The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. How was the world of work changing for most Americans during the beginning of the 20th century? What benefits and drawbacks did the emerging industrial economy have for ordinary people?

Teaching Suggestion: The Radium Girls takes place in the working class world of the early 20th-century United States. If students are familiar with this setting, they might respond to this prompt, then utilize the resources below as a way to self-check their ideas. If they lack prior background knowledge, they might review the resources first and use the prompt to apply new information.

• This article from the Library of Congress offers an overview of the working world in early 20th-century America.
• This article from the Oxford Research Encyclopedia offers an in-depth discussion of working conditions from 1900 to 1945.
• This 2-minute film from the Library of Congress shows a typical working environment for women in 1904 at the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company.

2. What is “technological optimism”? How did the public’s beliefs about science give rise to technological optimism in the early 20th century?

Teaching Suggestion: The Radium Girls demonstrates how early 20th-century technological optimism created a climate that seriously minimized the dangers of radium. Even if students have not heard this term before, they will likely be able to make logical guesses about its meaning. They might discuss this term as a group, then utilize these or similar resources in order to answer the prompt’s second question.

• This article from Dickinson College’s Digital Museum explains the rising popularity of science as a form of both education and entertainment at the close of the 19th century.
• This article from CBS News explores the technological optimism that evolved from the scientific advancements of the early 20th century.

Personal Connection Prompt

This prompt can be used for in-class discussion, exploratory free-writing, or reflection homework before reading the text.

Do you ever worry about encountering substances that are commonly believed to be safe but that are actually harmful? What reasoning leads you to feel one way or the other?

Teaching Suggestion: Whether students answer “yes” or “no” is less important than the reasoning process they use to arrive at their answers, as they may refer to science, media, advertising, expert opinion, and other ideas they will encounter the text. This prompt lends itself well to discussion, but students may be more comfortable and answer more thoughtfully in small groups rather than in a whole-class setting.