logo
episode-header-image
Aug 2023
38m 5s

Marie Curie

History Hit
About this episode

In a leaky shed in Paris, Marie Curie turned two tons of pitchblende (aka special rocks) into a single test tube of radium chloride - its green glow lighting up the walls. It must have been a magic...if radioactive!...moment.


Today on Patented we talk with Patricia Fara about Marie Curie. A giant in the history of science but a woman whose story has been twisted and mistold over the years.


Edited and Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long


Discover the past on History Hit with ad-free original podcasts and documentaries released weekly presented by world renowned historians like Dan Snow, James Holland, Mary Beard and more.


Get 50% off your first 3 months with code PATENTED. Download the app on your smart TV or in the app store or sign up at historyhit.com/subscribe


You can take part in our listener survey here.

Up next
Sep 2023
Things vs. Humans: the spiteful behaviour of inanimate objects
If you can never connect to a printer, if furniture jumps out to stub your toe, if when you do the dishes the water jumps out the sink to soak you - then you are victim of the inanimate malice of things.The belief that all things are essentially out to get us us has a name - Resi ... Show More
30m 26s
Sep 2023
First Ever Submarine
400 years ago on the River Thames a mad genius showed off the world's first submarine. A crowd of thousands including King James watched as Cornelis Drebbel disappeared beneath the murky water, only reemerging after three whole hours had passed.The same genius also came up with p ... Show More
39m 38s
Sep 2023
Inventing Fire: the First Spark of Humanity
Fire is the unsung hero of human evolution. We could not have turned into the big-brained, deep-thinking animals we are on raw food alone. The moment two million years ago that our forebears first started using fire to cook, was the spark that started everything off.That's accord ... Show More
36m 38s
Recommended Episodes
Feb 2022
Marie Curie: The Mother of Radioactivity
Polonium for Poland and Radium for the rays. Marie Curie was a Pole and scientist through and through. But as a woman in the early 20th century, her contributions in discovering two elements nearly went unknown. Support the show: https://www.aljazeera.com/podcasts/hindsight/ 
44m 7s
Jul 2023
Oppenheimer
On a summer morning in 1945, a device known simply as 'Gadget' was detonated. An enormous explosion tore a crater into the New Mexico desert, melting sand into radioactive green glass and sending a mushroom cloud 7.5 miles into the sky. This was the first controlled detonation of ... Show More
33m 21s
Nov 2017
Marie Curie
Marie Curie was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize--and she didn’t only win one, she won two. Carter and Vanessa discuss Marie’s inspirations in naming the elements she discovered: polonium and radium, and how she fought sexism throughout her life, paving the way for women in s ... Show More
55m 48s
Aug 2016
Marie Curie (Part 1)
A lot of people only know Marie Curie as a woman who won a Nobel prize (or two...spoilers) but that's just a small part of the life of this physicist, wife and mother. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices 
1h 21m
Nov 2023
Mary, Queen of Scots
This is the story of the incredible rise and fall of Mary, Queen of Scots. She was queen of Scotland, she was queen of France, and she could have been queen of England. She led armies, lived as a fugitive, became embroiled in love affairs and spent nearly two decades in jail. Dan ... Show More
41m 55s
Aug 2020
Marie Curie, Double Episode Revisit
If Amazon Prime's movie Radioactive has you curious about Marie's REAL story, we joined our two episodes of her, broke them into chapters, and created this one mega-Marie deep dive into her life Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices 
2h 48m
Jul 2022
The Gatekeeper
This week, Reporter Peter Smith and Senior Producer Matt Kielty tell the story of the U.S. Supreme Court decision that set the standard for scientific expertise in a courtroom, i.e., whether an expert can testify in a lawsuit. They also tell the story of the Daubert family — yes, ... Show More
49m 4s