Street, City, Country
Freta Street 16, Warsaw, Poland
Who was there?
Marie Curie (1867–1934), born Maria Salomea Skłodowska
When did she live there?
1867–1868
What is it today?
The building houses the Muzeum Marie Skłodowskiej-Curie (MMSC), which was established in 1967 on the 100th anniversary of Maria Skłodowska-Curie’s birthday, as well as the headquarter of the Polish Chemical Society.
Original building?
No. After being completely destroyed during World War II in 1944, the old town of Warsaw was largely rebuilt between 1949 and 1955 to closely resemble its original form. In 1980, it was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Brief history of the person and the house
Maria Skłodowska was born in 1867 in the 18th-century tenement building located in the historic city center of Warsaw [1,2]. The building served as a school for girls, where Maria’s parents taught. The family lived there for one year before moving to Nowolipki Street. Later, the family “wandered” around Leszno Street, living in various tenement houses in the same area during the periods 1872–1874, 1878–1882, and 1883–1884 (see three pictures below).
From 1874–1875, they lived on Piesza Street (see picture below right). Today it is a narrow street close to the monument of Maria in the New Town [2].
In 1891, Maria Skłodowska left Warsaw and followed her elder sister to Paris, France, to continue her studies which was not possible for a women in Warsaw at that time.
What is Marie Curie known for?
Marie Curie and her husband, Pierre Curie (1859–1906), discovered polonium and radium in 1898. In 1903, they won together with Henri Becquerel the Nobel Prize for Physics for discovering radioactivity. Marie Curie was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. In 1911, Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for isolating pure radium (this time unshared).
References/Sources
[1] V. Koester, 100 Years Polish Chemical Society, ChemistryViews 2019. https://doi.org/10.1002/chemv.201900087
[2] Personal communication Prof. UAM dr hab. Tomasz Pospieszny, Department of Bioactive Products, Faculty of Chemistry, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland, 2024.
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