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Despite being advised not to travel to Sweden, Marie she returned to Paris and her beloved institute, where
arrived in Stockholm in December 1911 to accept her she and a mechanic were the only ones who remained.
Nobel Prize—this time in chemistry for her discoveries During the war, France asked its citizens to donate
of polonium and radium and for her work advancing their gold and silver to help the war effort, and Marie
the understanding of radium. Following the ceremony offered all of her medals, including both Nobel Prizes,
where she delivered her Nobel address (during which but the French National Bank refused to accept such
she credited Pierre and her team for their work), she a valuable possession and returned them. Marie did
sat across from King Gustaf V (himself embroiled in a her part by using most of her Nobel Prize money to
scandalous affair) at a formal state dinner. purchase war bonds.

“Petites Curies” | Marie’s X-rays on wheels

As World War I raged on, Marie was determined to find
a way to make the X-ray examinations she lectured
about at the Sorbonne available for battlefield surgeons
operating on wounded soldiers near the front lines, and
she came up with an idea for field radiological centers.
She convinced the French government to allow her
to set up France’s first military radiology centers, and
she was named Director of the Red Cross Radiology
Service.

At Marie’s request, automobile body shops transformed
Figure 2. Marie Curie’s 1911 Nobel Prize citation Renault cars into vans, and by late October 1914, the
first of 20 radiology vehicles she would equip was
A month later, Marie was hospitalized with depression ready. Marie learned how to drive a car and began
and acute kidney issues. She underwent surgery and training other women as operators of her fleet of fully
spent months recuperating. She and her friend and equipped mobile radiology units that French enlisted
fellow physicist, Hertha Ayrton, rented houses near the men would soon dub “petites Curies” (little Curies).
English seashore where they were joined by Marie’s Marie also established 200 permanent X-ray
daughters and their governess. She returned to Sceaux installations in France and Belgium, and it is estimated
in October 1912 for further bed rest and to the lab in that over one million wounded soldiers were treated
December where she made her first lab entry in 14 with her X-ray units.
months.
Although she was just 17 years old at the time, Irène
The Radium Institute | The Great War begins joined her mother as her chief assistant and worked at
her side as a nurse and radiologist. She helped Marie
Marie set out to achieve her goal of creating a new in her efforts to train women in the field to be skilled
scientific institution from the ground up on her own— X-ray technicians. At the same time, Marie and Irène
one that would be worthy of Pierre’s memory. Andrew worked together to develop medical applications for
Carnegie’s grant in 1907 enabled her to assemble a radium. Both women were exposed to large amounts
research staff, and the University of Paris joined forces of radiation in the process.
with the Pasteur Foundation to fund a Radium Institute.
Marie would supervise the radioactivity laboratory, and
an eminent physician would supervise the medical
research laboratory.

In August 1914, the Radium Institute—located in the Latin
Quarter of Paris on the newly named Rue Pierre Curie—
opened its doors. Germany declared war on France and
dropped three bombs on Paris on 2 September 1914.
The French government moved to Bordeaux as the
German army advanced on Paris. France’s entire supply
of radium for research was the single gram in Marie’s lab.
She traveled to Bordeaux with the precious element in a Figure 3. Marie Curie | Curie mobile X-ray unit | WWI
heavy lead box. After securing it in a safe deposit box,