We’re celebrating the One Book One Community selection Hidden Figures with a look at some other little-known women in history. Adults are invited to the Main Library at Goodwood at 7 PM Saturday, March 24, for a free book talk on The Radium Girls:
The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women with author Kate Moore. In the book, Moore traces the lives of more than a dozen American women who were employed as luminous watch-dial painters as early as 1917. She tells how these women, some barely in their 20s, were enchanted by high pay and the allure of the paint’s luminescent substance: radium. Carefully researched, the work will stun readers with its descriptions of the glittering artisans who, oblivious to health dangers, twirled camel-hair brushes to fine points using their mouths, a technique called lip-pointing. By the end of 1918, one out of six American soldiers owned a luminous watch, but the women who made them that way didn’t experience such glowing results. Copies of the book will be sold at the event. Stick around after the discussion to have your book signed by the author!