.

00:13:38.431 --> 00:13:38.730
Okay.

00:13:39.720 --> 00:13:46.792
So we're going to talk about the Radium Luminous Materials Corporation in Newark, new Jersey.

00:13:46.792 --> 00:13:48.294
Okay, have you ever been?

00:13:49.240 --> 00:13:50.443
I've never been to New Jersey.

00:13:50.784 --> 00:13:51.768
I've seen their airport.

00:13:52.328 --> 00:13:52.629
Have you?

00:13:52.629 --> 00:13:54.620
Yeah, did you fly over it or were you in it?

00:13:54.620 --> 00:13:55.280
I was in it.

00:13:55.280 --> 00:13:56.581
Oh, okay, where were you headed?

00:13:56.581 --> 00:13:57.182
Italy?

00:13:57.182 --> 00:13:58.302
Oh yeah, nice.

00:13:58.302 --> 00:13:59.163
Yeah, you told me you went there.

00:13:59.903 --> 00:14:08.428
So at that corporation they created watch faces, gun sights, ship compasses and airplane instruments.

00:14:08.730 --> 00:14:09.610
All made out of radium.

00:14:10.049 --> 00:14:11.030
So they could glow in the dark.

00:14:11.572 --> 00:14:12.131
That's crazy.

00:14:12.251 --> 00:14:18.535
Yeah, so young women were employed there.

00:14:18.535 --> 00:14:20.636
It was considered like the best job around.

00:14:21.057 --> 00:14:21.258
Sure.

00:14:25.940 --> 00:14:29.447
And they would call on their siblings and their cousins and they would all be employed together because it was going to be a big, lucrative job.

00:14:29.447 --> 00:14:33.402
Yep, so each style painter had her own supply.

00:14:33.402 --> 00:14:36.366
They would actually mix their own paint.

00:14:36.366 --> 00:14:45.068
They would use radium powder, water and gum, arabic adhesive, and they called the luminous paint undark.

00:14:45.691 --> 00:14:46.251
Undark.

00:14:46.251 --> 00:14:50.126
Okay, I mean, it makes sense if it glowed.

00:14:50.126 --> 00:14:51.169
So it's not dark.

00:14:51.169 --> 00:14:54.105
So did it always glow?

00:14:54.105 --> 00:14:58.734
Or is it like those things that glow in the dark where you have to have the sunshine on it for a while?

00:14:58.734 --> 00:15:00.764
No, it always glows, it just was always glowing.

00:15:01.046 --> 00:15:01.347
Okay.

00:15:01.347 --> 00:15:13.073
So that paint only contained about a small amount of radium mixed with zinc sulfide, which the the radium also reacted to to create a brilliant glow.

00:15:13.073 --> 00:15:20.945
So, mixing the paint carefully, stirring it in their crucible, most women actually ended up with splashes on their bare hands, I would imagine.

00:15:20.945 --> 00:15:25.433
And there was dust all over the work studio.

00:15:25.433 --> 00:15:31.173
It was on the flat surfaces, the floors, the counters, and it seemed to hover in the air as well.

00:15:31.822 --> 00:15:33.754
I figured they probably inhaled quite a bit.

00:15:34.721 --> 00:15:40.114
Yeah, it settled on their shoulders and their hair and it literally made them all glow.

00:15:40.179 --> 00:15:42.649
I was going to say were they just walking around glowing they?

00:15:42.688 --> 00:15:42.889
were.

00:15:42.889 --> 00:15:43.600
That's crazy.

00:15:43.740 --> 00:15:44.001
Yes.

00:15:45.063 --> 00:15:51.075
So each worker had a slim camel hair brush with a narrow wooden handle.

00:15:51.075 --> 00:15:54.850
So it was a fine brush with only about 30 hairs.

00:15:54.850 --> 00:16:04.751
The smallest pocket watch was three and a half centimeters across, meaning the tiniest element for painting was a millimeter in width, good Lord.

00:16:04.751 --> 00:16:09.729
So how would you make these fine brushes even finer?

00:16:10.912 --> 00:16:11.493
Cut them in half.

00:16:12.441 --> 00:16:14.488
They would put the brushes in their mouths.

00:16:14.869 --> 00:16:14.928
Ew.

00:16:16.062 --> 00:16:18.549
So it's a technique called lip pointing.

00:16:21.182 --> 00:16:23.269
Oh, where they just make a fine tip on it, yep.

00:16:23.461 --> 00:16:24.451
So they would lip dip paint.

00:16:24.451 --> 00:16:24.552
That.

00:16:24.552 --> 00:16:25.159
So they would lip dip paint.

00:16:26.383 --> 00:16:35.466
That was their like motto lip dip paint, so their insides glow too then, or their mouth at least, because, good Lord, clearly they're getting it inside of them.

00:16:37.203 --> 00:16:44.051
So the women working there were also were fairly concerned about putting the stuff in their mouth.

00:16:44.051 --> 00:16:48.730
I would hope so, but their higher ups said that it wasn't dangerous and to not be afraid.

00:16:48.980 --> 00:16:50.746
That's why you should always listen to a CEO.

00:16:51.008 --> 00:16:54.830
Yeah, but the workers were paid by piecework.

00:16:54.830 --> 00:17:01.432
So for the number of dials they painted it was an average rate of $0.01 a watch.

00:17:01.432 --> 00:17:06.909
So they actually ranked in the top 5% of female wage earners.

00:17:06.909 --> 00:17:14.730
So they took home about an average of $20 a week, which in today's money is about $370 a week.

00:17:15.372 --> 00:17:15.973
That's terrible.

00:17:18.080 --> 00:17:20.904
The faster you painted, the more you made.

00:17:21.244 --> 00:17:21.726
Obviously.

00:17:22.207 --> 00:17:27.013
So, with all the dust in the air, the girls were asked to limit waste.

00:17:27.013 --> 00:17:34.093
So once their shift was over, they were taken to a dark room to be brushed off.

00:17:34.093 --> 00:17:50.673
Particles were swept up was a dark room so they could see where, where it was basically okay particles were swept up and used the next day, but but by the time they get home they're actually still covered, including their undergarments.

00:17:51.074 --> 00:17:53.767
Oh, right yeah their corsets, their underclothes.

00:17:53.767 --> 00:17:54.048
Everywhere.

00:17:54.560 --> 00:17:55.644
Yeah, it was everywhere.

00:17:55.644 --> 00:17:56.448
Yeah, that's crazy.

00:17:56.448 --> 00:18:05.636
So in 1917, congress voted America into World War I and the demand for radium products skyrocketed.

00:18:05.636 --> 00:18:15.294
Because of demand, they moved from newark to orange, new jersey, and this warehouse included labs and processing plants.

00:18:15.294 --> 00:18:24.506
70 women worked in newark and the numbers tripled in orange so did men not work here they were all at the war.

00:18:24.506 --> 00:18:30.448
They had like higher ups and people in the lab.

00:18:30.448 --> 00:18:33.738
So scientists and the CEOs C-suite C-suite.

00:18:33.738 --> 00:18:40.107
So the company founder Sabine von Soshocki Sure.

00:18:40.849 --> 00:18:41.550
Let's go with that one.

00:18:41.590 --> 00:18:43.625
Sure, sure he was Austrian born.

00:18:43.625 --> 00:18:50.511
Oh, sure was, and I'm going to have to get used to saying that because he appears a couple of times.

00:18:50.511 --> 00:18:53.945
So, von Sockshi, yep, I'm done already.

00:18:55.222 --> 00:18:56.607
Yeah, I've lost interest in that last name.

00:18:56.647 --> 00:18:58.403
Yeah, what was his first name?

00:18:58.403 --> 00:18:59.487
Sabine.

00:18:59.748 --> 00:19:00.269
Just say that.

00:19:03.560 --> 00:19:11.720
So, as Austrian born, he was 34 and he was um a phd, so he actually invented the paint in 1913.

00:19:11.720 --> 00:19:17.439
He sold 2 000 watches initially, and now the company's output ranked in the millions.

00:19:17.439 --> 00:19:25.931
Holy crap, yeah, so, um, he paired up with physician dr ge George Willis to start the company.

00:19:25.931 --> 00:19:28.173
Okay, sabine.

00:19:29.315 --> 00:19:29.776
See, there you go.

00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:39.871
Studied with the Curies and Pierre was heard to remark that he would not care to trust himself in a room with a kilo of pure radium.

00:19:39.871 --> 00:19:41.854
A kilo, kilo, what'd I say?

00:19:42.054 --> 00:19:43.195
A kilo Sweet.

00:19:45.540 --> 00:19:58.013
He would not care to trust himself in a room with a kilo of pure radium Because it would be bad for him, as it would burn all the skin off of his body, destroy his eyesight and probably kill him.

00:19:58.013 --> 00:20:05.507
You don't say oh, Sabine the Curie suffered many a burn.

00:20:05.507 --> 00:20:13.347
Yeah, Radium had gotten into Pierre's index finger and he hacked the tip off.

00:20:13.509 --> 00:20:16.773
Oh Jesus Christ, Really yeah, so he's just like huh.

00:20:17.294 --> 00:20:17.954
I don't need that.

00:20:18.941 --> 00:20:20.205
I mean, I guess he probably don't need the tip.

00:20:20.226 --> 00:20:41.969
but Lab workers in the Orange Plant were actually provided with ppe personal protective equipment right I believe so they had line lead lined aprons, ivory forceps to handle tubes and sabine wrote in january of 1921 that radium should be handled by taking the greatest precautions.

00:20:42.449 --> 00:20:42.950
No doubt.

00:20:43.391 --> 00:20:49.948
However, even though Sabine said that he also didn't care that much, Do as I say, not as I do.

00:20:50.220 --> 00:21:02.192
Yeah, that's the problem with, especially back then, is there was no OSHA or whatever, so they're like the CEO guy or whatever his actual title was like ah, it's fine.

00:21:02.593 --> 00:21:03.253
You're good.

00:21:03.859 --> 00:21:06.624
It's like, yeah, yeah he's saying that because he's getting rich off of it.

00:21:06.624 --> 00:21:10.458
He doesn't give a fuck what's happening to his employees.

00:21:10.458 --> 00:21:16.109
He's not doing it, so he's fine so sabine handled the radium without ppe.

00:21:16.230 --> 00:21:18.421
He was playing with it, holding it in tubes.

00:21:18.421 --> 00:21:19.281
How?

00:21:19.362 --> 00:21:20.364
do you play with radium?

00:21:21.005 --> 00:21:24.992
it's just in the tube, so it's like a fidget toy so like how is it?

00:21:25.192 --> 00:21:27.983
is it a liquid form or just a dust?

00:21:27.983 --> 00:21:28.345
It?

00:21:28.384 --> 00:21:32.800
might still be in the dust form, I don't know because I'm like how would you play with that?

00:21:32.800 --> 00:21:39.542
But even the other founder, george willis, was fairly lax and he didn't use any forceps when he was working with the radium.

00:21:39.542 --> 00:21:44.250
So we're gonna talk about k Catherine Schaub.

00:21:44.751 --> 00:21:45.252
Schaub.

00:21:45.534 --> 00:21:52.875
Mm-hmm, she was 15 when she started employment there, okay, in February of 1917.

00:21:53.921 --> 00:21:56.390
So she was born in 1902.

00:21:59.084 --> 00:22:04.054
So she started developing acne within a year of working at the plant and went to the doctor.

00:22:04.054 --> 00:22:08.567
Developing acne within a year of working at the plant and went to the doctor.

00:22:08.567 --> 00:22:10.951
The doctor asked if she worked with phosphorus, as it was a well-known poison in newark.

00:22:10.991 --> 00:22:22.906
Other women had said that the paint made them sick one woman one woman got sores on her mouth just a month after working there because they were not sure what all was in the paint.

00:22:22.906 --> 00:22:26.352
They confronted their immediate boss, mr savoy.

00:22:26.352 --> 00:22:32.188
Okay, so savoy reiterated the radium's harmless nature, but the girls weren't having it.

00:22:32.188 --> 00:22:40.491
So savoy went to his superior superiors, george willis and sabine, together as doctors.

00:22:40.491 --> 00:22:56.972
They promised that the radium was used in such a small amount that it could not cause them harm, despite sabine working with pierre curie I really hope at the end of this story is them going to prison the women continued to paint.

00:22:57.253 --> 00:23:03.528
Of course they did because they needed to make money, going as far as painting the material all over their teeth for a date?

00:23:04.070 --> 00:23:04.330
What?

00:23:04.330 --> 00:23:05.173
Why?

00:23:05.173 --> 00:23:10.171
So it would knock their partners dead, clearly, yeah.

00:23:10.270 --> 00:23:10.772
And literally.

00:23:11.000 --> 00:23:14.550
They would paint on the radium.

00:23:14.940 --> 00:23:17.223
So is that like the early form of a grill.

00:23:17.223 --> 00:23:18.025
What's?

00:23:18.065 --> 00:23:20.548
a grill, oh a teeth grill yeah.

00:23:20.548 --> 00:23:25.425
Oh gosh, I'm hungry, sorry, what I was thinking of like a barbecue grill.

00:23:25.425 --> 00:23:26.554
No, I'm talking about like oh gosh, I'm hungry, sorry, what?

00:23:26.574 --> 00:23:27.359
I was thinking of, like a barbecue grill.

00:23:27.359 --> 00:23:29.166
No, I'm talking about like no, I'm hungry.

00:23:29.166 --> 00:23:30.785
You're like what?

00:23:30.785 --> 00:23:31.227
Rappers?

00:23:31.227 --> 00:23:32.886
That was like a big thing with rappers.

00:23:32.886 --> 00:23:35.387
I mean I don't know, 10, 15, whatever years ago.

00:23:35.387 --> 00:23:36.986
As far as I know it still is.

00:23:36.986 --> 00:23:42.948
I'm old, so whatever you are and yeah, anyways, continue.

00:23:45.259 --> 00:23:46.443
I'm just going to sit over here.

00:23:46.443 --> 00:23:54.847
So a year later, in September of 1918, arthur Roeder, a successful businessman, became the company's new treasurer.

00:23:54.847 --> 00:23:58.028
He was based in the New York location.

00:23:58.028 --> 00:24:14.324
So at one point despite sharing with the dial painters that just a year before that the radium was harmless, sabine walked through the studio where the girls were which he never did but did on this one occasion and noticed them lip dip and paint.

00:24:14.324 --> 00:24:17.893
He approached one of the painters and said don't do that, you'll get sick.

00:24:17.893 --> 00:24:21.185
And then he just left, wow, without an explanation.

00:24:21.185 --> 00:24:26.153
So he knew, yeah, because he studied with Pierre.

00:24:26.334 --> 00:24:32.853
Yeah, and he just again just wanted to sell more watches and scopes and blah, blah, blah, blah blah.

00:24:33.861 --> 00:24:44.308
So, november 11th 1918, world War I ended and many of the dial painters went on to marry and to start a family, and many were replaced by new women.

00:24:44.308 --> 00:24:53.252
Okay, the summer of 1919, a new chemist was brought on and he was the future vice president of the company, howard barker.

00:24:53.252 --> 00:24:58.924
He started formulating the paint Mesothorium.

00:24:58.924 --> 00:25:16.739
Okay, so radium-226, which is what they were using, is now converted into an isotope called radium-228.

00:25:16.739 --> 00:25:18.165
Ooh, too high.

00:25:18.165 --> 00:25:25.010
So the original radium-226 had a half-life of 1,600 years.

00:25:25.751 --> 00:25:27.295
Okay.

00:25:29.079 --> 00:25:34.393
Radium-228 had a half-life of 6.7 years.

00:25:35.040 --> 00:25:37.730
So did they do that, so it would run out, so they could produce more.

00:25:38.861 --> 00:25:42.672
They did it because it was cheaper and much more abrasive.

00:25:42.672 --> 00:25:45.310
They would still mix the paint.

00:25:45.310 --> 00:25:54.444
Paint, but it was a cheaper version but also much, much more dangerous, with a half-life of less than seven years, right, wow.

00:25:54.444 --> 00:25:59.237
So despite the war being over, production actually didn't slow down.

00:25:59.237 --> 00:26:06.173
The company decided to start selling undark, now trademark trademarked, to consumers and manufacturers.

00:26:06.173 --> 00:26:14.353
Making this change drastically reduced the original dial painter's work, so the women started looking for other jobs.

00:26:14.353 --> 00:26:22.339
Okay, meanwhile, women were experiencing stiffness in their joints and was constantly tired.

00:26:22.339 --> 00:26:29.689
They felt run down, weight started dropping off their bodies and their jaws started aching, oh dear.

00:26:29.689 --> 00:26:41.951
In the summer of 1921, co-founder George Willis sold a large share of his stock to the treasurer Arthur Roeder, and Willis and Sabine were oust in a corporate takeover.

00:26:42.800 --> 00:26:44.926
That's the treasurer who became vice president.

00:26:44.926 --> 00:26:45.729
You said yes, Right.

00:26:46.069 --> 00:26:53.278
Yes, so the new name of this corporation is now the United States Radium Corporation, or USRC.

00:26:53.278 --> 00:26:56.691
Okay, arthur Broder is now the president.

00:26:56.893 --> 00:26:57.094
Yes.

00:26:57.114 --> 00:26:58.019
Okay, okay.

00:26:58.019 --> 00:27:02.282
So there's this girl, molly Maggia.

00:27:02.883 --> 00:27:08.352
Maggia, yeah, poor, poor or molly magia oh dear yeah, what happened to molly?

00:27:09.173 --> 00:27:10.777
well, she ended up at the dentist.

00:27:10.836 --> 00:27:26.469
She had a tooth ache I bet she did so they removed her tooth naturally well, because that's what you do you don't fix it, you just remove it yeah, so her tooth actually never healed, so there was just a constant wound in her mouth.

00:27:26.489 --> 00:27:38.685
Oh, so, like the the spot where the tooth was, as you're saying, it never healed so she went to a second dentist hoping for a diagnosis or a cure, like, hey, what's going on here, right?

00:27:38.685 --> 00:27:42.071
That dentist was dr joseph neff, k-n-e-f.

00:27:42.071 --> 00:27:42.373
Neff.

00:27:42.373 --> 00:27:46.685
Okay, for weeks she had pain in her lower gum and jaw.

00:27:46.685 --> 00:27:49.090
It was so unbearable.

00:27:49.090 --> 00:27:55.913
The socket from her tooth removal failed to heal and several of her other teeth were loose.

00:27:55.913 --> 00:28:05.234
Oh Jesus, dr Neff treated her for pyuria, which is an inflammatory disease affecting tissues around the teeth.

00:28:05.676 --> 00:28:05.817
Okay.

00:28:06.644 --> 00:28:08.311
But she became steadily worse.

00:28:08.311 --> 00:28:12.054
Molly had more teeth removed, oh jeez.

00:28:12.054 --> 00:28:19.057
Neff tried to alleviate the infection, but none of the extractions ever healed.

00:28:19.057 --> 00:28:19.979
Imagine that.

00:28:19.979 --> 00:28:21.691
And then ulcers started to form.

00:28:21.691 --> 00:28:22.232
Oh gross.

00:28:22.232 --> 00:28:24.550
But Molly continued to work.

00:28:24.550 --> 00:28:25.835
She needed the money.

00:28:26.045 --> 00:28:29.756
Well, yeah, I mean that's why we all work, because we need the money.

00:28:29.756 --> 00:28:31.683
So it kind of sucks.

00:28:32.244 --> 00:28:42.875
Co-workers would try to engage in conversation and even though Molly was sore, she talked less and less because there was just a horrendous odor coming from her mouth, yeah, because it's decaying.

00:28:42.964 --> 00:28:44.612
She was rotting yeah.

00:28:44.612 --> 00:28:46.507
Oh, that's gross.

00:28:46.847 --> 00:28:54.932
So next she would have aches and pains in her hips and her feet and the doctor thought it was rheumatism and they sent her home with aspirin.

00:28:57.046 --> 00:28:58.611
Take two of these and call me in the morning.

00:28:58.791 --> 00:28:59.073
Yeah.

00:28:59.493 --> 00:28:59.954
Jesus.

00:29:00.325 --> 00:29:03.595
The more Dr Neff tried to help, the worse she became.

00:29:05.185 --> 00:29:06.451
That dude needs to fucking stop.

00:29:06.805 --> 00:29:08.711
Well, Neff no longer pulled out her teeth.

00:29:09.133 --> 00:29:11.330
Oh, thank God, Because she probably didn't have many left.

00:29:11.684 --> 00:29:12.868
They just fell out on their own.

00:29:12.949 --> 00:29:15.096
Yeah weird, oh, that's gross.

00:29:15.464 --> 00:29:17.373
Her mouth was literally disintegrating.

00:29:17.373 --> 00:29:23.173
So by January 1922, doctors tested her for syphilis.

00:29:23.173 --> 00:29:25.638
The test was negative Weird yeah.

00:29:25.638 --> 00:29:31.807
And Dr Neff concluded that she had phosphorus poisoning Fosse jaw is what they called it.

00:29:31.807 --> 00:29:32.627
Fosse jaw.

00:29:33.608 --> 00:29:44.433
I remember I don't think it has anything to do with this I saw a picture of a guy who was treated with radium or whatever.

00:29:44.433 --> 00:29:50.096
I don't remember the whole details of this, but it was a picture and his jaw just fell off.

00:29:50.538 --> 00:29:50.758
Yeah.

00:29:51.157 --> 00:29:51.357
Yeah.

00:29:52.259 --> 00:29:54.880
Stay tuned Okay cool, all right.

00:29:54.880 --> 00:30:01.042
So Fosse jaw is tooth loss, gum inflammation, necrosis and pain.

00:30:01.042 --> 00:30:02.787
You don't say so.

00:30:02.787 --> 00:30:05.615
Dr Neff found where she worked and he investigated himself.

00:30:05.615 --> 00:30:08.755
He asked for the paint formula but was denied.

00:30:08.755 --> 00:30:11.671
He was told it contained no phosphorus.

00:30:12.823 --> 00:30:15.070
Did they not realize radium had phosphorus in it?

00:30:15.070 --> 00:30:17.948
Is that why they say that?

00:30:18.651 --> 00:30:20.210
No, it had no phosphorus in it.

00:30:20.210 --> 00:30:22.459
Right, radium had no phosphorus.

00:30:22.459 --> 00:30:24.632
Okay, radium is an element by itself, correct?

00:30:24.632 --> 00:30:29.114
Yeah, and the paint was mixed with was not mixed with phosphorus.

00:30:29.114 --> 00:30:32.595
Okay, gotcha, the doctor just thought it was Fossey draw, gotcha.

00:30:33.425 --> 00:30:36.053
Oh, so he misdiagnosed it because he didn't know.

00:30:36.053 --> 00:30:37.356
Yes, I understand what you're saying.

00:30:37.505 --> 00:30:41.155
Yeah, so he asked for the paint formulation, thinking there was phosphorus in there.

00:30:42.705 --> 00:30:44.232
They wouldn't give him that info anyways.

00:30:44.444 --> 00:30:47.575
No, but they did declare that there was no phosphorus in the paint Gotcha.

00:30:47.575 --> 00:30:52.538
So Molly's mouth was full of sores and ulcers and she could barely speak.

00:30:52.538 --> 00:30:54.371
She couldn't eat and she was full of agony.

00:30:54.371 --> 00:31:01.688
Her lower jaw, roof of her mouth and bones of her inner ear were all one huge abscess.

00:31:01.688 --> 00:31:05.994
Oh, chris, molly finally quit her job as a dial painter.

00:31:05.994 --> 00:31:11.954
Little late Molly became nearly lame with the aches in her hips and feet.

00:31:11.954 --> 00:31:13.749
She went to dr neff again.

00:31:13.749 --> 00:31:20.065
He probed inside her mouth barely any teeth left raw red ulcers.

00:31:20.065 --> 00:31:32.336
And from the book that I mentioned earlier, from kate moore, quote to his hoarder and shock even though his touch had been gentle, her jawbone broke against his fingers.

00:31:32.336 --> 00:31:39.538
He then removed it, not by operation but merely by putting his fingers in her mouth and lifting it out.

00:31:40.026 --> 00:31:41.030
That's disgusting.

00:31:41.030 --> 00:31:43.561
Yeah, Wow, yeah.

00:31:43.561 --> 00:31:48.316
Could you imagine like take a second Just going to remove your jaw?

00:31:48.316 --> 00:31:50.410
Holy fuck.

00:31:51.444 --> 00:31:52.631
Doesn't that sound intense?

00:31:52.845 --> 00:31:57.867
That sounds terrible, Like agonizingly terrible that is.

00:31:59.407 --> 00:32:01.394
But we're not done, I'm sure we're not.

00:32:01.394 --> 00:32:05.421
Just a week later, her lower jaw was removed in the same exact way.

00:32:05.421 --> 00:32:06.184
Oh fuck.

00:32:06.184 --> 00:32:09.184
Neff tested her for syphilis again.

00:32:09.184 --> 00:32:22.333
This time the test came back positive, but the results were kept from her why, if she had known her results, she would have told him that that wasn't possible, I think, to keep her from being embarrassed.

00:32:22.333 --> 00:32:31.551
Maybe I don't know okay, I mean but she would have told him no, that's not possible, I'm possible, I'm a good girl, I'm a good little Catholic girl.

00:32:31.592 --> 00:32:33.094
That just works at the dial Plus.

00:32:33.094 --> 00:32:34.236
Who wants to fuck this?

00:32:34.236 --> 00:32:36.618
I got no, teeth what.

00:32:36.759 --> 00:32:39.627
I mean seriously no.

00:32:39.627 --> 00:32:42.992
Once her jaw was removed, the affected parts of her mouth.

00:32:42.992 --> 00:32:45.518
Instead of slowing disintegration, it sped up.

00:32:46.159 --> 00:32:46.459
Really.

00:32:46.984 --> 00:32:47.045
Wow.

00:32:49.545 --> 00:32:50.086
So it didn't help.

00:32:50.106 --> 00:32:52.795
She was starting to get painful sores in her throat.

00:32:52.795 --> 00:33:01.106
Oh geez, her jaw was spontaneously bleed and the infection spread and ate its way through her jugular vein.

00:33:01.106 --> 00:33:12.680
Wow, on september 12 1922, with her mouth flooded with blood, mouth empty of teeth and jawbone, died a painful and terrible death.

00:33:13.040 --> 00:33:13.721
No kidding.

00:33:14.747 --> 00:33:16.531
She was 24 years old.

00:33:16.531 --> 00:33:18.217
That's sad Wow.

00:33:19.866 --> 00:33:22.435
That escalated quickly yeah.

00:33:22.685 --> 00:33:24.478
So let's open up a new plant, shall we?

00:33:24.478 --> 00:33:25.545
In September?

00:33:27.069 --> 00:33:28.694
Well, we need more undark watches.

00:33:30.185 --> 00:33:38.579
In September so the same month that she died, september 1922, a new plant was built in Ottawa Illinois.

00:33:38.579 --> 00:33:47.733
Actually they used like an old high school, and Ottawa Illinois is actually less than an hour of where my husband grew up.

00:33:48.075 --> 00:33:51.130
Oh, there you go, shout out to Illinois, favorite state of the union.

00:33:52.965 --> 00:33:55.193
So the new Radium factory started hiring.

00:33:55.193 --> 00:33:58.315
The population of Ottawa was around 11,000.

00:33:58.315 --> 00:33:59.810
Now it's about 19,000 people.

00:34:00.205 --> 00:34:01.612
So it hasn't increased very much.

00:34:02.207 --> 00:34:06.574
It's 85 miles southwest of Chicago, so it's kind of like right dab in the middle.

00:34:07.224 --> 00:34:08.510
Yeah, the best part of the state.

00:34:10.764 --> 00:34:14.030
So the company is called the radium dial company and it was um.

00:34:14.030 --> 00:34:18.077
The president of the company was joseph a kelly um.

00:34:18.077 --> 00:34:26.567
Here workers were encouraged to paint rings on their fingers, paint their buttons on dresses and buckles because it glow in the dark.

00:34:26.567 --> 00:34:27.849
These people are insane.

00:34:27.849 --> 00:34:33.949
The women took the paint home, painted their walls for decoration here in Ottawa.

00:34:33.949 --> 00:34:35.074
They could waste the paint.

00:34:35.074 --> 00:34:40.105
They didn't partake in any washing facilities and went home looking like glowing angels.

00:34:41.228 --> 00:34:45.338
So why was this place so different that they're just like, yeah, just whatever man.

00:34:45.744 --> 00:34:48.911
Well, now it's being made with that word.

00:34:48.931 --> 00:35:09.110
I can can't pronounce that mesotherium yeah so it's a lot cheaper now I suppose yeah, that would be why okay so in ottawa they were called the ghost girls not the radium girls no, the ghost girls, ghost girls, yeah so back in newark, new jersey, women were being treated for diseased bones in their mouths.

00:35:09.813 --> 00:35:15.233
Okay, removing teeth, jawbone, jesus, and continually seeing no improvement.

00:35:15.233 --> 00:35:19.034
You don't say Again, phosphorus was deemed the culprit.

00:35:19.637 --> 00:35:20.400
They didn't find any.

00:35:20.400 --> 00:35:21.545
How can it be the culprit?

00:35:21.764 --> 00:35:23.271
Well, they took their word for it.

00:35:23.864 --> 00:35:25.588
Well, they also took.

00:35:25.588 --> 00:35:28.376
That's fine, It'll be good Actually.

00:35:29.056 --> 00:35:29.639
Actually.

00:35:29.639 --> 00:35:39.617
So pieces were starting to add up, women telling their doctors about Molly, who died with the same symptoms, and new cases emerging.

00:35:39.617 --> 00:35:50.097
New cases were still reported as Fosse-Jaw to the Industrial Hygiene Division and they were asked to investigate that division, which they did immediately.

00:35:50.097 --> 00:35:56.918
So authorities noticed the lip paint method and a paint sample was taken for testing.

00:35:56.918 --> 00:36:15.893
A chemist who didn't even test the sample but knew as an educated man that there was probably not any phosphorus in the paint and concluded that the infection was likely due to radium weird huh, you don't say he started testing the samples in 1923.

00:36:15.934 --> 00:36:24.530
George willis, the co-founder of the orange firm, having handled radium with his bare hands, had his right thumb amputated.

00:36:24.530 --> 00:36:25.552
That sucks.

00:36:25.552 --> 00:36:27.195
It was riddled with cancer.

00:36:27.195 --> 00:36:31.460
By April of 1923, the chemist concluded his tests.

00:36:31.460 --> 00:36:33.570
No phosphorus was found.

00:36:33.570 --> 00:36:37.152
Again, everything was due to radium poisoning.

00:36:37.152 --> 00:36:44.496
Yeah, after reviewing the tests and the results, the Department of Labor did nothing.

00:36:44.496 --> 00:36:45.858
They did nothing.

00:36:46.905 --> 00:36:48.833
You know yeah.

00:36:50.929 --> 00:36:51.311
Good talk.

00:36:52.065 --> 00:36:52.951
I'm going to stop there.

00:36:53.625 --> 00:36:58.036
In July 1923, Catherine Schaub, who had acne at 15.

00:36:58.416 --> 00:36:58.918
Sure did.

00:36:59.085 --> 00:37:00.952
Started taking matters into her own hands.

00:37:00.952 --> 00:37:03.092
She went to the Department of Health.

00:37:03.512 --> 00:37:03.793
Okay.

00:37:04.525 --> 00:37:12.572
She told them about her coworkers who were sick and about the one who died, and she called the United States Radium Corporation out by name.

00:37:13.364 --> 00:37:13.786
I would have.

00:37:14.489 --> 00:37:17.731
A memo was filed, a call was made.

00:37:17.731 --> 00:37:25.092
The foreman of the USRC, named Veet, said the claims were not true, and that was that.

00:37:25.525 --> 00:37:27.773
Yeah, because you know we're not going to listen to this little girl.

00:37:27.773 --> 00:37:32.751
No, we're just going to listen to this man who says can't be that way.

00:37:33.726 --> 00:37:36.755
A few months later, another investigator looked into the memo.

00:37:36.755 --> 00:37:39.831
Veet was out of town, so she did nothing.

00:37:41.034 --> 00:37:43.710
Really, yep, just because it was out of town?

00:37:43.710 --> 00:37:45.510
Yep, that is worthless work.

00:37:46.407 --> 00:37:48.672
At this time, approximately five women have died.

00:37:49.134 --> 00:37:49.735
Holy crap.

00:37:53.605 --> 00:37:55.809
In late 1923, lip paint pointing had finally stopped.

00:37:55.809 --> 00:38:01.650
The memo to the woman, to the women explained to the girls that the lip dip method spoiled the adhesive.

00:38:01.650 --> 00:38:02.911
That was their excuse.

00:38:02.911 --> 00:38:11.777
It spoiled the adhesive and killed you finally, the us public health Service issued an official report across the nation.

00:38:11.777 --> 00:38:17.775
Safety precautions should most definitely be undertaken by those handling radium.

00:38:18.197 --> 00:38:18.998
No kidding.

00:38:19.985 --> 00:38:23.456
The USRC was undergoing massive losses.

00:38:23.456 --> 00:38:25.532
More and more girls became sick.

00:38:25.532 --> 00:38:31.425
Recruiting was difficult because of all the rumors, and now production was being held up.

00:38:31.425 --> 00:38:38.871
One of the sick girl's mother told the company she was about to make a claim for compensation on account of her daughter's illness.

00:38:38.871 --> 00:38:41.030
Their attention was got.

00:38:41.972 --> 00:38:42.594
Imagine that.

00:38:43.105 --> 00:38:49.612
The USRC execs finally decided to launch an investigation of their own, headed by President Arthur Roeder.

00:38:49.853 --> 00:38:52.192
Weird, and he didn't find anything wrong, did he?

00:38:52.864 --> 00:38:59.137
Well, President Arthur Roeder contacted Dr Cecil Drinker.

00:38:59.657 --> 00:39:01.942
Drinker Mm-hmm, don't mind if I do he is.

00:39:05.969 --> 00:39:08.512
He was a Harvard industrial hygienist.

00:39:08.512 --> 00:39:15.239
Hygienist, hygienist, hygienist, hygienist, hygienist, hygiene.

00:39:15.239 --> 00:39:16.621
It's about hygiene.

00:39:16.621 --> 00:39:20.268
I get the word Hygienist Pretty positive.

00:39:20.288 --> 00:39:20.929
That's how you say it.

00:39:21.009 --> 00:39:24.338
Hygienist, oh God, hygienist.

00:39:24.338 --> 00:39:28.014
Let's call the whole thing off, I'm done.

00:39:28.014 --> 00:39:37.413
Anyway, he was an industrial hygienist and his wife, catherine, also was Industrial hygienist.

00:39:37.413 --> 00:39:44.938
So upon studying the radium, the factory and the glowing girls, they were horrified.

00:39:44.938 --> 00:39:53.476
You don't say, they noticed as well that chief chemist, Dr Edward nope, Edwin Lehman.

00:39:54.978 --> 00:39:55.219
Nope.

00:39:56.525 --> 00:39:58.773
Had some serious lesions on his hands.

00:39:58.773 --> 00:40:02.349
You don't say Is that going to be the title of this podcast?

00:40:02.349 --> 00:40:06.643
You don't say Nope.

00:40:06.643 --> 00:40:11.612
Lehman scoffed at the seriousness of this problem.

00:40:11.612 --> 00:40:13.996
He's like nah, I'm fine lesions.

00:40:14.217 --> 00:40:14.498
It's just.

00:40:14.744 --> 00:40:15.586
It's just a scratch.

00:40:15.586 --> 00:40:16.550
You should see my back.

00:40:16.550 --> 00:40:17.992
It's just a flesh wound.

00:40:17.992 --> 00:40:19.757
It's just a flesh wound.

00:40:19.757 --> 00:40:27.353
The drinkers knew that radium was at fault, but the status quo remained the same, which means the status quo.

00:40:27.353 --> 00:40:31.599
I just realized the status quo means.

00:40:31.599 --> 00:40:32.661
It's the same thing.

00:40:32.661 --> 00:40:34.369
It sure does.

00:40:35.565 --> 00:40:39.193
Yeah, the status quo remains the same.

00:40:39.193 --> 00:40:40.797
That's the title.

00:40:40.797 --> 00:40:48.192
Oh, that's great.

00:40:48.192 --> 00:40:57.554
Jesus Christ, tell me more about the status quo staying the same.

00:40:57.554 --> 00:41:08.393
Oh man, that's some good stuff, right there.

00:41:09.166 --> 00:41:13.972
So everything remained the same, aka the status quo.

00:41:13.972 --> 00:41:15.215
Wait what?

00:41:17.346 --> 00:41:18.690
Say what.

00:41:20.233 --> 00:41:20.896
Oh my goodness.

00:41:20.896 --> 00:41:22.672
Okay, so everything stayed the same.

00:41:22.672 --> 00:41:24.733
Nobody changed anything.

00:41:25.025 --> 00:41:26.411
Would you say it was all status quo.

00:41:26.411 --> 00:41:27.528
It was all status quo.

00:41:27.528 --> 00:41:30.331
All right, continue, go on.

00:41:30.331 --> 00:41:32.793
Let's get past this, for the sake.

00:41:33.364 --> 00:41:36.092
Drinkers testing took weeks to come back.

00:41:36.092 --> 00:41:38.925
Okay, woo, wow, of course.

00:41:38.925 --> 00:41:42.536
When the report was ready, no surprise, radium was at fault.

00:41:43.514 --> 00:41:44.364
Yep, like they said.

00:41:44.646 --> 00:41:47.074
Uh-huh and he recommended PPE.

00:41:47.074 --> 00:41:51.851
Well, you don't say Stop saying that I did that one on purpose.

00:41:51.851 --> 00:41:59.719
When President Arthur Roeder learned of Drinker's plans to publish the report, roeder threatened to sue.

00:41:59.719 --> 00:42:03.173
I'm going to sue you, go ahead.

00:42:03.173 --> 00:42:06.554
Well Drinker decided to drop it.

00:42:07.126 --> 00:42:10.266
What a fucking bitch Really.

00:42:10.527 --> 00:42:15.733
Yeah, corporations were much too large to battle in court at this time.

00:42:15.733 --> 00:42:16.916
It just didn't happen.

00:42:17.164 --> 00:42:26.449
But the thing is, it's like you're not really battling the corporation, You're battling for people's lives here, and it's just like you know what Hands off.

00:42:26.449 --> 00:42:26.851
I'm good.

00:42:27.454 --> 00:43:04.547
So this next quote was taken from a Harvard School school of public health article in 2013 2013 okay, quote while drinker reluctantly agreed not to publish the report, his colleague alice hamilton refused to back down that a boy what, through a contact in the national consumers league, she learned that us radium had submitted cecil drinker's report to the new jersey department of labor with the findings altered to present the company in a more positive light.

00:43:05.588 --> 00:43:07.731
hamilton alerted both drinkers.

00:43:07.731 --> 00:43:14.481
The New Jersey Department of Labor has a copy of your report and it shows that every girl is in perfect condition.

00:43:14.481 --> 00:43:21.538
Do you suppose Roeder could do such a thing as to issue a forged report in your name?

00:43:21.538 --> 00:43:25.615
She wrote in a 1925 letter to Catherine Drinker.

00:43:25.615 --> 00:43:34.976
Confronted with the evidence that Roeder had acted in bad faith, the drinker, the drinkers ignored the continued threat of a lawsuit and published the report.

00:43:34.976 --> 00:43:36.391
Good for them.

00:43:36.391 --> 00:43:39.315
He forged drinkers report.

00:43:39.315 --> 00:43:40.710
What a dick.

00:43:41.865 --> 00:43:49.032
That is a dick move, because he just to say, yeah, everyone's cool, man, it's all sunshines and rainbows.

00:43:49.204 --> 00:43:51.434
Even my hands are beautiful little.

00:43:52.164 --> 00:43:54.552
I had to chop my thumb off, but we're cool, it's fine.

00:43:54.552 --> 00:43:55.735
Wait, that was a different guy.

00:43:57.686 --> 00:44:02.005
Every woman had a clean bill of health and there was no occupational hazard at this company.

00:44:02.025 --> 00:44:04.213
Yeah, they had a clean bill of health before they started working there.

00:44:04.465 --> 00:44:06.032
Yeah, everybody was in the clear.

00:44:06.032 --> 00:44:08.226
So the drinkers published right.

00:44:08.226 --> 00:44:11.670
The firm then hired Dr Frederick Flynn.

00:44:11.670 --> 00:44:19.960
He was an assistant professor of physiology at the Institute of Public Health at Columbia University.

00:44:19.960 --> 00:44:23.143
Same as drinker, he specialized in industrial hygiene.

00:44:23.523 --> 00:44:23.664
Okay.

00:44:25.086 --> 00:44:25.467
Okay.

00:44:25.467 --> 00:44:29.856
So he also had a history of downplaying the hazards of industrial work.

00:44:29.856 --> 00:44:31.326
What a dick Earlier.

00:44:31.326 --> 00:44:38.398
In 1925, he'd been hired by the Ethel Corporation to find evidence that leaded gas was safe.

00:44:38.398 --> 00:44:39.539
To what drink?

00:44:39.539 --> 00:44:41.250
No, just to work around.

00:44:41.250 --> 00:44:44.630
Oh, okay, flynn was a PhD, not an MD.

00:44:44.630 --> 00:44:46.637
Oh, clearly, keep that in mind.

00:44:46.637 --> 00:44:49.954
Yeah, I got locked in, locked, locked Loaded.

00:44:49.954 --> 00:44:51.418
Oh, clearly, keep that in mind.

00:44:51.418 --> 00:44:52.583
Yeah, I got locked in, locked, locked, loaded.

00:44:52.583 --> 00:44:58.489
So he examined many women who were experiencing strange symptoms and assured them that they were healthy.

00:44:58.489 --> 00:45:03.298
He told one Connecticut woman quote on eight separate occasions that there was not a single trace of radium in her body.

00:45:03.298 --> 00:45:06.554
She later died from that radium poisoning.

00:45:06.554 --> 00:45:07.034
End quote.

00:45:08.065 --> 00:45:10.090
So it must have got in there after he said that.

00:45:10.391 --> 00:45:10.813
Must have.

00:45:11.054 --> 00:45:11.614
I mean clearly.

00:45:12.056 --> 00:45:12.637
Super fast.

00:45:13.166 --> 00:45:17.155
I mean that's pretty impressive that there was none there when he looked at her.

00:45:17.704 --> 00:45:25.855
Flynn also examined the cases of five women who had died after working with radium in New Jersey and concluded radium poisoning was not the cause.

00:45:25.855 --> 00:45:32.626
An industrial hazard does not exist in the painting of luminous dials On dark.

00:45:32.626 --> 00:45:33.168
Not the cause.

00:45:33.168 --> 00:45:34.936
An industrial hazard does not exist in the painting of luminous dials Undark.

00:45:34.936 --> 00:45:37.425
Then, on June 7th 1925, the first male employee died.

00:45:38.027 --> 00:45:39.612
Oh, now we're going to take shit seriously.

00:45:40.394 --> 00:45:43.813
Dr Lehman, the one with the serious lesions on his hands.

00:45:43.913 --> 00:45:44.335
He died.

00:45:44.945 --> 00:45:47.012
He died at 36.

00:45:47.112 --> 00:45:48.436
Yeah, that's I mean.

00:45:48.436 --> 00:45:51.474
I know life expectancy was lower back then, but Jesus Christ.

00:45:52.585 --> 00:46:04.952
So there was a Newark physician named Dr Harrison Martland who conducted the autopsy on Lehman, and Martland actually made medical history, really.

00:46:04.952 --> 00:46:12.536
He reduced Lehman's bones to ashes and tested them with an electrometer which measures radioactivity in the body.

00:46:12.536 --> 00:46:19.259
He was successful in finding radium poisoning which saturated Lehman's remains.

00:46:19.259 --> 00:46:21.510
So that's how he did it.

00:46:21.510 --> 00:46:25.307
He had to like reduce them all to ashes in order to test them Sure, sure.

00:46:25.307 --> 00:46:42.920
So back during the drinkers initial investigation, a woman named Catherine Wiley was an executive secretary of the Consumers League, which was a national organization that fought for better working conditions for women, and John Roach from the Department of Labor.

00:46:42.920 --> 00:46:46.443
Both of them conducted their own investigation.

00:46:50.005 --> 00:46:54.389
So Wiley met with a woman named Marguerite Carlo Okay, and she was experiencing awful conditions.

00:46:54.929 --> 00:47:08.873
Well, like everyone else, so, taken from Kate Moore's book quote I can never rest until I've seen something done whereby I am assured it will not happen again, and I will stick to this thing until there is some action somewhere.

00:47:08.873 --> 00:47:09.534
End quote.

00:47:09.534 --> 00:47:11.277
So that was Katherine Wiley.

00:47:11.277 --> 00:47:18.476
She interviewed even more girls to discuss their ailments, and Wiley consulted a local judge on how families can take legal action.

00:47:18.476 --> 00:47:31.675
So New Jersey law had come in only that same year that made industrial diseases compensable, compensable, compensable, um, come come.

00:47:31.675 --> 00:47:35.318
Compensable, compensable, compensable, um.

00:47:35.318 --> 00:47:45.137
But only nine diseases were on that list and there was a five month statute of limitations, meaning any legal acclaim had to be filed within five months of the point of injury.

00:47:45.137 --> 00:47:51.795
Radium poisoning was not on that list one, and most of the girls had not been employed by the corporation for years, right.

00:47:51.795 --> 00:48:00.775
So the judge said that if the radium poisoning is ever made a compensable disease, it would not be retroactive, so nothing could be done for these girls.

00:48:00.775 --> 00:48:01.818
That's horseshit.

00:48:02.184 --> 00:48:03.688
Do you have the nine that were on the list?

00:48:03.688 --> 00:48:07.737
No, okay, I mean, I knew the answer.

00:48:07.804 --> 00:48:08.545
I have a different number.

00:48:08.545 --> 00:48:11.489
Later I knew the answer, but yeah.

00:48:11.489 --> 00:48:18.759
Wiley wrote to Dr Alice Hamilton, a scientist of industrial toxicology.

00:48:18.759 --> 00:48:20.521
Remember she worked with drinkers?

00:48:20.521 --> 00:48:28.880
Yep, she was a faculty member at Harvard University, working under Dr Cecil Drinker, but she too undertook her own investigation.

00:48:28.880 --> 00:48:32.251
Shit was getting real Shit's going down.

00:48:32.251 --> 00:48:36.876
So Wiley reached out to a Dr Frederick Hoffman.

00:48:36.876 --> 00:48:44.797
He was a statistician who specialized in industrial diseases and worked for the Prudential Insurance Company.

00:48:45.278 --> 00:48:45.400
Okay.

00:48:45.400 --> 00:48:48.211
He gathered evidence for Prudential like the rock.

00:48:48.853 --> 00:48:49.594
Prudential.

00:48:49.916 --> 00:48:50.077
Yeah.

00:48:50.197 --> 00:48:50.597
The rock.

00:48:50.597 --> 00:48:51.039
What do you mean?

00:48:51.059 --> 00:48:51.942
Theirential like the rock, prudential.

00:48:51.942 --> 00:48:53.003
Yeah, the rock, what do you mean?

00:48:53.003 --> 00:48:53.766
Their symbol I?

00:48:53.786 --> 00:48:54.228
think is like a cliff.

00:48:54.228 --> 00:48:55.333
Yeah, it might still be that same company.

00:48:55.333 --> 00:49:01.614
He gathered evidence for several radium factories, the women who were sick and their doctors who worked on them.

00:49:01.614 --> 00:49:05.916
His report was sent to the American Medical Association to be printed.

00:49:05.916 --> 00:49:11.496
His study was the first major study to connect the women's illnesses to their work.

00:49:11.496 --> 00:49:19.552
Sure, as early as 1914, specialists knew that radium could deposit in bone and cause changes in the blood.

00:49:19.552 --> 00:49:25.728
So radium stimulated bone marrow to produce extra red blood cells, which was a good thing.

00:49:26.090 --> 00:49:26.291
Right.

00:49:26.672 --> 00:49:27.134
At first.

00:49:27.134 --> 00:49:34.150
Until you have too much exposure exposure yeah, radium did boost the health of those ingesting it, but it was an illusion.

00:49:34.150 --> 00:49:39.952
The stimulation of bone marrow soon became over stimulated okay, and the body can't keep up.

00:49:39.952 --> 00:49:47.853
Hoffman said that the cumulative effect was disastrous, destroying red blood cells, causing anemia and necrosis.

00:49:47.853 --> 00:49:55.875
He said the disease should be brought under the workman's compensation laws, and that's what katherine wiley was attempting to do.

00:49:55.875 --> 00:50:00.289
In 1926 wiley's new law had been signed into being.

00:50:00.289 --> 00:50:04.565
Radium necrosis was now finally a compensable disease there you go.

00:50:05.067 --> 00:50:05.748
Is that number 10?

00:50:05.967 --> 00:50:09.193
however, the bill could not be applied retroactively.

00:50:09.193 --> 00:50:14.219
No one was injured before the 1926 could claim.

00:50:14.219 --> 00:50:21.505
See, that's fucked up as a new amendment of the original law of nine compensable diseases.

00:50:21.505 --> 00:50:26.056
It automatically had a five-month statute of limitation.

00:50:28.226 --> 00:50:30.273
So they kind of fucked themselves by putting it on there.

00:50:30.653 --> 00:50:43.875
Yes, so a time which was never long enough for radium poisoning to become evident right also the law only covered radium necrosis of the jaw oh, good lord, is that?

00:50:43.894 --> 00:50:53.818
because that's what happened to most of those people so not anemia, not locked hips or broken thighs, disintegrating backs, losing teeth none of that.

00:50:53.818 --> 00:50:57.445
The law was literally drafted so that no one could collect.

00:50:57.445 --> 00:51:05.530
So Wiley realized her mistake and, with the Consumers League, began campaigning to get radium poisoning into the law.

00:51:05.530 --> 00:51:07.114
Sure makes sense, yeah.

00:51:07.114 --> 00:51:18.367
So meanwhile Dr Neff the dentist became a scumbag it sounded like he was before.

00:51:18.387 --> 00:51:19.110
No, he was trying.

00:51:19.110 --> 00:51:20.815
He was trying really hard to get these girls.

00:51:20.815 --> 00:51:21.516
I mean he removed her jaw.

00:51:21.516 --> 00:51:21.858
That was weird.

00:51:21.858 --> 00:51:23.081
It was kind of an accident that one was.

00:51:23.724 --> 00:51:26.210
But he ended up a scumbag.

00:51:26.210 --> 00:51:47.577
So, having seen many of these girls for loose teeth, mouth, mouth ulcers and jaw necrosis for free, because they're all broke, he developed a plan oh dear neff gathered the usrc execs and said if you pay me, I'll keep my mouth shut about the women so he basically extorted yes wow.

00:51:47.577 --> 00:51:54.954
Their pain had caused the sicknesses which he was trying to treat and literally all the women had loyalty to him.

00:51:55.496 --> 00:51:55.757
Why.

00:51:56.485 --> 00:51:59.335
Because he was literally the only person trying to help.

00:52:00.146 --> 00:52:02.012
Because he would see them for free.

00:52:02.815 --> 00:52:03.054
Yes.

00:52:03.054 --> 00:52:06.134
But, now his loyalty to the women vanished.

00:52:06.625 --> 00:52:08.813
Clearly because it went to the almighty dollar.

00:52:08.813 --> 00:52:16.384
Neff asked for $10,000, which was, which back then was quite a lot $134,000 today.

00:52:16.384 --> 00:52:17.731
Not as much as you would think.

00:52:18.367 --> 00:52:23.711
And will have every second woman come to him for treatment, as he thought the women thought of him as a friend.

00:52:24.193 --> 00:52:24.956
What a dick.

00:52:24.956 --> 00:52:27.472
That dude is a scumbag.

00:52:27.766 --> 00:52:36.224
Neff even volunteered to get on the stand and testified that no, the women are not troubled by radioactivity and they're just gonna believe this guy, though.

00:52:37.047 --> 00:52:38.951
What the fuck kind of credibility does he?

00:52:38.992 --> 00:52:39.271
have.

00:52:39.271 --> 00:52:47.568
So if neff couldn't make a deal with the execs, he declared that he was going to sue the women and they would have to pay him out he was gonna get money from.

00:52:47.650 --> 00:52:50.195
Somewhere he was looking to get a payday.

00:52:50.195 --> 00:52:51.565
Yes, that's what it was, okay.

00:52:52.230 --> 00:52:57.514
So, unbeknownst to Neff, the USRC already employed Dr Flynn, and that was going well.

00:52:57.514 --> 00:53:07.547
So they sent him packing, masking a moral high ground as they dismissed him when the news came out on the line oh, we didn't take his bribes.

00:53:07.547 --> 00:53:12.271
We're moral, we're better than that, sounds like our government.

00:53:12.271 --> 00:53:17.795
So now I'm going to talk about Grace Fryer.

00:53:18.666 --> 00:53:19.831
Grace Fryer.

00:53:22.025 --> 00:53:27.097
So she had a whole list of medical conditions and she had been trying to find lawyers for a while.

00:53:28.184 --> 00:53:31.405
Were they hiding the lawyers no, find lawyers for a while Were they hiding the lawyers.

00:53:31.764 --> 00:53:33.853
No no lawyers would take them.

00:53:34.125 --> 00:53:36.112
Just because they didn't want to go against the corporation.

00:53:36.112 --> 00:53:40.255
No, they were broke and they demanded money up front Gotcha okay.

00:53:40.255 --> 00:53:42.974
Because I'm like she was trying to find lawyers.

00:53:42.974 --> 00:53:44.291
I'm like I didn't know the lawyers hid.

00:53:44.291 --> 00:53:46.773
I mean one call, that's all.

00:53:46.793 --> 00:53:47.355
It's everywhere.

00:53:47.355 --> 00:53:53.153
That's a joke with our Wisconsin.

00:53:53.434 --> 00:53:53.554
No.

00:53:53.554 --> 00:53:58.315
So my buddy Al, our one listener From Las Vegas, hi, al.

00:53:58.315 --> 00:54:01.090
Well, no, he's in Las Vegas.

00:54:01.090 --> 00:54:17.155
He lived, him and his wife lived in Arizona for a little bit and I went to go visit him and we were driving up the freeway, we were going to go to a casino down in Arizona and I'm like I didn't realize this was a franchise and it's a random dude.

00:54:17.155 --> 00:54:19.452
It says one call, that's all.

00:54:19.452 --> 00:54:22.572
Let's not call him out by name on this.

00:54:22.572 --> 00:54:23.514
We're not.

00:54:23.514 --> 00:54:24.688
He's not paying us.

00:54:26.311 --> 00:54:27.215
He's everywhere.

00:54:27.556 --> 00:54:31.527
And and unlike him, I want to get paid up front, not if, only if we win.

00:54:31.527 --> 00:54:37.550
But yeah, it's like I saw, and this was years ago, so you can tell how long this has been around.

00:54:37.550 --> 00:54:41.233
It's like I didn't realize it was like franchised or some shit.

00:54:41.233 --> 00:54:43.429
It's like McDonald's or One Call, that's All.

00:54:43.429 --> 00:54:45.456
What do you want to start, anyways.

00:54:45.565 --> 00:54:49.487
Okay, so Grace Fryer, she's trying to find a lawyer, right?

00:54:49.487 --> 00:54:53.329
Yeah, so she ends up at a small firm of Potter and Berry.

00:54:53.329 --> 00:54:57.050
So Raymond H Berry was not even 30 yet.

00:54:57.050 --> 00:55:04.175
He came out of Yale and he's a junior partner, father of three girls, three Mm-hmm.

00:55:04.175 --> 00:55:07.036
So he conducted a brief investigation.

00:55:07.036 --> 00:55:10.918
He went to Martland's labs he was the guy who did the autopsy, martland.

00:55:11.139 --> 00:55:11.398
Yeah.

00:55:11.960 --> 00:55:15.101
And he interviewed Sabine von Soshki.

00:55:15.101 --> 00:55:15.842
Oh, you're.

00:55:15.862 --> 00:55:18.523
You're attempting it again, sabine, let's just go with Sabine.

00:55:19.565 --> 00:55:24.786
Barry decided to take their case, maybe because he had three girls and they kind of influenced him.

00:55:24.806 --> 00:55:26.327
Maybe and or he's like.

00:55:26.327 --> 00:55:27.467
I'm going to make a name for myself.

00:55:27.867 --> 00:55:29.068
That too you never know.

00:55:29.068 --> 00:55:39.172
So Barry campaigned that the two-year statute of limitations should start once a formal diagnosis was received, which was years after the women left the factory.

00:55:39.172 --> 00:55:52.878
Right Grace Fryer made a formal complaint against USRC on May 18th 1927, and she demanded $125,000 in damages 1.7 million today.

00:55:52.878 --> 00:55:56.318
Wow, and that was on one count and a second count.

00:55:56.318 --> 00:56:00.981
She was assuming for a total of $250,000, which is 3.4 million today.

00:56:00.981 --> 00:56:01.702
I got the math.

00:56:01.702 --> 00:56:05.563
Five women, one by one, filed suit.

00:56:09.704 --> 00:56:11.230
Grace Fryer, Catherine Schaub with the acne.

00:56:11.692 --> 00:56:27.670
Ac yeah, kinta mcdonald, kinta, kinta, albina loris and edna husman edna barry found a specialist named elizabeth hughes, who was a physicist and former assistant to sabine.

00:56:27.670 --> 00:56:30.052
Sabine is everywhere.

00:56:30.052 --> 00:56:31.394
I mean, can you blame them?

00:56:31.394 --> 00:56:43.286
Jeez Louise, she would run new radioactivity tests on the women, but how, if you?

00:56:43.306 --> 00:56:45.001
recall, the only way to extract radium from a victim's bones was to burn them.

00:56:45.001 --> 00:56:45.423
Is it reduced to ash?

00:56:45.423 --> 00:56:47.271
Yeah, so you just cremate them and they'll be fine.

00:56:48.646 --> 00:56:54.152
Obviously, none of the women could help, but if you recall, molly Maggia.

00:56:55.032 --> 00:56:55.253
Yeah.

00:56:55.693 --> 00:56:56.414
The first death.

00:56:56.675 --> 00:56:58.298
Yeah, she could.

00:56:58.298 --> 00:56:59.199
They dig her up.

00:56:59.786 --> 00:57:01.630
The woman who died of syphilis.

00:57:01.751 --> 00:57:04.157
Yeah, died of syphilis they dug her up.

00:57:04.385 --> 00:57:19.577
October 15th 1927 at the Rosedale Cemetery, 13 officials in all gathered witness to Molly's exhumation Dr Flynn, Barry, Mrs Hughes, Dr Martland, to name a few.

00:57:19.577 --> 00:57:25.048
Despite the dim fall day, the coffin glowed, that's crazy.

00:57:25.048 --> 00:57:26.510
Unmistakably radiant.

00:57:26.510 --> 00:57:28.313
That's crazy, crazy.

00:57:28.313 --> 00:57:43.650
Her body went through x-rays, bones ignited into ash, she was tested for radioactivity and shocker or no shocker there was no evidence of syphilis or phosphorus, or phosphorus it was the damn radium.

00:57:44.090 --> 00:57:49.876
So january 12th 1928, the trial began with judge becks.

00:57:49.876 --> 00:57:55.202
So barry the attorney, um all with mr barry.

00:57:55.202 --> 00:58:01.445
All the women would share their stories and their agony and all the doctors would share their findings.

00:58:01.445 --> 00:58:06.273
So sabine got up there and dr neff, the fucker, got up there.

00:58:06.293 --> 00:58:07.175
The the fucker.

00:58:08.597 --> 00:58:10.159
In particular Elizabeth Hughes.

00:58:10.505 --> 00:58:14.416
Why did Neff get up there when they told him to go basically go fuck yourself?

00:58:14.416 --> 00:58:18.476
Or was that later, when it came out there like moral high ground?

00:58:18.476 --> 00:58:20.070
That would have been after this.

00:58:20.646 --> 00:58:22.592
No, I think it all happened before the trial.

00:58:22.592 --> 00:58:24.090
He still wanted to get paid.

00:58:24.686 --> 00:58:25.911
He was still looking for a payday.

00:58:25.971 --> 00:58:26.313
Yeah, okay.

00:58:26.313 --> 00:58:38.190
So Elizabeth Hughes was employed at the bureau of standards, which is now the national institute of standards and technology, where she specialized in radium measurements.

00:58:38.190 --> 00:58:42.023
Her work at the bureau provided her with in-depth knowledge.

00:58:42.023 --> 00:58:51.244
In-depth knowledge of radium's properties, its effect on the human body and the message methods to measure radium content in various substances.

00:58:51.244 --> 00:59:01.525
Her measurements of radium content in the dial painters bodies and their work environments helped to establish the link between radium exposure and the women's illnesses.

00:59:01.525 --> 00:59:11.545
In 1928, the usrc asked to reconvene in september of 1928 because many of their experts would be traveling abroad in the summer.

00:59:11.545 --> 00:59:14.576
Tell them to fucking cancel their trip.

00:59:14.576 --> 00:59:23.715
Well, the ailing women, they pointed out, they may not live to see the end of the trial yeah, no kidding we went from april and they're like, okay, we're gonna reconvene in september, see you in five months.

00:59:23.735 --> 00:59:25.121
Isn't that ridiculous?

00:59:25.121 --> 00:59:32.318
Well, that's how it worked back then, because people had to vacay well, even that, the travel was a lot harder.

00:59:33.585 --> 00:59:41.117
So there was a huge public outcry, Newspapers, including the World, which was the most powerful newspaper of the day.

00:59:41.117 --> 00:59:53.550
Their girls posed for photo shoots, they conducted interviews, they shared horrifying stories, all to stay in the public eye, With the public platform, the public sympathy and the case's momentum.

00:59:53.550 --> 01:00:04.271
Judge Bex actually reinterpreted the law to Barry in a way that would benefit the women, Because the bones contained radium and the radium was still hurting them.

01:00:04.271 --> 01:00:16.650
They were still being injured and this statute began again, new each moment of that injury wow so barry's former boss judge william clark.

01:00:17.112 --> 01:00:26.989
Barry was a clerk to clark a clerk barry was a clerk to clark, when Clark was a partner and he actually told Barry to settle out of court.

01:00:27.329 --> 01:00:28.052
Of course he did.

01:00:28.340 --> 01:00:38.909
Yeah, barry considered this, not because he didn't think he could win, but that the women may not make it in time for justice Sure, and Judge Clark offered to be the unofficial mediary.

01:00:39.429 --> 01:00:39.952
Imagine that.

01:00:40.902 --> 01:00:45.911
So USRC agreed as settling this case out of court would not only make the negative publicity go away, but also meant that the company can choose when to fight.

01:00:45.911 --> 01:00:49.932
Agreed as, settling this case out of court would not only make the negative publicity go away, but also meant that the company can choose when to fight its battles in court.

01:00:49.932 --> 01:00:56.980
It's inevitable for future lawsuits and it will get easier once the women were not plastered all over the news right.

01:00:56.980 --> 01:01:06.027
So friday june 1st, the company offered them ten thousand dollars each, which is approximately 138 000 in today's money.

01:01:06.027 --> 01:01:09.987
There it is, with all medical bills and litigation costs.

01:01:09.987 --> 01:01:13.684
They'd only receive a pittance, right Just a little, a little bit.

01:01:13.900 --> 01:01:20.849
Well, that's the thing, because even back then, $10,000 was a lot, but you've got to pay all these bills due to your illness, injury, whatever you want to call it yes.

01:01:20.849 --> 01:01:22.253
That's nothing.

01:01:23.360 --> 01:01:26.682
The women said no Good and countered All right.

01:01:27.063 --> 01:01:28.945
They countered with $15,000.

01:01:28.945 --> 01:01:31.847
Oh Jesus Christ, $208,000 today.

01:01:31.847 --> 01:01:40.795
But they wanted it as a cash lump sum and they wanted a pension of $600 a year for life, which is over $8,000 today.

01:01:40.795 --> 01:01:43.536
Of course, life for them is not that much longer.

01:01:43.536 --> 01:01:55.376
No, but $600 a year, year for life and for past and future medical expenses, and the usrc was to cover all court costs.

01:01:55.376 --> 01:01:56.659
So that was their counter.

01:01:56.659 --> 01:02:00.190
The company agreed the following monday.

01:02:00.190 --> 01:02:04.063
However, all demands were met, except the fifteen thousand dollar lump sum.

01:02:04.063 --> 01:02:08.382
They included the original 10,000 and all the women ended up signing.

01:02:09.326 --> 01:02:11.934
So they gave, they caved a little bit caved a little bit.

01:02:12.697 --> 01:02:23.527
So they're getting $10,000 lump sum, they're getting the $600 a year life pension and they're getting all of their medical bills passed in future paid and they're covering all the court costs.

01:02:23.527 --> 01:02:26.333
So but the settlement.

01:02:26.333 --> 01:02:26.934
Here's the kicker.

01:02:26.934 --> 01:02:30.329
The settlement specified that the company had no guilt.

01:02:30.329 --> 01:02:32.927
See, that doesn't make sense.

01:02:32.927 --> 01:02:37.610
It was written in the contract that they were not going to take any of their responsibility.

01:02:37.610 --> 01:02:44.668
It was not negligent and the claims of the plaintiffs are barred by the statute of limitations.

01:02:44.900 --> 01:03:04.242
So USRC also made a statement that we settled it purely because it was humanitarian yeah, they're trying to put a positive spin on it and be like look at us go yeah, so another part of the settlement was that the company insisted that a committee of three doctors were to set up to examine the girls regularly.

01:03:04.242 --> 01:03:12.929
So one doctor was appointed by the girls, one doctor was appointed by USRC and one doctor was appointed mutually.

01:03:12.929 --> 01:03:20.784
So if any two doctors' opinions are that the girls are no longer suffering from radium poisoning, the payments were to cease.

01:03:20.784 --> 01:03:22.440
Sure, I thought that was pretty logical.

01:03:22.760 --> 01:03:24.748
I mean, it makes sense right.

01:03:24.949 --> 01:03:25.108
Yeah.

01:03:25.108 --> 01:03:33.931
So now, if you recall that mesotherium was added to the radium paint yeah which had a half-life of 6.7 years.

01:03:33.931 --> 01:03:46.795
Well, those years were miserable for those women, obviously, but as the half-life passed, the attack also diminished okay however, the damage was already done sure, yes, 228 yes, so just briefly.

01:03:47.416 --> 01:03:53.487
The iowa, illinois, radium dial company opened in 1917 using their version of undark called luma.

01:03:53.487 --> 01:04:09.052
These girls would have read the news coverage about the new jersey workers, but the radium dial company claimed that it was the element of mesothelium that was a culprit in new jersey and that radium dial paint was safe because it contained no mesothelium, only radium.

01:04:10.074 --> 01:04:10.295
Only.

01:04:10.780 --> 01:04:17.306
Approximately 40 women had died For a short period of time, even closer to my husband.

01:04:17.306 --> 01:04:22.275
Yet they opened up a plant in Streeter, illinois, streeter, streeter Okay.

01:04:22.275 --> 01:04:30.653
So the company officials feared that the publicity from the New Jersey dial painters might scare Ottawa workers.

01:04:30.653 --> 01:04:35.608
Streeter residents were less likely to read about something happening out east.

01:04:35.608 --> 01:04:39.193
But that plant only stayed in operation for about nine months.

01:04:40.163 --> 01:04:40.945
Oh, why so short?

01:04:42.561 --> 01:04:51.413
I don't know, I didn't look that up, okay, but there's a statue there of a radium girl.

01:04:53.083 --> 01:04:53.867
They don't deserve it.

01:04:53.867 --> 01:04:55.746
They're open for nine fucking months.

01:04:55.746 --> 01:04:57.070
Fuck that.

01:04:57.070 --> 01:04:59.103
That is so dumb.

01:05:01.367 --> 01:05:01.628
Okay.

01:05:01.849 --> 01:05:02.871
Seriousness Year minimum.

01:05:03.793 --> 01:05:04.556
Seriousness.

01:05:04.936 --> 01:05:06.059
Oh my God, we weren't serious before.

01:05:06.541 --> 01:05:09.951
On December 7th 1929.

01:05:09.951 --> 01:05:14.387
Oh, he was going to bring up the Juno.

01:05:14.387 --> 01:05:17.648
Do you know what happened on December 6th?

01:05:17.648 --> 01:05:19.304
Stop it right now.

01:05:19.304 --> 01:05:23.148
At least you knew where I was going to go with that.

01:05:23.148 --> 01:05:23.742
I saw that.

01:05:23.742 --> 01:05:24.465
Look in your eye.

01:05:26.822 --> 01:05:31.588
No, I don't Do tell what happened on December 6th, the day before Pearl Harbor.

01:05:32.880 --> 01:05:39.869
On December 7th 1929, keenta MacDonald died of a sarcoma.

01:05:39.869 --> 01:05:41.842
She was 29 years old.

01:05:41.842 --> 01:05:43.806
In 1929?

01:05:43.827 --> 01:05:44.548
Mm-hmm.

01:05:44.548 --> 01:05:45.952
She was born in 1900?

01:05:45.952 --> 01:05:46.253
Mm-hmm.

01:05:51.139 --> 01:05:54.708
Catherine Schaub fell on the steps, broke her knee and they found a sarcoma.

01:05:54.708 --> 01:05:58.938
She declined amputate amputation and then I don't know.

01:05:58.938 --> 01:06:00.661
And then she later reconsidered.

01:06:00.661 --> 01:06:02.025
She's like okay, I don't need this leg.

01:06:02.025 --> 01:06:09.882
In fact, I got another one, yeah, but it was too late yeah, imagine that yeah, she died february 18th 1933 at 31 years old.

01:06:09.882 --> 01:06:10.284
Damn.

01:06:10.284 --> 01:06:17.012
Grace fryer died on october 27th 1933 at 34 years old.

01:06:17.012 --> 01:06:25.630
Edna husman died in 1939 at 37 years old she almost made it to 40 well, Well.

01:06:25.650 --> 01:06:32.188
Albina Laris died November 17, 1946 at 51 years old Wow, oldest radium girl.

01:06:32.188 --> 01:06:41.650
That's crazy, so in 1929, the US Department of Labor identified 23 fatalities attributing to radium poisoning.

01:06:41.650 --> 01:06:49.710
In 1931, the examiner reported five deaths from bone cancer among a sample of 18 formal dial painters.

01:06:49.710 --> 01:06:53.231
The other 13 were from various related diseases.

01:06:53.231 --> 01:06:57.371
The doctor stated this proved that radiation could cause cancer.

01:06:57.371 --> 01:07:06.894
By 1959, deaths from recorded radiation exposure had reached 45, although thousands more are expected to have died from radiation exposure.

01:07:07.320 --> 01:07:09.608
Just without the actual diagnosis of it.

01:07:09.608 --> 01:07:10.389
Diagnosis, yeah.

01:07:11.860 --> 01:07:25.967
It wasn't until 1938, when a dying radium worker named Catherine Wolfe Donahue successfully sued the Radium Dial Company in Ottawa over her illness, that the issue was finally settled.

01:07:25.967 --> 01:07:34.431
Another group of women won a lawsuit against the radium dial company in Illinois that required protective measures for dial painters.

01:07:34.431 --> 01:08:00.099
According to Kate Moore in the book, these cases paved the way for American labor rights milestones throughout the 20th century and then inevitably inevitably inevitably, indubitably, throughout the 20th century and inevitably led to the creation of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, aka OSHA.

01:08:14.186 --> 01:08:19.507
Radium taught the world of radiation's dangers, yet it was not until 2005 that Congress put that's wild.

01:08:19.507 --> 01:08:20.948
Yeah.

01:08:20.948 --> 01:08:24.590
Radium now is considered.

01:08:24.590 --> 01:08:32.853
Radium-223, another isotope, is sometimes used to treat prostate and breast cancer in patients who are medically inoperable.

01:08:32.853 --> 01:08:44.417
Gotcha, it can treat sarcomas that has spread into bone tissue, but otherwise it is really not used in today's medical history or medical world.

01:08:44.837 --> 01:08:50.984
Sure, that is the story of the radium girls.

01:08:50.984 --> 01:08:51.524
What, what else?

01:08:51.524 --> 01:08:52.146
What else do they use?

01:08:52.648 --> 01:08:56.899
radium, for do you know um they also used it in um I think it was like nuclear.

01:08:56.899 --> 01:09:03.769
It wasn't nuclear, it's just industrial radiography applications, so mostly in the medical world.

01:09:04.109 --> 01:09:08.956
Okay, do you know when the USRC closed?

01:09:08.956 --> 01:09:11.046
Because I can't imagine they're still open.

01:09:11.539 --> 01:09:14.489
No, I think I wrote that down somewhere, but no, I don't remember.

01:09:15.061 --> 01:09:16.849
Okay, but they clearly closed right.

01:09:17.121 --> 01:09:18.259
Yeah, they don't exist anymore.

01:09:18.500 --> 01:09:22.949
No, because they just murder people with their products.

01:09:24.132 --> 01:09:27.707
Let's see when did the USRC close?

01:09:27.707 --> 01:09:28.429
19?

01:09:28.469 --> 01:09:31.997
1926, that's when they closed.

01:09:31.997 --> 01:09:46.923
Wow, so they weren't open for very long then, nope in the grand 1917 to 1926 well, when you had that much shit going down, you're bound and plus they were losing money at the end there because no one wanted to work there yeah, everybody was done, yeah and the people who to work there.

01:09:46.923 --> 01:09:48.726
Yeah, everybody was dying, yeah, and the people who did work there.

01:09:48.846 --> 01:09:49.469
well, they died.

01:09:49.469 --> 01:09:51.452
Yeah, isn't that crazy.

01:09:51.452 --> 01:09:52.753
That's such a crazy story.

01:09:55.805 --> 01:09:57.456
It really is, because I mean, do you want to see some pictures?

01:09:57.456 --> 01:09:58.019
Not at the moment.

01:09:58.038 --> 01:10:02.750
Oh, okay, I was just going to show you a picture of a sarcoma on someone's chin.

01:10:03.051 --> 01:10:08.421
I'm good, are you sure?

01:10:08.421 --> 01:10:09.087
Because I've got it up right now.

01:10:09.087 --> 01:10:09.429
Yeah, let's do it.

01:10:09.429 --> 01:10:10.759
Looks like a giant ball sack hanging off her face.

01:10:10.759 --> 01:10:13.305
Or a sarcoma caused by radium poisoning.

01:10:13.326 --> 01:10:15.131
That's what I meant to say Sure, sure, sure, sure Sarcoma.

01:10:15.131 --> 01:10:21.592
I'm going to have a couple pictures on our social media of some of the radium girls.

01:10:21.760 --> 01:10:22.201
Yeah, it's.

01:10:22.402 --> 01:10:34.189
Only one of them is a little gruesome, and it was the sarcoma on the chin or the ball sack well, that's nuts, because you don't expect that.

01:10:35.484 --> 01:10:38.395
You expect to go to work and be okay to a degree.

01:10:38.395 --> 01:10:40.340
Obviously there's obviously variations of that.

01:10:40.340 --> 01:10:46.769
But back then I mean that's 100 years ago they didn't fucking know but, some of them did.

01:10:48.041 --> 01:10:50.167
And the fact that they're like nah, you're good yeah.

01:10:50.167 --> 01:10:52.051
In fact.

01:10:52.399 --> 01:10:54.359
Mia's CEO says you're fine.

01:10:56.002 --> 01:11:00.332
And Marie Curie also died of radium poisoning.

01:11:00.492 --> 01:11:01.453
Yep, because she was.

01:11:01.453 --> 01:11:03.802
But isn't that like, how was that how that wasn't how x-rays were found?

01:11:03.802 --> 01:11:04.296
But isn't that like, how was that how?

01:11:04.296 --> 01:11:12.537
That wasn't how x-rays were found, but she did a lot of work with it to over quite a long time.

01:11:12.537 --> 01:11:19.671
Right, she lived for a while, so she wasn't, but she also wasn't put in her fucking mouth was she, no, she wasn't, yeah, so.

01:11:21.052 --> 01:11:26.804
I don't remember how long, how long she lived, because they discovered it in 1898, right, but I didn't write down when she died, how long she lived, because they discovered it in 1898.

01:11:26.804 --> 01:11:28.926
Right, but I didn't write down when she died.

01:11:29.408 --> 01:11:32.404
It's all right, I know she was around for a bit so.

01:11:32.944 --> 01:11:33.546
I'm going to look.

01:11:34.708 --> 01:11:36.512
This is 1934.

01:11:36.512 --> 01:11:38.586
Oh, so how old was she though?

01:11:39.261 --> 01:11:41.750
She was 66.

01:11:42.280 --> 01:11:43.947
Older than any of those other girls that died.

01:11:44.287 --> 01:12:07.889
So I mean she died of anemia older than any of those other girls that died, so I mean she died of anemia, but again, she also wasn't dipping it in her brush into radium nope and then repeat lip dip paint repeat so well, here's a health fact for all you don't ingest radium.

01:12:08.701 --> 01:12:10.186
Don't work in a radium factory.

01:12:10.186 --> 01:12:12.104
Just stay away from radium.

01:12:12.600 --> 01:12:15.408
So you want to know how Pierre Curie died.

01:12:15.548 --> 01:12:15.951
I do now.

01:12:15.951 --> 01:12:18.038
I didn't care before that sentence.

01:12:18.038 --> 01:12:21.489
He died in 1906 at 46 years old.

01:12:21.489 --> 01:12:21.951
Okay.

01:12:23.082 --> 01:12:24.755
From a car accident.

01:12:24.755 --> 01:12:26.912
Really Well a street accident is, I guess, how they described it, not a car accident.

01:12:26.912 --> 01:12:29.967
Well, a street accident Is, I guess, how they Described it not a car.

01:12:29.967 --> 01:12:34.347
His skull was crushed Under the wheel of a horse drawn carriage.

01:12:34.822 --> 01:12:38.188
I was going to say he died by I was going to bring up a horse there.

01:12:38.207 --> 01:12:38.307
Yeah.

01:12:39.644 --> 01:12:41.368
That must have been a pretty heavy fucking carriage.

01:12:41.368 --> 01:12:47.306
Ouch, poor guy Never even got to die of radium poisoning.

01:12:47.306 --> 01:12:55.550
Sad life, such high hopes and horse carriage killed him.

01:12:55.890 --> 01:12:56.072
Yeah.

01:12:56.940 --> 01:12:59.930
Well, I mean thanks for bringing me down.

01:12:59.930 --> 01:13:02.804
This was.

01:13:03.400 --> 01:13:21.645
Have you seen those like TikToks or I'm not really on tick tock, but I still see videos and stuff through like Pinterest and whatever but of these people who are dressed in all black with like black hoods and everything, but then they put like glow sticks on their body to look like um skeletons or stick men.

01:13:21.926 --> 01:13:22.347
I haven't.

01:13:22.347 --> 01:13:24.423
I mean I've seen other places, but yeah, I kind of want to do that.

01:13:24.423 --> 01:13:24.625
I haven't.

01:13:24.625 --> 01:13:25.427
I mean I've seen other places, but yeah.

01:13:25.448 --> 01:13:26.310
I kind of want to do that.

01:13:26.310 --> 01:13:29.483
You should totally do that, except for I don't like hoods, Like they kind of creep me out.

01:13:30.707 --> 01:13:31.229
Okay.

01:13:31.269 --> 01:13:33.503
Anyway, so I wouldn't do that.

01:13:33.503 --> 01:13:34.367
So they see my face.

01:13:34.367 --> 01:13:37.546
Well, you know which kind of defeats the purpose.

01:13:37.546 --> 01:13:38.786
I'm going to drink some more beer now.

01:13:39.440 --> 01:13:41.930
And on that note, I suppose.

01:13:46.920 --> 01:13:47.421
Well, well, I suppose.

01:13:47.421 --> 01:13:48.444
All right, buffoons, that's it for today's episode.

01:13:48.444 --> 01:13:50.810
Buckle up, because we've got another historical adventure waiting for you, next time.

01:13:50.810 --> 01:13:58.351
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01:13:58.920 --> 01:14:00.225
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01:14:00.225 --> 01:14:05.192
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01:14:05.192 --> 01:14:09.823
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01:14:10.404 --> 01:14:15.221
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01:14:15.462 --> 01:14:18.697
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01:14:19.137 --> 01:14:34.295
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