Latest / Children's Hour / 2.28.26 - Part 1

Transcript

2.28.26 - Part 1 · Children's Hour

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Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Realized Children's Story Hour. As a reminder,
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Realize a reading service intended her people who are blind
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or of other disabilities that make it difficult to read
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print material. Today we will be reading from various books
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on famous women. Your reader today is Diane. Our first
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book is titled Marie Curry in the Land of Science
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and it was published by Creative Editions. It has a
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copyright year of twenty nineteen to twenty twenty five and
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the author is Irene cohen Jenko. They say that sometimes
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behind the windows of the old brick building, a gossamer
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shadow passes by a thin woman with white hair and
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eyes the color of ash. She crosses the rooms where
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white ceramic work benches glisten, and sits behind a large
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one desk kirtchin, resting on one hand. This old woman
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used to be young, one of five children in the
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Scolawski family. Manya Menusa, Maria, my love, my pet to
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come here. Madame Skalovski could not embrace any of her
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children because she had tuberculosis, a serious contageous disease. Despite
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her illness, games and happiness were very much part of
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the life of the young children, playing laughing, and most
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importantly learning. Every Saturday around the samovar, with a look
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of wonder on their faces, the four daughters Zosia, Bronia, Helia,
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Menia and Joseph, the only son, listened to their father
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read the classics of Polish English and French literature to them.
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When Mania learned from this education would guide her for
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the rest of her life. There is no greater wealth
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than learning culture, knowledge. Minya's favorite room in the house
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was her father's office, which hit a wealth of treasures.
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A beautiful blue, severious porcelain cup, a bright green palaschet
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to pendulum, some paintings and precious frames, but above all,
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a barometer with gold needles hanging on the wall, a
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glass case containing glass tubes, samples of multicolored minerals, and
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a magnificent gold leaf microscope. Mania found all these objects enchanting.
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There are instruments used for physics her father toteor with
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her lovely gray eyes. Mania never tired of contemplating them.
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Physics instruments, physics instruments. In January eighteen seventy six, Typhod
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took her sister's Sozia, then ten year Omenia doned black
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morning clothes. When her beloved mother died in May of
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eighteen seventy eight, she felt terribly alone. Bronia, her older sister,
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took over running the household. Mania finished secondary school and
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graduated the highest possible award, a gold medal. Her thirst
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for knowledge was insatiable, but in Poland, girls did not
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have access to higher education. Furthermore, Poland was living under
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Russian rule. At school, at the university, it was forbidden
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to even speak Polish. A group of professors decided to
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create a secret to university during the night. In the
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freezing apartments of Warsaw, courses in history, literature, math, and
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natural science sciences were taught. For two years, Mania and
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Bronia attended these classes. Mania also taught women who were poor.
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She gave readings in the workshops, and she created a
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small library. The two sisters agreed that Bronia would go
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to pair in Roun the university, and Mania would stay
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and work to support them. Once Bronia became a doctor,
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she would in turn pay for Mania's studies. Mania accepted
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a position as a governess for a family of wealthy
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industrialists and a far away province on the Code and
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Foggy morning of January first, eighteen eighty six, Mania left
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Warsaw for field after a field of beats and soil
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for as far as the eye could see. Soon Mania
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forged connections with the families who worked that land, teaching
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their children to read and write. She had lots of
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science bookshipped to her, and at night she continued to
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study on her own. She was devoured by the same
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thirst for knowledge as ever, sometimes, however, the desperation, discouragement,
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and bitterness would get the better of her. In December
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eighteen eighty six, she wrote these words to her cousin.
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My dreams have gone up, and so I have buried them,
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shut them off, hidden, and forgotten them, because, as you
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well know, walls are always stronger than the heads that
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tried to tear them down. Finally, in eighteen eighty nine,
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Mania went back to Warsaw to live and work. Five long,
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sad years had gone by until one day in March
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eighteen ninety, when Bronia, who in the meantime had become
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a doctor and got married, wrote to Mania, next year
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you will come to Paris and live with us. At last,
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it was Mania's turn. She was ready to tear down
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all the walls that were keeping her apart from her dreams.
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In November eighteen ninety one, the transcontinental train left twenty
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four year old Mania standing on the smoke filled platforms
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of the God de Nord. No sooner had she put
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her things away and settled into Bronia's home, than she
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raced to the Palace of Wisdom, the Temple of Knowledge,
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the Sorbonne. She wrote under the name Marie Skolowski. Ready
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to get a degree in science, Marie had to come
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to terms with their own lack of knowledge in physics
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and math, and even in French. She worked without seas seen,
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and she slept and ate very little. In the evening.
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She's studying the great Library of Saint Geneva until ten,
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and after that in her tiny room until three in
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the morning, with the light of an oil lamp burning
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next to a freezing cold heater. One day, Maria was
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so worn out she feigned. Bronia's husband, also a doctor,
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went to see her. What did you eat today, he asked,
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I'm not sure. Some cherries and radishes, perhaps, What about yesterday?
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A bunch of radishes will come on? Then, come with
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me a couple of steaks and some proper rest will
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do the trick. In July of eighteen ninety three, she
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raced to the Sorbonne to find out the results of
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her physics degree exam. As the president of the exam
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board was about to speak, Hush came over the great amphitheater,
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first in her class, Mademoiselle Maurice Gladowski. Later in eighteen
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ninety four she would be secondar class for a degree
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in mathematics. Marie had but one passion, and that was
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science until spring day in eighteen ninety four when she
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met Pierre Curry. He was already important scientists who had
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made some major discoveries, A man who was driven by
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the same passion and the same ideals as Marie. Pierre
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cared nothing for money or honors. He loathed the competitive spirit.
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Pierre would spend hours discussing physics problems with Marie. Instead
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of flowers and chocolate candy, he gave her science textbooks.
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She told him about her childhood dreams, about her lawn
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walks in the woods. That summer, when she went to
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Poland to visit her father and stayed there to teach,
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Pierre wrote to her, I would be greatly saddened if
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you were not to come back this year. But Marie
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did return, and on July sixteenth, eighteen ninety five, she
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and Pierre were married. That year, in Germany, professor Wilhelm
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Rotkin had discovered some strange race that could cross solid
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matters such as wood, aluminum, and human flesh. The race
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were called X rays because X symbolizes the unknown in math.
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Soon afterwards, French physicist Henry that Kurrell discovered some other
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invisible race, but this time they came from a mineral
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called uranium. Marie was curious where did the energy emitted
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by uranium come from. She began by analyzing the composition
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of uranium rich rock known as pitchblend. Discovering and isolating
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the elements besides uranium that were contained in pitch blind
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was difficult. The work conditions were miserable. Tons of minerals
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needed to be treated, which were carriage from Bohemia to
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the laboratory courtyard. On July eighteenth, eighteen ninety eight, Pierre
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and Marie discovered a new metal, which they called polonium,
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a memory of poland. But hiding inside those pitch black
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rocks was another substance radium. After processing eight tons of
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pitch blend, the curriers finally managed to extrict a gram
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of radium in nineteen oh four. They were amazed at
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the marvelous substance lying in tiny peatrie dishes and its
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beautiful shade of blue glowing in the night. Four years
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went by, with no money, no lab, no assistance. Pierre
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was starting to feel severe pain in his legs. Marie's
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hands were worn thin, burned by the ascids. Both often
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fell ill and suffered from terrible fatigue whose origin the
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doctors could not diagnose. And yet Marie would later write
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that in those years we were living as if in
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a dream. It's an absolute revolution. Their discovery was about
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to transform physics completely. A new source of energy was born,
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and it came directly from matter. Radium could replace wood charcoal.
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Some doctors began using radium to treat tumors, but you
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had to know how to extract the radium, and only
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the Curies knew how to do that. When questions started
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coming in from the world, here ask Marie, can we
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consider ourselves the owners, the inventors of radium and get
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the world royalties for its production. They could earn a fortune.
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All they had to do was take out a patent,
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but Marie wouldn't hear of it. They chose to reveal
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to the world's scientists the results of their research. On
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December tenth, nineteen oh three, Marie and Pierre, along with
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Henry Beckcurrell, received the Nobel Prize, the highest scientific honor
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of all, for the research on radioactivity. Marie was the
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first woman ever to be awarded a Nobel Prize. Their
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fame was instant, and reporters and photographers from around the
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world followed their every move. Even d D, the family cat,
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became famous. The United States offered the Crees huge amounts
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of money to give talks. They missed the days when
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they were both unknown. We would like to burrow a
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ton on underground and find some peace, Marie wrote to
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her brother. Pierre was finally named professor of physics at
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the Sorbonne, but the real lab that he had been
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dreaming of for years hadn't been built yet. On April nineteenth,
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nineteen o six, the sky over Paris was dark and rainy.
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The narrow, crowded streets were full of shouting coachmen, screeching tramps,
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and rumbling automobiles. Suddenly, a heavy ladin wake and drawn
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by two horses appeared on rude dolphin. Pierre Curry was
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walking behind a carriage holding a big black umbrella over
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said and he failed to see it. He was killed instantly,
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crushed by the hoofs of the heavy horses. Marie was
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now loan with two young daughters, Irene and Eve, who
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were just nine and two. She was asked to take
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over Pierre's teaching position at the Sorbonne. After much deliberation,
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Marie took her husband's place as Professor of General Physics
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in the Faculty of Sciens. On November fifth, nineteen oh six,
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before a picked amphitheater, Marie gave her first lecture. After
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being the first woman ever to receive a Nobel Prize,
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she became the first woman to hold a university chair
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in France. Although Marie routinely taught her lessons, she continued
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to do research and she shone brightly within the international
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scientific community, alongside luminaries such as Einstein, Rutherford and Plank.
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Then she received the most extraordinary news of all had
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been awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for her discovery
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of radium and polling them for the first time ever.
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A winter was crowned for a second time. At last,
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the Radium Institute could now be built. Research laboratories are
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the sacred places of the future, wrote Marie, when the
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project for a real laboratory finally saw the light. However,
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once the two year project was complete, it was nineteenth
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August of nineteen fourteen. The war soon declared, the dead
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and the wounded already numbered in the thousands. Marie recalled
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Ronikan's famous X rays that made it possible to explore
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the human body, to photograph the bones and the organs.
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X rays could help searches identify a bullet from a
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rifle strapped now in the body of the wounded, and
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helped them do their job with great precision. But there
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were very few of these machines, just two or three
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in the Paris hospitals, and the army had only one
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radiological ambulance. Armed with the prestige of her name, Marie
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started her campaigning at the ministries. She visited all the
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riches families and several princesses lent her their cars, beautiful
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limousines and vans to which she had the necessary equipment
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added She even went to see the automobile manufacturers in
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Paris and the suburbs. Radiologists need to be trained, and
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Marie herself taught the courses with the help of one
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of her students, marth Klynn, and her daughter Irene. She
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had two hundred X ray machines installed in the military
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hospitals and equipped twenty onomobiles that plowed the battlefields. As
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a tribute to Marie's bravery and determination, the ambulances were
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nicknamed batitue curries. Marie got a driver's license so that
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she could drive a batitue curry herself. This famous woman
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could be seen driving back and forth across the battlefields,
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wearing a thread to bear black out path a coat,
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a red crossband around her arm, a small, fading and
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floppy round hat perched on her head, and carrying a
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shabby yellow leather bag. More than a million wounded received
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X ray examinations thanks to the petiitue curries in the
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field hospitals. When peace finally returned, Marie went back to
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her lab and to the experiments she had begun before
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the war. One morning in May of nineteen twenty, American
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journalist and great admirer of Marie's, Missus Maloney, went to
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see her. She asked Marie what she wished for most
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in the world. Marie replied, we need a gram of
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radium to continue with my research. A single gram was
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worth one hundred thousand dollars. Missus Maloney launched a huge
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campaign and collected the amount of money that was needed.
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One year later, United States President Warren Harding presented Marie
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with a box lined with lead as he placed a
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cloth ribbon with a tiny go key around her neck.
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Inside the box was the precious gram of radium. Then
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Marie got sick. Her beautiful gray eyes became veiled. She
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underwent numerous operations to retrieve her eyesight. Although she became
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weaker by the day, she never stopped researching, teaching, and
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running the Radium Institute. One sunlit afternoon in May nineteen
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thirty four, Marie took a walk in the garden of
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the institute, where she admired the spring colors. Marie would
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never return to her lab, nor would she ever against
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row through her garden. The doctors had just begun diagnosing
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the illness that was consuming her. Her nil illness was
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caused by the radium in its rays to which Marie
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Curry had been exposing herself without any protection for thirty
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five years. She died on July third, nineteen thirty four.
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They say that sometimes behind the windows of the old
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brick building, a shadow passes by a thin woman with
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white hair and eyes the color of ash. She crosses
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the rooms where white ceramic work benches glisten, and sits
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behind a large wind desk, her chin resting on one hand.
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Our next book is titled Me in the Sky Captain
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Beverly Bass, Pioneering Pilot, and this book was published by
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Alfred A. Knaf. It has a copyright ear of twenty
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nineteen and the author of the book is Beverly Bass
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with Cynthia Williams. This is a story that begins with
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a stubborn little girl with one thing on her mind, flying.
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She would climb up on her family's washing machine and
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jump off, her arms out stretched like wings. She fell
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on brewster knees, but she climbed right back up and
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tried again. Her name is Beverly Bass. When Beverly was
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a baby in a stroller, she squilled and reached with
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both hands for airport planes flying overhead. When Beverly got
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a little older, she talked her aunt Ginger into taking
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her out to the airport at night to watch the
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airplanes take off in land. When she was a little
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older still, Beverly asked her daddy if she could take
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flying lessons when she turned sixteen. He shook his head.
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He was sure that flying was only the passing fancy
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of a little girl with a big imagination. But Beverly
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would not give up on her dream. Remember the washing machine,
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she looked up into the sky and knew she had
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to go there. With such an unusual aspiration for a
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young girl that she didn't talk about it much with
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her friends, but her determination never wavered. When she was nineteen,
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Beverly decided she could wait no longer. She drove herself
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to the airport and signed up for flying lessons. Beverly
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had been flying in airplanes since she was little. Just
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walking to the small airport terminal in her hometown of
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Fort Myers, Florida got her heart beating, And when the
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engines rebbed and the propeller swirled, and the plane began
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rolling down the runway faster and faster, Beverly's heart swelled
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up so much she thought it would burst. Her heart
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was pounding the day she climbed aboard the small trainer
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plane for her first flying lesson. She had no idea
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her instructor was going to let her hold the controls.
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She wrapped her hands around the yoke. At last, she
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was where she had dreamed of being all her life,
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in the pilot's seat of an airplane. Beverly had always
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been fascinated by how tiny everything looked from an airplane,
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and was even more striking when she was the one
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doing the flying. She gazed down at the tops of
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trees and at cars so small they looked like toys.
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She saw houses with tiny swimming pools and tinier people.
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They flew over the beach look white seagulls floating way
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down below the plane. Beverly's smile grew so wide that
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tears came to her eyes. She felt as if she
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were floating. When she got home that evening, Beverly said
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to her parents, I AM going to fly for the
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rest of my life. She was a natural, fearless, confident,
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and eager to learn. Wasn't long before Beverly was allowed
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to fly all by herself, with no instructor aboard the
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airplane When she flew over her house, her mother would
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run outside and wave. Her parents were proud of their
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daring daughter. Beverly wanted to do more than just fly
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for fun. She wanted to be an airline pilot, the
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kind who wears a uniform and flies big airplanes filled
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with people. What an idea. Everybody knew. Airlining pilots were men,
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not girls. People felt safe in planes flown by men
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who would feel safe with only a girl in the cockpit.
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This is the way people thought when Beverly was growing up,
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not so very long ago. But Beverly was stubborn. Remember
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the washing machine. She kept making lessons until she got
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the licenses she needed to fly cargo. She took jobs
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that men didn't want. She took jobs that men left
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behind when they got better ones, and in this way,
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she too, moved on to better jobs, like flying private
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planes for businessmen. Again and again, Beverly proved that she
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could do anything men could. She showed people that it
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doesn't take big muscles to fly airplanes. It takes brains
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and determination, and she had plenty of both. And at
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last her chance came. American Airlines was hiring pilots in
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those days, all pilots started out as flight engineers or
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co pilots. A flight engineer sits behind the co pilot
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in the cockpit and ensures that all the systems that
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make the aircraft fly are working properly. It is a
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great responsibility. Very few women in the United States had
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held that position with American Airlines trust at twenty four
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year old woman with such a job they did. Two
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years later, Beverly moved up a seat right next to
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the captain of the airplane. She had been promoted to
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co pilot and was now one of only a handful
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of women in the United States who were first officers
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aboard a major passenger carrier. A few years later, after that,
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Beverly's lifelong dream came true, she moved up once more
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into the captain seat. The age of only thirty four,
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Beverly Bass made history as the first woman ever to
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captain the American Airlines commercial airliner. When they gave Beverly
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her silver captain Swings, her heart filled with pride, in
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her eyes with tears of gratitude. On one of her
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first flights as captain, Beverly flew into her hometown airport.
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The man who had let Beverly hold the controls on
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her first flying Lesson was there to meet her, along
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with her parents, news reporters, her third grade teacher, her
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lifelong best friend Laurie, and one hundred other people, and
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her departure. As the jetliner seven twenty seven began to
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row down the runway, the crowd grew quiet, watching through
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the big glass window of the terminal. Their heads turned
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together as the jet rushed past them. Captain Bass eased
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the throttles forward, the nose of the plane lifted, and
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the roar of one hundred voices rose with it. The
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little girl who used to jump off from mother's watching
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machine grew up to make history. She was the first
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female captain of American Airlines B seven twenty seven and
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of an American Airlines BEE seven sixty seven. She was
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the first female to captain an all female flight crew
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from American Airlines when and was also the first female
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check airman air woman teaching other pilots to fly their
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big aircraft. Oh and the little girl who was told
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that girls can't fly big airplanes. She was the first
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female to command a Boeing seven seven seven, the largest
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twiget in the world's for an airline. Never let anyone
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tell you that you can't. Beverly says, can't is the
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worst word in the English language. Believe in yourself and
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know that you can do anything you set your mind to.
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Beverly's life teaches us that dreams can come true, but
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not by wishing. Dreams come true through hard work and determination.
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Her message is simple, No dream is too big, Dream
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big and sore high. This concludes the Children's Story Hour
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for today. Please join us next time as we will
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read more stories, fables and fairy tales. Thank you for
24:54
listening and please stay tuned for the lax naher Leader
24:58
on Radio I