Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine - Radium Girls

Episode Date: June 28, 2022

Back in 1917 radium was all the rage. The fact that it glowed made people believe it was healthy and important, so they included it in things like toothpaste, cosmetics, even water. The Radium Girls, factory workers who used radium-laced paints to detail watch faces, were among the first to indicate that it may not be as safe as we imagined. Charlie McElroy is here to tell us about their fight for workplace safety.Music: "Medicines" by The Taxpayers https://taxpayers.bandcamp.com/

Sawbones is a show about medical history, and nothing the hosts say should be taken as medical advice or opinion. It's for fun. Can't you just have fun for an hour and not try to diagnose your mystery boil? We think you've earned it. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of distraction from that weird growth. You're worth it. that weird growth. You're worth it. Alright, talk is about books. One, two, one, two, three, four. We came across a pharmacy with a toy and that's busted out. We were shot through the broken glass and had ourselves a look around.

Some medicines, some medicines that escalate my cop for the mouth. Wow! We can't really feel my pockets. Hello and welcome to Saw Bones, a marital tour of Miscite and Medicine. I'm your co-host, Sydney Macroi. And you are... Charlie Macroi, your daughter. That's right. Charlie Macroi, my daughter,

is helping host the show this week. But what are you doing over there right now, Charlie? I'm just watching this Radio Bell girls video. It's cool. What a video about who now? Radio girls. Oh, that's that sounds pretty cool Do you think that's something you might want to tell us about? Yeah, yeah I think that might make a good episode of saw bones the podcast the podcast we're doing like right now Excellent I help of course you can help. I would like right now. Yay! Excellent. Can I help? Of course you can help.

I would love your help. Yay. So, do you want to start us off and tell us what you know about Radium Girls? So, the Radium Girls started. And I'm not quite sure the year because, I'm not sure it said that. You don't have to have, I've got years, I've got places,

I got all the facts. You just tell us the story, tell you what, I'll give you some years, 1917. Okay, so it all started in 1917. There were glow-in-the-dark watches, and they needed delicate hands to paint on the paint. So they hired woman and they hired women. That's right.

And girls. And girls, just all female people. And they needed delicate hands. And very, very tiny brushes. That's right. And they traced everything in glow-in-the-dark paint. And when they came home, they got paint all over themselves. So they started to get called the Ghost Girls.

Did they like that? Do you think they liked being on Glowy? Maybe. Well, that's going on to the next part of our story. The girls had to use their mouths to get the brushes wet. And what was it the paint was radium? Mom, can you tell me what radium is? Charlie, that's a great question. So, you know, the periodic table of elements. Yes. Have you heard of that? So they're all like the basic substances. I mean, not as small as atoms, but you get the idea that everything's made up of. Radium is one of the elements.

And the thing about radium is it gives off radiation, which isn't great for humans. Radium was in the paint. They were getting the radiation into their body. And the girls were painting their faces, lips, and teeth with the paint. And some of them even took lunch breaks at their workspaces. Now did they know that the paint was dangerous? No. At the time it was a cure for cancer, I'm pretty sure. So they thought of it as a good thing. And they started to put it in different things like toothpaste and water and chocolate,

all sorts of stuff. Yeah. So then it all worked out great. And to this day we put radium in our two things. No, no, no, no, no. What has to do with the story? Something goes totally wrong. We'll tell you what, before we get into what goes totally wrong, let me, can I give you a few more facts? Because this is a great start. This is a great story. And I can fill in some of the blanks.

Yeah. So what are the blanks that I missed? Well, you didn't miss anything. I'm going to give you, it's called context. I'm going to give you some stuff around it. Okay, context. Okay, context. Yeah. No, you've done a great job, fantastic job.

Oh, okay. So, like you said, female factory workers, 1917 was when it started in a place called Orange, New Jersey, and then they also started similar factories in the early 1920s in Ottawa, Illinois, and Waterbury, Connecticut. Okay. Got it. So, those are the places in the town and the times. Now, radium was first named, first discovered and named

by Marie Curie or Madame Curie. Whoa, cool. Yeah. The French physicist. Well, that's a basic, I love her. She's a basic. And she isolated it back in 1898, so a little bit before this. And do you know why she called it radium? Why? Because it glowed and it gave off its own light, like the sun. And what

do we call the things that come down from the suns, the suns? Radium. Oh. Radium. There you go. Now, when she first noticed it was glowing and giving off radiation, we didn't know that that was a dangerous thing. Now, if you saw a glowing rock, bad. Yeah.

Radiation. Yeah, now we kind of know that when we see something glowing, it worries us. Back then, we didn't know. We thought it was like cool. Like, glowing fungus or something like that out in the woods. And like you said, at the time, nobody knew how dangerous radiation was. Even though Marie Curie's did suffer burns, radiation burns from handling all these different

things. And eventually, she would die of something called aplastic anemia, which basically meant her bone marrow couldn't make cells anymore because of the radiation that she was exposed to. But we didn't know all that back then because it takes a while for all this to happen. So you can handle it for quite a while before anything happens. When Kuri first discovered it, and you know, she also discovered another element called polonium, and it's named for her home country of Poland, Polonium.

Yeah, if you look at all the elements on the periodic table, they're all named for lots of things. They're like an icedinium. Who do you think that's named for? Albert Einstein. There you go. And the breakthrough when she first found it had a lot of implications,

like the way that we understand energy and Physics and all of that it Fundamentally changed once we started to understand the idea that things can be radioactive and give off radiation We just didn't know that yet and Marie Currie taught us something totally new about the world around us The applications at first Seemed endless like how what could we do with this new thing? the applications at first seemed endless. Like, what could we do with this new thing? Well, first of all, we had already sort of figured out

before this X-rays, do you know what an X-ray is? What do we do? What do we use an X-ray for? Like, if a bone may have broken, you X-ray to see if it's really actually broken. That's true. So we can X-ray your body to look at your bones. It's a way of looking at your bones without actually having to cut you open and do the stuff. Which is dangerous. And specifically when it came to medicine in the human body, X-ray, radiation seemed to have

a lot of possibilities. Later during the war, World War One, Marie Curie would establish these little mobile X-ray units. They called them petite curries, little curries, little x-ray machines. Yeah, it would be useful out in the field. And she also made these little needles that were empty inside. They were hollow inside and they were filled with a gas that we now call radon gas, which could be used to sterilize tissue, which could be used to like kill bacteria.

It'd keep a wound clean or whatever. And you could put that little needle in somebody and try to keep things clean after they'd gotten an injury or something. That's really cool. We have some safer ways of doing that now. Yeah, way safer. This was before, you know how we take antibiotics sometimes when we're sick? We didn't have those yet.

Those didn't exist yet. Eesh. Eesh. I might have been about time. Yeah, we needed those. That was a big, that was a big time point. Yeah. So, like you said, radium was definitely used in the early 1900s as a treatment for cancer. At the time, we barely understood cancer. Yeah. And yeah, we barely understood it. Yeah, like almost not even at all. We didn't know who or why or how. And we certainly didn't know how to stop it or treat it. There was no at the time surgery was really dangerous. We didn't have good anesthesia. We didn't have good ways of keeping people clean, like keeping wounds clean and surgery. So surgery was super dangerous. We didn't have good ways of keeping people clean, like keeping wounds clean and surgery. So surgery was super dangerous.

We didn't have any chemotherapy like we use for cancer now. So radiation was the thing we had. And it did work in some cancers in some people. But it had side effects. Yeah. It worked to a degree. But it was also a dangerous treatment. So, but it was the only thing we had. And of course, I mentioned it glows. Right. It glows in the

dark and people like that. What colors it? It can give off like a greenish glow or a yellowish, greenish yellowish. Like, chartreuse. Now, you're smarter about colors than me, which, what kind of green is chartreuse? So it's like a mix between yellow and green. Yeah, sure. I think a chartreuse would be. Right there. Yes, that button on the board you're pointing to, I think that's about right. Yeah, yeah. So, um, so people liked that it glowed.

And at the time, people thought that glow was like, ooh, it's healthy. It's important. It glows. So like you said, they put it in everything. They put it in toothpaste. They put in cosmetics. They put it in water. They put it in water.

Literally water. What was that called, Dino? I'm not sure. Rad author. What? That was a water you could buy that had radio minute. It was a fake medicine. They used to sell all these kinds of fake medicines called patent medicines.

So anyway, it glows and that can also be useful for making things glow in the dark. As you mentioned during World War One, starting in 1914, the thought was, well, it could be useful to have a watch that you could see in the dark. So what if we made the dials and the faces and the hands? What if we made it off the... Yeah, that was the numbers. ...and the numbers. And so that was a useful place to start.

The US radium corporation were the ones that first created this product. They went out to Paradox Valley, Colorado, and some parts of Utah, and they mined radium from something called Carnitite ore. And they dug the radium out of the earth, and they mixed it with zinc sulfide, and it would come in like a powder, and then you had to like mix it with oil and stuff into a paint. And they started marketing it as, you know what the name of this paint was? Undark.

Get it? Not a very good name. It's not dark, so it's undark. It glows. Not a good name. You get it? And there would be other versions. There was another one that a company made using a similar formula called Luna. That's a way better name. And there was another one called Marvelite. That's a way better name. And there was another one called Marvelite. That's a better name. That's an undark. So the paint was there. Undark is the worst of this.

It is not a good name. Undark is not a good name. We know what we needed to do with it. We had the little watches. We just needed the people to get to do the work. And as you said, it was fine detail work. They needed little hands, little delicate hands. Yes, delicate hands and very, very, very TV brushes.

They were like just a smidge and big. And as you said, the girls knew that they were being exposed to the paint because they glowed. Their dresses and their skin and their... Yeah, they would come home all glowy because they're outfits and it's just really glowy and it's probably pretty yeah imagine if they went out to like a restaurant or a bar later that evening and they're glowing if one of them had to dress all with like a belt and then they painted the belt mm- would look really cool. Like blue dress, purple dress, something like that.

Yeah, it would, and they would, they would like that. They would like that their dresses would get covered with that or that like you said they might paint their nails or their teeth. Yeah. They painted their faces too. And in addition to all of just,

by the way, do not do that. Yeah, that's a really good disclaimer. Don't do this with radiation of any kind. Yes. Just any kind of radiation, do not do that. So in addition to the fact that just working with the paintment that got exposed to it, like you said, they were encouraged to use what was called the lip dip paint method. So you would... Basically, the brushes, they

were these camel hair brushes and they would, they needed to be a really fine point to do the little detailed work and they might lose that point pretty quickly. Oh yeah, because so you need to like, mm-hmm, that, they called that pointing it with your mouth. You put it in your mouth to point it and then you would dip it in the paint and paint with it and then lip it again put it on your lips to point it. Why did they just wash it before they did the lip? That is a great question. Do you know why they didn't just use washcluster water or whatever? What? Because that would have cost money. It was cheaper just to have them stick it in their mouth. I know, the hard realities.

And the girls didn't know. Like you said, they were constantly being reassured. The paint is totally safe. There's nothing to worry about. It's fine that you're sticking this paintbrush in your mouth. It's fine that you painted your teeth with it. It's not. But that's what they were told, right?

Not fine at all. Like the women employed did not know what was happening. Yeah, at all. Let me tell you what radium is doing to these two people who are exposed to it. You know how we need calcium for our bones and teeth? Yeah. Well, your body can confuse radium and calcium.

It will put radium in the places where it puts calcium. So it will become part of your bones. And that makes you sick. And part of your teeth. Yes, and it can make you sick. Except that when it gets in there, it will actually destroy the stuff around it. So in your bones,

you look good at all. In the middle of your bones, you have bone marrow, and your bone marrow makes all your blood cells, and it would destroy all that. And that can cause, and it can cause things to grow abnormally, which can lead to cancer. So, and like I said, that thing called anemia, where you don't have any blood cells,

and it can cause the blood supply to bones to be destroyed, which just damages the bone. Like the bone basically can die. What? Your bones can die? Yes. So this was bad, right? Like you can see where this is going.

Can I keep going to the back? You want to tell the part that got bad? OK. So. Well, wait, before you tell us the bad part, Daddy hates when I do this. Yes. We got to go to the billing department. Say, let's go. Or before you tell us the bad part, daddy hates when I do this. We gotta go to the billing department.

Say, let's go. Let's go! The medicines, the medicines, the escalate macabre for the mouth. How lucky are with breaking news on a revolutionary form of entertainment, professional wrestling. For more, we go to our correspondent, Danielle Rafford. Professional wrestling is the craze that's sweeping the nation, featuring Vista Coss, and colorful costumes. But who can help us make sense of this world of body slams, Lindsay Kell has the answer. Sources tell us of an amazing podcast called Tides and Fights, filled with discussions of the absurdity of professional wrestling, plus all the sincerity and hilarity that you

could shake a stick at. Listen to the Tides and Fights podcast every week. Find it on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts. And your old-timey radio. Hey there, I'm Ellen Weatherford. And I'm Christian Weatherford. And we've got big feelings about animals that we just got to share. On just the zoo of us, your new favorite animal review podcast.

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in its natural habitat on MaximumFun.org. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. [♪ Music playing, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling,istling, whistling, whistling,istling, whistling, whistling,istling, whistling,istling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling,istling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, whistling, wh done. Tell us, tell us the bad part. Okay, so the women started to come home really, really, really sick. They started to notice that. And then they had a way, way that deadlier name, the radium girls. That's how it's whole story got its name. That's right. They did start to get sick.

The first people who noticed were their dentists. Yeah, because... The dentists, because the teeth were falling out and just horrible. So they started going in and they had two thugs and their teeth were coming out. They had to have some of them pulled. Yeah. They might have to have dentures. And nothing was healing well either. They had sores and it was bad. They had all sores. So the the first people who noticed they were like, oh, the dentist are noticing. And then there

was one woman in particular, Molly Maggia, who was one of the first to suffer really severe illness. First she started with the teeth issues, and then that seemed to spread to her jaw. Oh. And the bone that makes up her jaw started to necrose, which is like it was dying. And eventually her jaw had to be removed.

Oh, oh my. Mm be removed. Oh, my. Yes. So obviously something was very wrong, but nobody wanted to admit that something was really wrong. So after she had died, they just blamed it on another illness. What? They blamed it on something called syphilis. We've done a whole episode on syphilis.

Okay, I'll have to watch that episode. We'll discuss syphilis later. So they blamed it all on something else. Basically, because, well, a couple reasons. Syphilis. Yes, which is an illness that people used to get all the time. But they didn't, and they still get it, but not quite as much. Like cold?

You know, for a while, yeah, basically. Oh cool. We'll get into this later. Okay. So as the other girls got sick with similar stuff, right? Like it wasn't just Molly. Other girls are getting sick too. And the company is saying, well, it's not the pain, definitely not the pain.

Definitely not the pain. Don't worry. Don't look here. And you know what? The company said they were like, look, to prove it's not the paint. Definitely not the paint. Don't look here. And you know what, the company said, they were like, look, to prove it's not the paint, we're gonna get these people, these researchers, to come in, do an independent study, an independent means, we're not doing it. I know.

They're gonna do it, right? So you can trust them. So they're gonna come in, they're gonna look at all this, and they're gonna tell us if it's the paint. And they came in and they looked at all this, and you know what they said? It's the paint. It's the paint. They said, yes, no, it to tell us if it's the paint and they came in and they looked at all this and you know what they said it's the paint. It's the paint. They said yes, no, it is the paint.

It's the paint. It's this is radiation induced illness. They're sick because of exposure to the paint. And the company said, are you sure? I don't think so. Let's get some other people in here. So then they paid some other experts to come in and say it wasn't the paint. What? So must stop, right? That is so much stuff. I bet they paid them to say that. I bet they paid me that. I bet you're right. I'm better

doing it. So all these poor women are sick. And they can't prove that it was the paint that did it. are sick, and they can't prove that it was the paint that did it. So at that point, they turned to the legal system. Yes. They demanded that the company admit that it was the paint and pay for all the medical care they were in here. And they're suffering. They were really sick.

And surgeries and things like that. But it took years to make anything happen. The number one reason at first is that no lawyer wanted to help them. They felt like it wasn't worth it that there was no way they'd win. The company was too powerful. It would be too hard to prove. Also these were bad. These were all women and young women and girls and they didn't have a. We're not treated good. No, back then.

Not at all. You didn't have a lot of power. Yeah. And so it took a while to find a lawyer who would work with them. And even then, it took, it was a lot. It was 1928 when they first appeared in court. January of 1928. So quite a while after people were getting sick. Well, I mean, at least they appeared in court January of 1928. So quite a while after people were getting sick.

Well, I mean, at least they appeared in court. The girls who would be known as who would go down in history as you said as the radium girls were Grace Friar, Edna Husman, Catherine Shaw, and two sisters, Quintamect Donald, and Albena Al Albenia Larise. And they were called the Radium Girls. By the time they actually got to go to court, two of them were already bedridden. And they were all so sick that when you go to testifying court, do you know that they make you raise your hand and swear to tell the truth? Have you seen that in movies and stuff? I swear to tell the truth and

the whole truth and not the about the truth. So help me God. Yeah They were so sick they couldn't even raise their hand to do it. So Right, I know it's so unfair. Wait, why didn't they just say well that proves the point that in there Well, man, we need baby cis here to answer these lawyer questions. Yeah. Uncle Michael, it's never that easy when it comes to the legal system. You can't just say this is the truth. Both sides get to argue and they both get to present all of their facts to try to prove

that they're right and the other person's wrong. Even if it's really clear who's right and who's wrong, both sides get to present that. That's how the justice system works. Did it for husbands help them? Well, I don't know if they had husbands. Some of them might have. But... You're like the one...if the ones who did have husbands, wouldn't they help them? I mean, you like to think they did Hopefully.

And I can, if you're making the point which I think is fair to say that men had more power generally in society than women did at the time That's possible, but But these women were also Like the The company was working really hard to make sure that in the media, in the newspapers, these women were being seen as liars. So sometimes there's something called a smear campaign when you want to make somebody look really bad so that you win.

They were kind of doing that. So it was really hard. So I mean, maybe these women's, the women's own families didn't believe them. It's hard to say. I'm not, I don't know. I don't know. But it was absolutely not. Then as now, it can be, it can be tough to be a girl. Yep. So even as all this was happening, so they're in court, it's in the newspapers, everybody knows about this, right? That this paint may or may not have done this stuff and that's all going to be up to a judge.

So I mentioned to you that there were still women in other places. There are other factories who were doing this. They didn't know. As this was going on, these other women were still unaware. And so they were still doing the lip dip, the lip dip, the lip dip paint method. And even as the people who owned that company called the radium dial company, they knew about this court case, they knew about all this. They would, they didn't tell these employees what they didn't tell them. What's not one point that is not fair.

Now at one point they did start to get worried that there the girls and women who work for them would get sick too. And they don't want to get sued. So they switched from the brushes to these sort of glass pins that you could use instead of the brushes. And then that way you didn't have to dip it because you didn't have to point it, pins that you could use instead of the brushes. And then that way you didn't have to dip it because you didn't have to point it, right? If it wasn't a bunch of fibers, if it's just a tip,

then you can just dip it in the paint and keep painting. So you don't need to stick it in your mouth. Good. So they gave everybody these glass pens to use instead, but here was the problem. The way that you got paid by then was by how many you did during your shift. So you'd show up at whatever time in the morning, you'd stay until whatever time in the evening.

And the number of watches you got done in that time period was how much you got paid. You got paid about a penny and a half a watch, not a lot. Yeah, very low wages. So you would most, so at the at the most you make about a dollar. Probably if they were really efficient they could make two two and a half dollars even. Yeah that's like the most anybody could make. But the problem is it took longer to work with the glass pen than it did with the brush. So do you know what they did? What? They voluntarily went back to using the brushes

so that they could keep making money because they needed to make money so that they could, you know, eat. But is the way it's bad? Either way it's bad, why? They still didn't, because they still didn't know. I know, I know. So anyway, finally, in 1928, the radium girls

would win their case in New Jersey. In Illinois, eventually they found out about this. The women who worked there also sued. It would be 1939, so 11 years later before their suit would finally settle and they would finally win and they would be compensated. 11 years. That's older than me.

I'm seven. I know it took that long in court battles. They're so crazy. And especially like you said when it was so obvious that they were doing the wrong thing. So obvious. To this day we don't we'll never know exactly how many people got sick and how many people died of radiation exposure because the thing with radiation exposure is it doesn't always immediately hurt you. Some things like cancer or that that thing that Marie Curie got, a plastic anemia, those can take a really long time to develop. And so you don't know how sick you got from it until later. And that makes it really hard to figure out, you know, how many people got sick. Ooh. So we don't know exactly. We know, I'm guessing about 50 something probably.

There were over 50 people that got sick. We know of there were over a dozen people who died that we know of, but that's that's an underestimate. There were over 50 people that got sick, we know of, there were over a dozen people who died that we know of, but that's an underestimate. There were definitely a lot more than that. Oh yeah. Yeah. But more, it's more. In your video, did they tell you what we learned from this?

Do not eat radio. Well, that is an important lesson. Do not eat radio. You know, somebody asked me that question on an episode we did a few weeks back. If you can eat a radioactive rock. Can you? No.

My answer was no. Do not eat the radioactive rock. That's a radioactive, radioactive, N-E-T-V. That is true. Don't eat anything radioactive. If it's radioactive flavored candy like those really really sour candies. That aren't really radioactive. Yeah, those like toxic. Oh okay. I know what you're talking about. They look like they're in a barrel of nuclear waste. Yeah. Candy's weird sometimes,

doesn't it? Yeah, really, really weird. Yeah. And that's not real radiation we should say. Yeah. That's just candy. Candy that is made to look like it. Strade. The kids like to eat things that look like toxic things you're not supposed to eat? No. It's very strange. Unless they're like five or younger. Oh, okay. Then they do. Well, Cooper. It's Cooper. She'll eat anything. She has a death wish. I think she just has no fear. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So first of all, as you said, we understood after that that radium was dangerous. This was actually they worked with one of the women who worked in and painted the watches to have her breathe out and they measured levels of radiation as she was breathing.

And they from these different studies, they established what we call the safe limits for occupational standards. So like if you work in a hospital, we have X-ray machines, right? Like you. Yeah, like I do. So people who work down in the radiology area who do all the imaging get exposed to radiation. So we know what the safe levels, like you can get exposed to a little bit throughout your life and it's okay.

And so we have now standard set for how much you're allowed to be exposed to in a workplace and things like that. You know that and they have special vests they have people wear with lead in them to protect them from radiation. Oh cool. Anytime somebody comes in a room to do an x-ray I usually run out the door. Like the lead from pens. Yeah like that. Like the lead. Which can block areas of the body from radiation. Okay, got it. Yeah, LED. Why is it spelled like that? Why is anything spelled like it is? Yeah.

What do we tell? In English is weird. That's what we tell you. Anytime you ask why are certain words spelled some ways, don't we? English is weird. So this was a big turning point for our understanding about radiation and radium.

And this was also a big turning point for our understanding about radiation and radium. And this was also a big turning point for workers rights. Because we shouldn't force people to work in dangerous situations just to make enough money to eat, right? Like, you should we deserve safe workplaces, don't we? Yeah. And now, luckily, there are safe workplaces, hopefully. They're better than they were, generally, much not all. Well, better than they were, but not great, but better than they were. And there's still a lot of issues with that, but that's why it's really important to always allow workers to band together

and form unions and fight for their rights. Yeah, we'll talk about that more some other time. Okay. So, radium would finally fall out of popularity. Yeah. Because like you had said earlier, it was in toothpaste and everything. Yeah, it was even water. Water, guys.

Literally water. Literally water. One case that really, at the same time that all this was happening, there was a famous golfer named Eben Byers. He played golf. You know, the sport golf. Golf. Golf.

It's that thing that pop falls asleep watching sometimes. You know, pops my grandpa by the way. So there was this guy named even buyers who was a famous golfer and he heard his arm and his doctor prescribed him Ratathor, which was water with. Radium. And so he thought it really was helpful. So he took tons, tons and tons and tons, drank bottle after bottle of radium. He took tons, tons and tons and tons, drank bottle after bottle of radium, and then his jaw fell off in 1931. Yes. Why do people, why is it always the jaws? It was getting directly exposed because the, that's, yeah.

That was the sight of first exposure, right? Was the face because you're just, you're drinking it or putting it in your mouth. Yeah. What if you put it up your nose? Well, the nose, your nose would fall off. Probably. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. So anyway, that was because he was like, you know, a sports person and everybody's

paying attention. When that happened, a lot of people were like, you know, a sports person, and everybody's paying attention. And when that happened, a lot of people were like, yeah, stay away from radium. And so now we try to limit radiation. We only use it for very specific things, and we have a lot of control over the doses we use now, like an X-ray, like for instance, if we are worried that you broke your arm and we want to X-ray your arm, the amount of radiation you get from that is very, very tiny. Yeah, it looks like a sweet.

Now, there are some that are more like if you get a cat scan. That's more radiation. And then certainly we- There's more radiation, but not enough to make you like really, really sick. Right, and we do, we watch those things in workplaces and we also do still use radiation as a treatment for some. That's right. So that use that we found all those years ago is still valid, but it's very specific for just certain things in certain places.

Just right. Well, Charlie, do you have any more questions before we go here I think we're about out of time any more questions about the radium girls. You don't have to have any questions. I actually have to more one more question. What is my name? Okay I'll just check it. You'll be in silly. I'm done. Hey, can I say something though? Yeah. Thank you. You're welcome. This was No Joke, Charlie's idea.

Yeah. This was literally my idea. I was the one who showed her the video, even. Charlie watches on her own, of her own choosing, educational YouTube videos. Yeah that teach her about all kinds of things from history and science and The animal world and all kinds of topics and this I watched to get us to go to record one one time. There was a Fastest toilet on wheels What where is the fastest toilet on wheels? Who won?

I don't remember. I didn't know that was something. Oh, Charlie. But you did. You watched these great videos and Charlie brought this video about the rating girls and said, I think this would make a good topic for saw bones. And I said, you are right. And Charlie researched this episode.

I just helped, but thank you. I think- We helped me research it, but she was the one who researched her parts. I was the one who researched my parts by watching that video over and over and over again. But I'm really proud of you. Did a great job. Thank you.

And you can take over the podcast someday when mommy retires from podcast. Let me have it. Oh, you're ready. Give it to me. Okay, I'm not ready yet. I already. You're not ready. I already have my own study. I love you so much. Thank you, Charlie. Thank you all for listening. You should check out Max and Fun. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because that's our podcast now works. I said, yeah, too much. And we love them. And thank you for listening to Saubones.

Daddy usually does the intro's an outro, so I'm struggling a little here. Thank you To the taxpayers. Yeah, thank you for our song medicines Yeah, which is the intro natural rubber program. Yeah, and Thanks for listening to Salmons and Again, this is this was me Charlie baccala Roy and I'm mom Sydney baccala Roy so okay and don't forget don't drill the hole in your head. Alright! supported.