The Disturbing Story of the Radium Girls Who Glowed in the Dark
These poor girls were assured that there was nothing to worry about.
Many young women during World War I found employment in clock factories, where they painted luminous radium on watch faces. The girls, who could be seen glowing in the dark after their shifts, suffered horrific side effects, prompting them to launch a race-against-time campaign for justice that would alter US labor regulations for good.
One such corporation, United States Radium Corporation (USRC) in New Jersey, hired a young lady called Grace Fryer on April 10, 1917, to work as a dial painter. Fryer was only 18 years old. Just four days after the United States entered World War I, Grace wanted to do everything she could to aid the war effort. She didn’t realize how much her new position would affect her and other workers’ rights until it was too late. This is the story of the Radium Girls.
The Ghost Girls
In response to the declaration of war, hundreds of working-class women went to the studio where they were engaged to paint watches and military dials with radium, a new element discovered by Marie Curie less than 20 years earlier.
For women who could break into the field, dial painting was “the elite job for…
