X is for X-rays on Wheels: Inventions by Women A-Z

(1920) Marie Curie 1867-1934

When Germany declared war on France in 1914, the renown physicist-chemist Marie Curie was prepared to do her part. She was even willing to donate her two Nobel Prize gold medals for melting down to assist in the country's metal shortage. The French National Bank refused her offer. 

France had been home to Polish born Maria Salomea Sklodowska since 1895 with her marriage to French scientist Pierre Curie. Together Pierre and Marie shared a Nobel prize in 1903 for their discovery of spontaneous radioactivity. Marie then won a second Nobel Prize in 1911 for her discovery of the elements polonium and radium (she coined the term radioactivity). Both made Marie the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the first person to receive a second Nobel Prize. She was also the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris. Marie never filed a patent, for fear it would hinder other researchers from making further discoveries.

Pierre and Marie Curie in their lab

Marie was dedicated to her field and loved working alongside her husband Pierre, but life dealt her a blow with his tragic death in 1906, when the wheels of a horse drawn carriage crushed his skull. Widowed, gifted, and well educated, she was in a position to offer her services during the war. 

Marie saw that the military's health services were in poor shape. She knew that doctors could benefit from X-ray equipment to confirm broken bones and locate bullets and shrapnel in their patients. The French government gave Marie permission to set up France's first military radiology centers, and she became the Director of the Red Cross Radiology Service. With zeal and passion, Marie designed and setup 20 mobile X-ray stations and 200 hospital stations. 

For the mobile units, she began by borrowing Renault trucks from her rich female acquaintances, and convinced automobile body shops to convert the vehicles into medical X-ray labs. She begged manufacturers and other wealthy acquaintances to purchase X-ray equipment and auxiliary generators (a "dynamo,"  worked by the engine, gave the electric current required).

X-rays on Wheels: the petite Curie

The 20 fully equipped mobile units became known as petite Curies (little Curies), or as some call them, X-rays on Wheels. Some 150 women were trained on how to operate the X-ray equipment. Marie too received training, including a lesson on human anatomy, and how to drive the vehicle, change a tire, and repair a engine. Marie visited the battle front with her 17-year-old daughter Irene, who became her faithful assistant and also received training. Approximately 1,000,000 wounded soldiers were examined in the petite Curies and 1.25 million X-ray films taken. Marie traveled all across Northern Europe helping wherever she could.  
  

Irene and Marie Curie at a hospital station

 At the end of WWI, Marie returned to her research of radium. Her exposure to radiation as a result, including her unshielded exposure to radiation in the X-ray stations, caused an early death from aplastic anemia. The effects of radiation were unknown at the time. Her papers written in 1890 are still radioactive and stored in lead-lined boxes, and protection is needed to read them. Even her cookbooks are radioactive. Reading her story, one senses a great purpose in life and a willingness to sacrifice. Her words sum it up beautifully:

 "Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe we are gifted for something and that this thing must be obtained."
-Marie Curie

 Sources:
http://www.aip.org/history/curie/brief/06_quotes/quotes_12.html
http://www.aip.org/history/curie/war1.htm
http://www.worldwar1.com/tgws/thismonthcurie.htm
http://sierrawyllie.weebly.com/little-curies.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Curie



Copyright 2015 © Sharon Marie Himsl