While dialpainters that worked on metal dials used styluses to apply an oil-based mixture, the Radium Girls were painting paper dials, so used camelhair brushes to apply a water-based paint.
The materials and methods of application were dependent on the type of dial being painted. These factories were owned by the United States Radium Corporation (USRC), the Radium Dial Company, and the Waterbury Clock Company respectively. They were employed to apply luminescent paint to watch dials from 1917 in three factories in Orange, New Jersey Ottawa, Illinois and Waterbury, Connecticut. The watches were made by a group of young women, who came to be known as ‘The Radium Girls’. Radium wrist watches were initially produced for military use, but their practicality made these a quickly ubiquitous civilian consumer item. In addition to its use in medicine, radium was used widely in industry. One gramme radium teletherapy apparatus, wheeled (the fourth Westminster Hospital “bomb”), c.1930 Cells that divide quickly, like cancerous tumours, are affected by this at a faster rate so are eliminated before healthy cells are damaged. This disrupts the chemical equilibrium of a cell and can cause cell death. This is when radiation removes electrons from atoms, transforming them into positively charged ions. When the rays pass through a person, it causes ionization. Early cancer treatments used radium 226 to eliminate tumours. The discovery of radium was followed rapidly by its use in medicine. However, zinc sulphide – a phosphorescent – will emit light when it is exposed to radiation. Radium as a lone element is not luminescent. Radiation is caused by the disintegration of atoms and comes in three main forms: alpha, beta, and gamma. As a radioactive element, it produces radiation. Radium 226 is an element discovered by Pierre and Marie Curie in 1898.
A special glow-in-the-dark paint was created. This led to a key innovation: luminous dials and hands. “Ingersoll” wrist watch with leather strap, pin pallet escapement and luminous hour hand, 1915īeing able to access and view watches in the dark trenches, ahead of timed and co-ordinated pushes over-the-top, was vital.
Wristwatches were so important that the British War Office ended up distributing them to soldiers. However, pocket watches were not practical to use in combat, so they lost favour during the war. Prior to the war, wristwatches were typically the preserve of women – more jewellery than timepiece – while men typically used pocket watches. The outbreak of the First World War led to the proliferation of wristwatches for men. Trainee Assistant Digital Curator, Gabrielle Bryan-Quamina, delves into our collection to tell the story of the Radium Girls, the first casualties of industrial radium poisoning.
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