In 1903, Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel were nominated for the Nobel Prize in physics. Marie was overlooked, but Pierre insisted that she was the driving force behind their research and deserved credit. The prize was then split between the Curies and Becquerel.
["Nobel Prize in Physics." The two-time Nobel prize winner Marie Curie was born 150 years ago, DW.]
“[The Nobel Prize] greatly increased the publicity of our work. For some time there was no more peace. Visitors and demands for lectures and articles interrupted every day. [...] This was a great help in the continuation of our researches.”
~ Marie Curie
[Pierre Curie, 1923]
["Marie Curie and her daughters Irène and Eve sitting on a bench in the garden" (1905). Marie Curie - Photo Gallery, NobelPrize.org.]
["Marie Curie and four of her students" (Photo taken between 1910 and 1915). Marie Curie - Photo Gallery, NobelPrize.org.]
Marie and Pierre welcomed a second daughter, Eve, in 1904. Now a family of four, they spent precious time with their children.
This was cut short in 1906, when Pierre was trampled and killed by a heavy wagon. Marie was devastated at losing Pierre, and dealt with this loss by submerging herself in work. She took over Pierre’s job at the Sorbonne, becoming the first female professor there.
“It is impossible for me to express the profoundness and importance of the crisis brought into my life by the loss of the one who had been my closest companion and friend. Crushed by the blow, I did not feel able to face the future. I could not forget, however, what my husband used sometimes to say, that, even deprived of him, I ought to continue my work.”
~ Marie Curie
[Pierre Curie, 1923]
“The death of my husband, coming immediately after the general knowledge of the discoveries with which his name is associated, was felt by the public, and especially by the scientific circles, to be a national misfortune. It was largely under this influence that the Faculty of Sciences of Paris decided to offer me the chair, as professor, which my husband had occupied . . .”
~ Marie Curie
[Pierre Curie, 1923]
Marie earned another Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1911 for discovering radium and polonium. She is still the only woman to be a two-time Nobel Laureate.
[Marie Curie Nobel Diploma. NobelPrize.org, 1911.]
“. . . at the end of 1911, when, for the second time, I received, this time alone, the award of the Nobel prize. This was a very exceptional honor, a high recognition of the discovery of the new elements and of the preparation of pure radium.”
~ Marie Curie
[Pierre Curie, 1923]
In America, Marie’s remarkable advancements garnered attention, inspiring several women to raise money for Marie to continue her work.
Marie travelled to America and met with President Harding to collect a gram of radium in 1921. She received many awards, including the Willard Gibbs Award and Benjamin Franklin Medal that recognized her revolutionary work.
["As the first woman elected to the Academy of Medicine in France, Marie Curie visits American President Warren Harding in his garden, in October 1921. American women honour Mrs. Curie with a gift of one gram of radium, worth half a million Swedish kronor." Marie Curie - Documentary, NobelPrize.org.]
“I keep a grateful memory of my sojourn in the United States for several weeks, of the impressive reception at the White House, where President Harding addressed me in generous and affectionate words, of my visits to the universities and colleges which welcomed me and bestowed on me their honorary degrees, of the public reunions where I could not but feel the deep sympathy of those who came to meet me and to wish me good luck.”
~ Marie Curie
[Pierre Curie, 1923]
In 1929, President Herbert Hoover invited Marie to America and gifted her $50,000 to fuel her research.
