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What a curious title for a talk. You might wonder "Why Marie Curie and why me"? Marie Curie serves as the role model for AAWR, and there are many parallels between Marie Curie, the women she influenced, and every one of us. Let me share with you some interesting facts about Madame Curie and some of the pioneering women in radiation oncology whom she influenced-Anna Hamann, Vera Peters, Eleanor Montague, Norah Tapley, and Florence Chu. Marie Curie was the first female radiation research-scientist. She was born Marie Sklodowska in Warsaw, Poland, in 1867. She was the youngest of five children. As a young girl, despite being small in size and frail, she developed a keen love of mathematics and physics from her professor father and desired to get a higher education. However, under czarist domination, Polish women were denied a higher education. Ever
resourceful, at age 16, she proposed an arrangement with her older
sister whereby Marie would work as a governess and send one-half
of her earnings to support her sister to study medicine in Paris-and
later her sister would do the same for her. Tragically, two years later, Pierre was trampled to death by a horse-drawn carriage and, at age 38, Marie became a single parent with two small daughters to raise. Ever resourceful, she called upon her father-in-law to provide childcare so that she could continue the work that she and Pierre had initiated. Within five years, by 1911, Marie had received a second Nobel Prize, this time in chemistry, the first person, man or woman, to receive the Nobel Prize twice. Marie Curie was amazingly resourceful, persevering, and optimistic. She was not stopped by the lack of education in her home country of Poland or by the lack of money to finance the education. She was not stopped by being widowed at a young age and made a single parent. She was not stopped by chronic radiation sickness from daily exposure to radon gas, and she was not stopped by the professional barriers imposed on female scientists More than any other woman, Marie Curie influenced the entire field of radiology so that others could use the magic healing powers of radium. One clinician scientist who Marie Curie influenced was Anna Hamann. Born in the late 19th century in Germany, she had to have led the most dramatic of lives. Anna Hamann's father was a physicist and saw that she received a proper education. She began her studies as a student of physics under professor Roentgen, the only woman whom I could find who, in fact, studied with professor Roentgen. And then she distinguished herself by being flunked by him because she arrived late for class one day. Only when Roentgen learned that Anna Hamann's father was a respected physicist-colleague was she reinstated. Her path crossed with Marie Curie in 1930, when she did graduate work at the Curie Institute in Paris. But these were troubling times and her father, who was a member of the German Socialist Party and at odds with the Nazi regime, was eager to get Anna out of German, for her own safety. She came to work at the University of Chicago as an instructor in radiation therapy for a salary of $2,400 a year! But even when she got to the United States, she was not free of stress. She was suspected of being a German messenger, a spy, and was under constant FBI surveillance-not only because she had come from Germany but also because she had lost her fingerprints from her prior exposure to radium, and this represented a problem for security. As if her foreign accent was not enough, her lack of fingerprints also handicapped her! But Anna Hamann was a woman of great humor, which certainly helped her persevere. A story is told that Anna once fell into a ditch; she broke her arm. Jokingly, she said that she "must get out in a hurry, or some of her professional colleagues might start throwing in the dirt"! Yes, Anna Hamann was funny and flexible-qualities that helped her persevere when in her later years she was nearly blind. Her vision was so poor that she had to put her face within millimeters of the patient she was treating. Nevertheless she persevered, using her hands to accurately place and pack the intracavity radium insertions. Anna Hamman developed a subungual melanoma. She died from a disease almost certainly acquired from the prior exposure to radium while in search of a cure for others. Another prominent clinician in radiation oncology who influenced many others was the late Vera Peters. Vera Peters pursued radiation therapy at the suggestion of her own mother's physician, Dr. Gordon Richards. Vera Peters is acknowledged as a pioneer in the research on Hodgkin's disease as well as breast cancer; however, for decades, the recognition for her work lagged behind the work itself. She began researching the outcome of patients with Hodgkin's disease treated with radiation therapy in 1940, long before others discovered this useful treatment. She had difficulty getting her work published; her first paper was rejected by the Canadian Medical Association Journal. Vera Peters told me that she often wondered if the disbelief of her data and the rejection of this paper was due, in part, because she was a woman. Even when other investigators reported their successes in Hodgkin's disease, which validated Peters' research, she was not easily accepted. She was advised to specialize in an area different than Hodgkin's disease-perhaps in breast cancer. But Vera Peters was able to ignore these comments, even excuse such paternal advice, by rationalizing that it was simple jealousy. I asked her how she kept up her spirits through all this rejection, and she replied that, way down deep, she knew she was doing the right thing. As Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." Twenty-nine
years later, Vera Peters received the Gold Medal from ASTRO for
her work in Hodgkin's disease and breast cancer, thus demonstrating
that persistence and optimism in one's belief is not only healthy,
but necessary, and very likely rewarding too. Eleanor Montague has been a champion for promoting public education about breast cancer. She emphasized the importance of breast self-examination and mammography. It was Eleanor Montague who became an early advocate of breast preservation using primary radiotherapy. And her successful advocacy has impacted the quality of life for all women. In addition, Eleanor has been a wonderful mother to four children. She worked full-time, but when her children needed her, her family came first. When needed at home, she was able to shift to part-time work without losing her professional momentum. She was elected to the Texas Women's Hall of Fame and was also named a Gold Medalist of ASTRO. Norah Tapley was an outstanding educator, researcher, and clinician. She was adaptable and flexible, despite a great handicap. She trained at Columbia University in New York in diagnostic radiology but was encouraged by Dr. Morton Kligerman to enter the field of radiation therapy. Dr. Kligerman told me that on more than one occasion, he found Norah weeping in the corner of his office, unable to deal with patients who were terminally ill. She was so sensitive that he questioned whether she could do the job. But she wanted to prove that she could do the job. In fact, she did such an outstanding job that Dr. Kligerman recruited her to a faculty position at Columbia. However, the hospital administrator intended to pay Norah considerably less than the male who had previously filled that position. Dr. Kligerman objected and put his own job on the line, threatening to resign if the hospital did not provide Norah an equitable salary-which eventually they did. Most women were not so fortunate in having a determined and powerful mentor like Morton Kligerman to champion their talents and skills. One of Norah's greatest professional contributions was her work with the electron beam, about which she wrote a book "Clinical Applications of the Electron Beam", stimulated largely by her chairman at the M.D. Anderson, Dr. Gilbert Fletcher. Fletcher had three strong women in his department, here shown with Lillian Fuller, Norah Tapley, and Eleanor Montague. Norah was a superb educator. She served as the Director of the M.D. Anderson Residency Program and was the first woman to be named a Trustee of the American Board of Radiology. Norah Tapley was a remarkable and accomplished woman. Perhaps her achievements become even more remarkable when you know the conditions under which she accomplished them. From the age of six until she was 18, Norah suffered from a non-healing osteomyelitis of the right distal femur, which kept her confined to bed much of the time. At age 18, she made the difficult decision that in order to go to medical school she would have to lose her bothersome leg. Norah Tapley chose to undergo an AK amputation in order to get on with her life. What a courageous young woman to have dealt so assertively with her physical handicap. Another influential woman, Florence Chu, received the AAWR Marie Curie Award in 1993. She was one of the first women to chair a major academic radiation oncology department, serving as Chair at Memorial Hospital from 1976-1984. She held this department together during very difficult times, against a strong group of aggressive male surgeons who had little use for radiotherapy. What ties Marie Curie, Anna Hamann, Vera Peters, Eleanor Montague, Norah Tapley, and Florence Chu with each of you? It is the qualities you all exhibit. Look back at these remarkable 20th century women. Most of the problems these women faced have not changed: balancing personal and professional life, job sharing, childcare, promotion, acceptance. Yet it is the way these successful women solved their problems that distinguishes them. They all shared certain qualities: they were curious and adventuresome in exploring, probing, and testing unknowns. They were resourceful in securing necessary support. They were creative in finding novel solutions, and they were persistent in overcoming barriers. The
barriers that these women overcame are the same barriers that we
all meet today. Although they had fewer resources than we have today,
they found a way to succeed. They succeeded because they were curious,
adventuresome, resourceful, creative, and persistent. These qualities
exemplified first by Marie Curie, and then by these remarkable women
who followed her, serve both as our guide and our inspiration.
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