Depends on what you mean “before they knew what radio activity was”. They did horrible things with it before they knew about the health effects.
Like putting Radium in pills you swallow:
Or even in suppositories which are even worse:
They put thorium in toothpaste:
They used massive powered X-Ray machines with no protection in shoe store so you could see how your feet fit in shoes:
They put radium in paint then put it on pocket watch faces so they glow, but the workers didn’t know the effects of radium and all died of massive cancer of the mouth, jaw, and throat. I’m not putting picture here for that. Google those at your own risk.
One of the early pros working with radioactivity was Marie Curie. She died of aplastic anemia in 1934. Her research notes are still radioactive. Her lab was said to be radioactive as well, yet it was not decontaminated until 1991.
Depends on what you mean “before they knew what radio activity was”. They did horrible things with it before they knew about the health effects.
Like putting Radium in pills you swallow:
Or even in suppositories which are even worse:
They put thorium in toothpaste:
They used massive powered X-Ray machines with no protection in shoe store so you could see how your feet fit in shoes:
They put radium in paint then put it on pocket watch faces so they glow, but the workers didn’t know the effects of radium and all died of massive cancer of the mouth, jaw, and throat. I’m not putting picture here for that. Google those at your own risk.
One of the early pros working with radioactivity was Marie Curie. She died of aplastic anemia in 1934. Her research notes are still radioactive. Her lab was said to be radioactive as well, yet it was not decontaminated until 1991.
https://www.openculture.com/2023/11/marie-curies-research-papers-are-still-radioactive-a-century-later.html
The radium paint one is particularly bad because they told the workers (mostly women) to give their brush a fine tip using their mouth.
And the company know pretty well the dangers, the men who worked with the material used protection against the radiation.