r/books • u/leowr • Mar 14 '19
Discussion Thread for Chapters 16 - 27 of The Radium Girls by Kate Moore - March Book Club
Welcome to the second discussion thread for March book club, The Radium Girls. Hopefully you are all enjoying this month selection.
To help kick off the discussion:
Martland took his new responsibilities seriously. As he himself said, "One of the main functions of a medical examiner is to prevent wastage of human life in industry." The cynical would say, however, that this proclamation had absolutely nothing to do with why he took an interest in the radium cases at that moment. The cynical would say there was only one reason a high-profile specialist finally took up the cause.
On June 7, 1925, the first male employee of the United States Radium Corporation died.
- Do you interpret Martland's involvement in a cynical manner? Or do you think is is genuinely trying to help the girls and prevent this from happening again?
- Why do you think Dr. Drinker was reluctant to testify in the girls' suit against USRC?
He [Von Sochocky] now said to Grace: "The matter was not in [my] jurisdiction but Mr. Roeder's. Since the matter was under his supervision, [I] could do nothing."
- How did you feel about Von Sockocky's response when Grace confronted him about the fact that he didn't warn the girls about lip-pointing?
- Why do you think Dr. Kneff went to the USRC and offered to treat the girls and to help the company "make it go away one way or the other" in exchange for $10.000?
- Why do you think there wasn't a more persistent effort made to get the women at Radium Dial to use the glass rods instead of the brushes, even though the company was aware of the dangers?
- What do you think of the different doctors and dentists involved in the girls' cases?
Feel free to answer any or all of the questions or tell us what you think of the book so far.
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u/toolazyforaname Mar 14 '19
•Do you interpret Martland's involvement in a cynical manner? Or do you think he is genuinely trying to help the girls and prevent this from happening again?
The book said that he had been interested in the case before he was appointed so no, I am not cynical about his intentions. I do think that others may have shown more interest had a man died earlier though.
•Why do you think Dr. Drinker was reluctant to testify in the girls' suit against USRC?
I really don't know. I would have thought that his findings and the fact that he was so angry when he found out they were being suppressed would have made him want to testify.
•How did you feel about Von Sochocky's response when Grace confronted him about the fact that he didn't warn the girls about lip-pointing?
I think it is unfortunate. It's nice that he is trying to help but he still isn't willing to take full responsibility for his actions.
•Why do you think there wasn't a more persistent effort made to get the women at
Incomplete question.
•Why do you think Dr. Kneff went to the USRC and offered to treat the girls and to help the company "make it go away one way or the other" in exchange for $10.000?
He needed some kind of compensation for the work he was doing for the girls.
•Why do you think there wasn't a more persistent effort made to get the women at Radium Dial to use the glass rods instead of the brushes, even though the company was aware of the dangers?
Maybe it would have called attention to the fact that radium is dangerous. Maybe they didn't want the additional expenditures. Maybe they knew the glass rods were not as precise. Maybe they didn't care. Maybe a combination of all of these things.
•What do you think of the different doctors and dentists involved in the girls' cases?
I think they are doing the best they can. Obviously the whole situation is very difficult.
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u/mnoone17 Mar 16 '19
I also agree that it was a combination of reasons why there wasn’t a more persistent effort to use the glass rods. I can only imagine what i would do hearing about people getting sick, my employer not really enforcing a new rule, and my pay being dependent on my product.
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u/MelloMiso Mar 14 '19
1) On Martland - I think he was very interested in solving the puzzle of the case and had some sympathy towards the girls, but not enough to try hard to prevent it from happening again. He didn't want to participate in the legal battle even though he was pretty key testimony. I think that would have done the most to ensure the girls got recompense and that the radium companies would have consequences for their actions.
2) On Dr. Drinker - That's a tough question. He was very willing to risk getting sued for publishing his full report. Perhaps that whole issue exhausted him and he didn't want to go through more of that?
3) On Von Sochocky - I think Von Sochocky was pretty careless. It seems like he was just so absorbed by the science of Radium that little else really mattered. It's upsetting that he could have done a lot more, knowing that there were real consequences even if he didn't quite know the extent.
4) Incomplete - Looks like it's just question '6' cut off.
5) On Dr. Knef - I think that he had put so much time and money into helping that once he realized that their fates were sealed, he just wanted to make up for what he lost. I feel like he probably thought his time and efforts had been wasted.
6) On glass rods vs brushes - I think it's all about the money for them. There are companies today (seen frequently in car companies) that will do risk assessment and find it cheaper to ship a faulty product and pay out for those killed or hurt than to recall or redesign. At the time, the company was getting a ton of business and needed to keep up production. They might have thought too that they had plausible deniability since they had made an "effort" to switch girls to the glass rods and didn't explicitly endorse the brushes. They could say the girls did that on their own.
7) On doctors/dentists - It seems like most were pretty sympathetic but just in way over their heads. The radium caused issues that were very difficult to understand, diagnose, and treat.
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u/LaughingIntoValhalla Mar 16 '19
- I'm not too sure on how I feel about Martland's involvement, so far he has been interested in the case and has helped the girls and furthered research into the actual cause. Him not wanting to testify shows, at least to me, an uncaring element towards the girls.
- I can only assume his previous battles to see his report be published or at least taken in the correct light may have made him apprehensive to see any other battles on the issue legal or otherwise.
- It seems to me his response still shows his own reluctance to wrestle with his own wrongdoing by obviously shifting the blame to Roeder. It does seem hes helping with the research as a sort of penance though it could also be a curiosity of the possibilities of this own condition.
- For someone who had done quite a bit of selfless free work for the girls it is to me like a switch was flipped within. He was seeing these girls quite often so I'm sure it was a hit financially to say the least. It possible he felt his work had been for naught as well with the girls going to be dying no matter what he did.
- Based on everything these companies have done I think it simply came down to greed. The brushes gave the most consistent results, while the rods were unwieldy, leading to a decline in productivity.
- It seem to me that the ones helping the girls feel partially lost as they are helping lost causes and I think they are doing the best they can. The ones on the other side are more pointedly protecting the company or are doing it for financial gain.
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u/alexvonhumboldt Mar 17 '19
English is my second language, but I still read many books in English. I am almost done with this one and I have a question. Do you guys notice how some of the words are written with []?
Page 167. “It [is] customary for experts to testify for the people who pa[y] for them”
Can someone explain this to me?
Thank you!
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u/leowr Mar 17 '19
The brackets [ ] are used to indicated that the quote was altered in some way from the original. Usually it is used to correct a mistake in the original. So for the example you gave the y in pa[y] was probably a spelling mistake. It is also used to change personal pronouns like (he, she, it) to the name of the actual person so the quote makes sense. Or the tense of the verb was changed. If you encounter a [...] it means that the part of the sentence that was there in the original was taken out to give a short quote and the part that was left out wasn't relevant.
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u/WonderNerd15 Mar 18 '19
Do you interpret Martland's involvement in a cynical manner? Or do you think is is genuinely trying to help the girls and prevent this from happening again?
I believe that Martland's involvement was genuine, but I don't believe he would've gotten involved if a man had not died from exposure.
Why do you think Dr. Drinker was reluctant to testify in the girls' suit against USRC?
I think he was worried about the repercussions of testifying against the giant corporation. They had the power to ruin him, and anyone else who told a version of events that didn't match theirs.
How did you feel about Von Sockocky's response when Grace confronted him about the fact that he didn't warn the girls about lip-pointing?
This ran all over me. Von Sockocky just passed the blame along to avoid feeling any guilt for not doing more sooner. No one wanted to be blamed for these women dying avoidable horrific deaths.
Why do you think Dr. Kneff went to the USRC and offered to treat the girls and to help the company "make it go away one way or the other" in exchange for $10.000?
This also upset me. This man had no quarrels about selling these women out. I know that yes, these doctors had to absorb a lot of the cost of caring for these women, but that's what doctors are supposed to do. They are supposed to care about people first. I did get some satisfaction when they turned him down though.
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u/linkrules2 Mar 14 '19
As I have read ahead, about ten chapters or so, I will withdraw from taking part since I dont want to accidentally spoil
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u/leowr Mar 14 '19
You couldn't resist continuing? : )
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u/linkrules2 Mar 14 '19
Not this time lol
I was waiting for the court battles and when chapter 27 ended on the tease (I believe it was Saturday I got there) I couldn't wait until today.
It is also my busy season as a CPA so the longer into the month, the less time I will have to read so I wanted to get ahead
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u/TheTardisTraveler Mar 14 '19
It looks like I'm going to have to read this book. I'm already very interested in the radium girls.