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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What song about radium became a hit after being featured in the Broadway musical Piff! Paff! Pouf!?
(a) Radium Romance.
(b) Radium Racket.
(c) Radium City.
(d) Radium Dance.

2. Whose family first joined the lawsuit Marguerite Carlough had filed against the United States Radium Corporation?
(a) Nellie Quinlan.
(b) Frances Splettstocher.
(c) Hazel Kuzer.
(d) Helen Quinlan.

3. Though during Swen Kjaer's visit to the Radium Dial studio in Ottowa, he saw water bowls being used by the dial-painters to clean their brushes, how does his observation during the visit differ from photographs he is given at a later date?
(a) In the photographs, the bowls are turned over.
(b) In the photographs, the bowls are empty.
(c) In the photographs, the bowls contain only radium dust.
(d) In the photographs, there are no bowls at all.

4. How did Katherine Schaub come to work at the Radium Luminous Materials Corporation?
(a) She walked by the building one day on her way to school.
(b) A friend of hers told her about an open position there.
(c) She read about the job in a newspaper.
(d) She attended the Grand Opening of the building.

5. Cecil K. Drinker's investigative report into radium poisoning stated that radium has a similar chemical nature to what element?
(a) Calcium.
(b) Phosphorous.
(c) Radon.
(d) Lead.

Short Answer Questions

1. What diagnosis did Dr. Humphries in Orange provide to Quinta McDonald before he bound her in plaster from "her diaphragm to her knees" (95)?

2. Arthur Roeder held what position at the United States Radium Corporation?

3. Why was radium such a scarce resource?

4. What color was the mark the scientist found on his skin in 1901 after keeping a piece of radium in his pocket, as described in the book's prologue?

5. As the most valuable substance on earth, how much did a single gram of radium cost in 1917?

Short Essay Questions

1. How successful was the Radium Dial company in 1925?

2. What is the author's purpose in depicting the scene of the lab workers' toiling at the Orange plant alongside the scene of the dial-painters working in the studio?

3. What actions did the United States Radium Corporation take once they received Cecil K. Drinker's full report regarding its employees on June 3, 1924?

4. Who was the first dial-painter to file a lawsuit against a radium company?

5. Why did Hazel Kuser's family refuse to allow friends to see her body at her funeral?

6. The Radium Luminous Materials Corporation's radium-laden paint was used to create what type of objects?

7. What is the author's evidence for the claim that radium made an "all-pervasive entry into American life"?

8. Why did radium poisoning victims often need another operation after they had just undergone one?

9. In 1917, what was the reputation of radium in America?

10. What is the author's tone when ending Chapter 11 with the words, "After all-now it was bad for business" (79)?

(see the answer keys)

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