July 2011
The Pontiac Radium Minnow
Pontiac Mfg Co
Pontiac, MI
1909
This hard to find lure features “bow tie” shaped propellers, uniquely designed side hook hardware, yellow glass eyes, hand-painted gill marks and a luminous paint scheme.
What made the paint scheme luminous? Well, the first layer of paint contained radium, which is a chemical element that is radioactive. Due to its instability, radium is luminescent and it gives off a faint blue glowing color.
At the time this lure was manufactured, radium was used in self-luminous paints for watches and clocks. In the mid-1920s, a lawsuit was filed by five dying "Radium Girl" dial painters who had used radium-based luminous paints on the dials of watches where they were employed. One of the procedures the company had for painting the watch dials was to shape the paint brushes with their lip. The dial painters' exposure to radium caused serious health effects which included sores, anemia and bone cancer. This is because radium is treated as calcium by the body, and deposited in the bones, where radioactivity degrades marrow and can mutate bone cells.
During the litigation, it was determined that company scientists and management had taken considerable precautions to protect themselves from the effects of radiation, yet had not seen fit to protect their employees.
As a result of the lawsuit, the adverse effects of radioactivity became widely known, and radium dial painters were instructed in proper safety precautions and provided with protective gear. Radium was still used in dials as late as the 1960s, but there were no further injuries to dial painters. This further highlighted that the plight of the “Radium Girls” was completely preventable.
After the 1960s, radium paint was replaced with other types of paints.
The Pontiac Radium Minnow was only manufactured for a short time and it was the only lure this company manufactured. Could they have got out of the business when the problems associated with radium became known? That is unknown to me at this time…. My lure does not glow anymore, but I still am a little cautious with any old lures that did contain materials such as this.
