![]() October is Nobel Prize season, so it’s a good time to examine the story of her story-how she lived, but also how she has been mythologized and misunderstood.Ĭurie was born Manya Sklodowska in November 1867 in Warsaw, Poland, and raised there during a Russian occupation. Curie has always been a fascinating character, the subject of books and plays and movies, and this anniversary has prompted several new works about her. In her honor, the United Nations named 2011 the International Year of Chemistry. This year marks the 100th anniversary of her second Nobel Prize, the first time anyone had achieved such a feat. Professional science until fairly recently was a man’s world, and in Curie’s time it was rare for a woman even to participate in academic physics, never mind triumph over it. You would not expect the president of the United States to praise one of Curie’s male contemporaries by calling attention to his manhood and his devotion as a father. She would forever be considered a bit strange, not just a great scientist but a great woman scientist. ![]() Curie worked during a great age of innovation, but proper women of her time were thought to be too sentimental to perform objective science. That was because she was a pioneer, an outlier, unique for the newness and immensity of her achievements. It was a rather odd thing to say to the most decorated scientist of that era, but then again Marie Curie was never easy to understand or categorize. “We lay at your feet the testimony of that love which all the generations of men have been wont to bestow upon the noble woman, the unselfish wife, the devoted mother.” President Warren Harding spoke at length, praising her “great attainments in the realms of science and intellect” and saying she represented the best in womanhood. tour was held in the East Room of the White House. Dozens more colleges and universities, including Yale, Wellesley and the University of Chicago, conferred honors on her. Later that week, 2,000 Smith College students sang Curie’s praises in a choral concert before bestowing her with an honorary degree. ![]() The American Chemical Society, the New York Mineralogical Club, cancer research facilities and the Bureau of Mines held events in her honor. She would later appear at the American Museum of Natural History, where an exhibit commemorated her discovery of radium. Andrew Carnegie before receptions at the Waldorf Astoria and Carnegie Hall. She attended a luncheon on her first day at the house of Mrs. But the Polish-born scientist, almost pathologically shy and accustomed to spending most of her time in her Paris laboratory, was stunned by the fanfare that greeted her. Da Capo, 1986.When Marie Curie came to the United States for the first time, in May 1921, she had already discovered the elements radium and polonium, coined the term “radio-active” and won the Nobel Prize-twice. Quinn, Susan Marie Curie: A life, Simon & Schuster, New York 1995.Ĭurie, Eve Madame Curie, Doubleday, 1938. Struggles, and momentous discoveries ,Birch Lane Press, New York 1993. McGrayne, Sharon Bertsch Nobel Prize women in science: their lives, Pais, Abraham Inward bound: of matter and forces in the physical world, Science of Radioactivity, Oxford University Some books in which one may read about the significance of herĭiscoveries for physics, and her life, are: Reference material on Marie Curie, her life and her work, is readily Humphrey Davy Medal with Pierre Curie 1903įor "discovery of the elements radium and polonium, by the isolation of radium and the study of the nature and compounds of this remarkable element." Recommended reading: The discovery of radium and Nobel Prize (physics) with Pierre Curie 1903įor "joint researches on the radiation phenomenon discovered by Professor Henri Becquerel." [ Click here for her personal account of these "Another New Radio-active Element," Comptes Rendus 127: 1215 (1898) with P. "New Radio-Active Element in Pitchblende," Comptes Rendus 127: 175 (1898) with P. With Pierre Curie, she discovered radium, polonium,Īnd other heretofore unknown radioactive elements. Of coal and pitchblende that there were other radioactive elements besides uranium. "Radiations from Compounds of Uranium and of Thorium," Comptes Rendus 126: 1101 (1898).Ĭonjectured the radiation, which Henri Becquerel called uranic rays, emanated from atoms of uranium,Īnd deduced from quantitative studies of the radioactivity of samples Initiated systematic studies of natural radioactivity.CWP at // Marie Curie Welcomeįirst Important Contributions and Publications:
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