Radium Girls

Radium Girls by D.W. Gregory, is centered around the deathly affects of radium. The play displays the horrors that factory girls endure through their contact with radium everyday. With their contact to radium everyday, Grace, Kathryn, and Irene’s health is in jeopardy. While the company’s owner, Roeder refuses to address or accept the problem, the radium girls pursue a court case to demand justice as well as protection for the rest of the factory workers. As the girl’s lives become increasingly fatal, the court case receives high press and high stakes for both the radium girls as well as Roeder. Act I begins with Grace, Irene, and Kathryn all working in the U.S. Radium Plant. While working with the radium paint all day, the girls do not suspect the paint is dangerous and proceed to put paint on their bodies while painting dials. Further, Madame Curie has been traveling the world

Drinker who works for the plant, sends Roeder a report stating that they believe radium is causing all their workers to become sick and leave the plant. Reorder enters a panic through this news, but refuses to accept the facts of radium. During this period, Grace sees another doctor to get another opinion on the condition of her jaw. Dr. Flinn examines Grace and sees that all she has is a poor diet and vitamin deficiency. As Grace comes to learn, Dr. Flinn received his PhD and realizes he is not a clinical doctor. Kathryn then tells Grace that Dr. Flinn works for the plant and has been checking all of the factory girls. Following Dr. Flinn’s evaluation of Grace, Grace and Tom got to see the Woman’s Club of Orange speak. Grace would like to speak to Ms. Wiley of The Woman’s Club of Orange who fights for social justice. After Grace tells Ms.Wiley about the plant’s affects on the girl’s healthy, Ms.Wiley agrees to help the factory girls get justice. Ms.Wiley’s first proposal for their fight against the plant, is to have Grace’s face all over newspapers to draw the public’s