Fun Facts
Lise Meitner was truly a jack of all trades. She was much more than the scientist we all think she was. She grew up in a giant family, 8 people, and grew up during WW1 so many family members served in the war. In fact, she served in the Austrian army as a x-ray technician. Because of her famous discovery Mrs. Meitner has a radioactive element named after her. It's called Meitnerium, and is the heaviest known element. To get into the University of Berlin she had to study for the entrance exam so while studying, she crammed 8 years of studying into 2 years.However, while she was studying to become a scientist, she was not allowed to climb the higher levels of the University of Berlin because many scientists believed woman did not deserve to go to higher science levels and labs. She turned out fine, though, and Albert Einstein even called her, "our Marie Curie." She was even the second woman to receive a doctorate in science from the University of Vienna. Obviously she would tell her family about this compliment, and speaking of family, one of her brothers became a composer and concert pianists as music education was important to her family. Finally, while she wrote for many famous science magazines and tabloids and she used to sign her articles under "L. Meitner" so the publisher thought that she was a man. As soon as the publisher found out that she was a woman, her articles were no longer published. As you can see she was way more than a scientist. She had a life, too, and definitely lived it to the fullest.