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It's Curious City, where we take your questions about Chicago and the region and investigate.

Report.

Explore.

From W.B.E.Z.

I'm reporter E.D. Rabinowitz, and this week we're answering a question about a woman

you probably never heard of.

But you should have because, well, her investigations into workplace toxins helped save millions

of lives. So who was she? Her name was Alice Hamilton.

She was a scientist in Chicago in the early 1900s. The work that she did formed the foundation

for the majority of labor reform that was happening at that time. That's Nadia Maraga from the Hull House Museum in Chicago.

House Hamilton lived at the Settlement House, founded by social reformer Jane Adams.

Hamilton fought for workers' protections at a time when Chicago factories could literally be deadly.

She built the scientific case for reform by showing how factory toxins caused illness,

or worse, death. She was known for her shoe leather epidemiology, wearing out the

souls of one's shoe bottoms by walking, in her case making visits to factories, homes, hospitals,

even saloons.

...