Final answer:
The first American radiation fatality was Eben Byers, not Marie Curie who was Polish and not American. Marie Curie did suffer from health issues related to radiation but died of leukemia, and she won Nobel Prizes for her research in radioactivity, a term she coined.
Step-by-step explanation:
The first American radiation fatality was Eben Byers, a wealthy American socialite, and industrialist. He is known for his death due to radiation poisoning after drinking a radium-containing tonic called RadiThor. Marie Curie, although a famous figure associated with radiation and who did suffer from radiation-induced health issues, was not American and she died of leukemia in 1934. Marie Curie, along with her husband Pierre Curie, were pioneering researchers of radioactivity and shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics with Henri Becquerel. Pierre Curie died in 1906, not from radiation, but from being run over by a horse-drawn wagon.
Marie Curie's extensive research led to the discovery of polonium and radium, efforts for which she received her second Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911. Her relentless work with radioactive substances, which she carried out without knowledge of the health risks, led to her developing leukemia, which was likely caused by long-term exposure to high levels of radiation.