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It may not be the first, but an early death was
Amelia "Mollie" Maggia, (1896 - September 12, 1922). She was a radium dial
painter who died at the age of 25. Her illness and death are described in
Deadly Glow, The Radium Dial Worker Tragedy, by Ross
Mullner, Ph.D, MPH.
She is identified as the first known death from
radium poisoning on page 49 of that book.
As an aside, the book is a well done
non-physics commentary of the dial workers' story told from a public
health perspective. There are no dose estimates, intake estimates, graphs, etc.,
in the book. To me it is a layman's text more suited to a historian
than a scientist. It is however, quite well referenced with several
hundred references in 11 chapters. I am of the opinion that it is a historically
reliable telling of the dial worker's story.
The American Public Health Association is the
publisher and they are on the web at www.apha.org and the book's ISBN is
0-87553-245-4. Published in 1999.
Dan Kane
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