u/bloodbath_andbeyond

Marie Curie-Sklodowska is remembered today for her pioneering work on radioactivity, which not only earned her two Nobel Prizes but also the recognition as the “mother of modern physics”. But while her research into the radioactive elements polonium and radium may have secured her a lasting scientific legacy, those same substances have also had a lasting effect on her body. 

Curie was not only the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, but also the only woman to be awarded prizes in two different fields. In 1896, the French physicist Henri Becquerel discovered that uranium salts emitted rays that were similar to X-rays in their ability to pass through objects. This discovery inspired Curie to explore Becquerel’s findings as part of her research thesis. She and her husband, Pierre Curie, set to work and ended up discovering radium and polonium, two new radioactive elements, in 1898. These results led to the Curies being awarded half of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903. The other half went to Becquerel. 

Then, in 1911, after much personal tragedy(Pierre Curie had died suddenly 1906), Curie-Sklodowska was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for isolating pure radium. She would go on to devote her research to the study of the chemistry of radioactive substances as well as their applications in medicine. In fact, if it were not for Curie’s work, our treatments for cancer would likely not be anywhere near as developed as they are today. But despite advocating precautions, Curie’s consistent and prolonged exposure to these substances came at a cost. 

Marie Curie died on July 4, 1934, from aplastic anemia caused by her work with radiation. Despite its name, aplastic anemia is more than just anemia; it is a rare blood condition that appears when bone marrow cannot make enough new blood cells for your body to function properly. When Curie died, her body was so radioactive that she had to be laid to rest in a lead-lined coffin. However, no one knew this until 1995 when her coffin was exhumed. 

At the time, the French authorities wanted to move the Curies to the national mausoleum, the Panthéon, in honor of their contributions to science and for being icons in French history. The officials responsible for the exhumation contacted the French radiation protection agency with concerns about residual radiation and asked for assistance to protect workers in the cemetery. 

François-Marie Arouet, known by his pen name Voltaire, was a French Enlightenment writer, philosopher, satirist, and historian. Famous for his wit and his criticism of Christianity (especially of the Catholic Church) and of slavery, Voltaire was an advocate of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state.

Voltaire was a versatile and prolific writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poems, novels, essays, histories, and even scientific . He wrote more than 20,000 letters and 2,000 books and pamphlets. Voltaire was one of the first authors to become renowned and commercially successful internationally. He was an outspoken advocate of civil liberties and was at constant risk from the strict censorship laws of the Catholic French monarchy. His polemics witheringly satirizedintexpositionsolerance and religious dogma, as well as the French institutions of his day. His best-known work and magnum opus, Candide, is a novellathat comments on, criticizes, and ridicules many events, thinkers and philosophies of his time, most notably Gottfried Leibniz and his belief that our world is of necessity the "best of all possible worlds.”

In February 1778, Voltaire returned to Paris for the first time in over 25 years, partly to see the opening of his latest tragedy, Irène. The five-day journey was too much for the 83-year-old, and he believed he was about to die on 28 February, writing "I die adoring God, loving my friends, not hating my enemies, and detesting superstition." He recovered, and in March he saw a performance of Irène, being treated by the audience as a returning hero.

He soon became ill again and died on 30 May 1778. The accounts of his deathbed have been numerous and varying, and it has not been possible to establish the details of what precisely occurred. His enemies related that he repented and accepted the last rites from a Catholic priest, or that he died in agony of body and soul, while his adherents told of his defiance to his last breath. According to one story of his last words, when the priest urged him to renounce Satan, he replied, "This is no time to make new enemies."

Because of his well-known criticism of the Church, which he had refused to retract before his death, Voltaire was denied a Christian burial in Paris,[112] but friends and relations managed to bury his body secretly at the Abbey of Scellières in Champagne, where Marie Louise's brother was abbé. His heart and brain were embalmed separately.

On 11 July 1791, the National Assembly of France, regarding Voltaire as a forerunner of the French Revolution, had his remains brought back to Paris and enshrined in the Panthéon. An estimated million people attended the procession, which stretched throughout Paris. There was an elaborate ceremony, including music composed for the event by André Grétry.