The last living witnesses to historical events are fascinating in so many ways. Not only are they time capsules of memories, experiences, and stories from a bygone era, they also hold in them the last remaining memory of that great event. When they die, that event passes from living memory into history. What is it like to be able to look back on 60, 70, or 80 years of life since that event and think “I am the last”? These 10 people know.
10 Mae Keene
The Last Living Radium Girl
Things were looking up for young women in America in the early 1920s. They had finally received the right to vote and they were entering the US workforce in larger numbers than ever. In particular, American companies wanted to employ young women in manufacturing operations that required precise yet repetitive work, such as hand painting radioactive radium paint onto clock faces. Radium was discovered in 1898 by Marie Currie, and four years later, William Hammer mixed radium with zinc sulfide to make radioluminescent paint. Before long, anyone and everyone had to have a radium-painted watch on their hand or a radioactive, glowing clock by their bed. Many companies rushed into the business of processing the radium, making the radium paint, or manufacturing the clocks and watches with the painted parts.
In 1924, 18-year-old Mae Keene went to work at one of these manufacturing plants, the Waterbury Clock Company of Vermont. Like the other young women who painted the clocks, she was taught how to obtain a fine point on her brush by moistening the tip with her lips. This meant ingesting radioactive radium each time they touched the painted brush to their mouth. The women were told the radium paint was safe, and to be fair, it wasn’t until the 1920s that the companies knew they were lying. The women would even sneak the paint out of work and use it to paint their nails.
Mae quit the job after only a few months, and that probably saved her life. Unlike so many of her coworkers, she did not develop the deadly diseases caused by radium such as “radium jaw,” a debilitating and usually fatal disease where radium attacks the bones and rots away the jaw. In fact, Mae lived to be a very old woman. Today, at the age of 108, she may be the very last living radium girl.
9 Werner Franz
The Last Living Crew Member Of The Hindenburg
Everyone has heard of the Hindenburg. The gigantic German passenger aircraft exploded, burned, and crashed at Lakehurst, New Jersey on May 6, 1937. It seems incredible anyone could walk away from that fiery crash, but of the 97 crew and passengers on board, 62 would survive. Today, 77 years later, that number is down to one. Werner Franz was a 14-year-old cabin boy on the Hindenburg and is the only living crew member from that historic event.
As a cabin boy, he worked from 6:30 AM until 9:30 PM serving the ship’s officers and crew. His job was to prepare the messroom for all meals and serve the crew coffee at night. By the time he was on his first voyage to the United States, Franz had been to South America aboard the Hindenburg several times. He had his job down to a routine. The evening the Hindenburg approached the tower in Lakehurst, Franz was still busy washing and putting away dishes in the mess.
He was lucky to be where he was, toward the front of the ship. Just as he was putting away a coffee cup, he heard a noise. The entire ship shuddered and sank at the stern, lifting the bow upwards. He ran out of the mess to the gangway, where he saw a ball of flame rushing towards him as the hydrogen cells exploded and burned. Just then, he was doused with water as the forward water ballast tank shifted and poured water toward the rear of the ship.
The water helped prevent Franz from being burned, but how to escape this burning ship? He remembered the provision hatch used to transfer stores onto the ship. He ran to it, sat down on a beam—with the glow of the burning ship all around him—and he kicked open the hatch. Franz looked down and saw the ground rushing up toward him. He waited until the Hindenburg was close to the ground and jumped. Ju