Marie Curie, Women, and the History of Chemistry

When in December 1911 Marie Curie stood on the platform in Stockholm, Sweden, to accept the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for isolating radium, she made history for the second time. In December 1903 she had become the first woman to be selected a Nobel Laureate. She shared the 1903 prize in physics with two physicists, her husband Pierre and Henri Becquerel. As a woman Nobel laureate, Marie Curie was an oddity in 1903 and 1911 as she still would be today. Women Nobel Prize winners in the sciences (physics, chemistry, and physiology/medicine) are still very scarce.