WORK ON RADIUM 169 



first used all radium had to be procured from Austria. 

 But in 1910 a mine in Cornwall was found near St. Ives, 

 where there was a large heap of residues containing 

 pitchblende. Ramsay began with his private assistant, 

 Mr. Whitehouse, to work out a process, and, after trying 

 it on a small scale, the mining company started a small 

 factory in the east-end of London under the title " The 

 British Radium Corporation." Mr. Whitehouse was 

 appointed chemist, and Ramsay's only son, William 

 George Ramsay, assisted him in the work. Ramsay 

 himself was neither a director nor shareholder, but he 

 acted as chemical adviser, his duties being to visit the 

 works at intervals and test the products. On 7th 

 January, 1911, he was able to say in a letter to Dr. 

 Travers in India, " The radium work is in full swing and 

 turning out more radium than I fancy will easily sell. 

 Still they are getting 20 a mgm. for it. Whitehouse 

 has done it well. The concentration of the ore is the 

 chief problem." The manufacture went on for a year or 

 more, when larger works were taken on the south side 

 of the Thames, but about that time the quality of the 

 ore declined and the output was reduced. The company 

 was ultimately wound up. 



At about the time that the corporation for the manu- 

 facture of radium commenced operations the Radium 

 Institute for the therapeutic use of radium was founded. 

 At first it was hoped that supplies might have been 

 obtained from British sources, but the corporation and 

 the Institute were entirely unconnected together, and it 



