The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1906-06-09
ROMANCE OF RADIU,M.
Death of its Discoverer Recalls Some of
His Struggles.

His struggles.
81 think l told you how | came upon
radium in the 1900 Exhibition" writes
the Paris correspondent Of Truth. in
letter lamenting the death of M. Curie,
the discoverer of radium. Il told you
how the compilers of the catalogue had
overlooked it; how a diamond merchant
from India found that its proximity
had discolored his exhibits and knocked
It angrily aside to the obscure hole
where / saw it; how the jurors had
passed it by unnotlced, and showed no
curiosity to see 1t.
The glow of the speck exhibited fas-
einated the correspondent and he hunt
ed up the inventor. M. Curie seemed
surprised and greatly pleased to find
that somebody outside his scientific
friends took an interest in his scientific
researches, Speaking of the energy of
| the new substance, he said he would
not walk into a room containing one
pound of radium, as the consequences
would be too dangerous. He did not
| believe, but would not be positive, that
our planet contained greater quantity
| Of this substance.
He told me in his gentle, patient
manner all about his difficulties the
| correspondent goes on. Tons upon
| tons of pitchblende had to be manipu-
: lated to get at few grains, or perhaps
tenths of a grain, of radium. Pitch
blende in its rough state was expen-
sive, the Austrian government having
monopoly of 1t.
| Madame Curie herself pounded in a
mortar all the pitchblende they used in
| producing the atom of radium l saw at
the exhibition and the particle in the
| phial She had not wasted a single
| gramme Of the mineral and she had
| ruined the beauty Of her hands. 1t
| would surprise me to hear that M. and
| Nine. Curie invested, save in pitch
| blende, any part of the one hundred
and twenty thousand francs which
their shares of the Nobel and theOrirls
| prizes brought them.
ION my first visit to M Curie the
price he mentioned for radium was six
thousand pounds gramme. Three
years laterfi owing to the demand ex-
ceeding the supply it had run up to
twelve thousand pounds a gramme, or
eight hundred pounds a grain.
"'And I am afraid said M. Curie,
that it win go on rising. Cest terri
BILE he added with sigh, as If he were
talking about naughty son.
HE told me that he and his wife had
spent every sou they possessed and
subjected themselves to many priva-
lions to buy pitchblende, The coat I
had already noticed was threadbare,
and the shoes pieced as if by some cob
bier.
Madame Curie, elsewhere learned
gave up gloves, the renewal of her Sun
day clothes, and resigned herself to
wearing the coarsest and cheapest
boots she could buy I dare say she
consented the more easily, from wish
to save for pitchblende, to her little
Irene being dressd on Sundays and
week days in a coarse suit Of boys
clothes.
"What I wrote first about NJ. and
Nine. Curie brought Germany and the
United States around me, but not sin
gle British inquirer. They had receives
in the most literal sense golden offers
from the United States if they would
go there to direct laboratories. Swift
zerland also made-for the Swiss-ar
offer of unwonted brilliancy
"They preferred, when once thu
, French government offered NJ, Curie ;
chair at the Sorbonne, to remain il
I Paris on the comparatively meagre sal
airy of twelve thousand francs a year
NJ. Combes secured to Madame Curie
as superintendent of his laboratory, 81,
thousand francs. He created the situa
ton for her, as NJ. Curie said he coult
not work without her scientific com
: partnership and help"
~