Thank you so much for supporting SWHS Theatre! This has been my first experience as a director and I could not have done it without this wonderful cast and crew. Working with them has been truly so rewarding, and I am incredibly proud of their hard work and dedication. It has been very exciting to see their acting skills grow from day one until now.
Radium Girls sheds light on a tragic but important piece of American history. The treatment of radium dialpainters and other victims of radium poisioning was shameful and horrific, but the legacy of their tragedy has saved countless others from a similar fate. Because of the understanding of radiation gained from these cases, safety standards were implimented during World War Two when the demand for luminous dials skyrocketed once again. A chemist working on the Manhattan Project (the government program creating the first atomic bombs), remembering the radium dialpainters, insisted that research be conducted on the radioactive plutonium they were using. Upon discovering plutonium would react in the body similarly to radium, safety requirements were implimented for the workers to protect them from the radiation. The long-term effects on radium girls' bodies have also been used to study the effects of radioactive fallout from said nuclear bombs. If the history of the radium girls interests you, I strongly encourage everyone to read The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women, by Kate Moore. This book was very helpful during my research process, and provides information in a way that is both factual and compelling.
A quick note on language: this play uses the word "cripple" to refer to a disabled person. While this language is accurate to the time period, I find it important to note that this word is now considered offensive and derogatory, and should not be used by the non-disabled community.
Thank you again to everyone who has been a part of this production, and to you, the viewer! I hope you enjoy the show.
Caroline Schroer
Director
