1938: Nobel Prize Awards

In 1938 Nobel prizes were awarded for Peace, Literature and Physics. No awards were made in the fields of Chemistry and Medicine. The prizes in each case amounted to approximately $37,975 or one fifth of the annual interest from the $9,000,000 fund bequeathed by the Swedish scientist A. B. Nobel, to be given each year to the persons or institutions judged to have contributed the greatest benefits to mankind during the year. The fund is managed by a board of directors the chairman of which is appointed by the Swedish Government. In accordance with Nobel's will the awards were made by the academic authorities designated to make the annual selection in their respective fields.

Peace.

On November 17th, 1938 the Nobel prize for Peace was awarded to the Nansen International Office for refugees, an organization which functions at Geneva, Switzerland to collect information on the welfare of refugees throughout the world. This office is the origin of instructions to relief organizations in all countries. The selection for the Peace prize was made by a committee of five appointed by the Norwegian Parliament, and marked the fourth time that the Peace award was given to an institution.

Literature.

The Swedish Academy in Stockholm awarded the Nobel prize in literature to Pearl Buck, American author, on November 10th, 1938. The citation was based upon her writings on Chinese peasant life. Her best known work is the novel 'The Good Earth' which was published in 1931 and which received the Pulitzer Prize for 1932. This year's award is the third time the Nobel prize in literature has gone to an American author.

Physics.

During the second week of November, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences at Stockholm announced that the 1938 Nobel Prize for Physics would go to Professor Enrico Fermi, a theoretical and experimental physicist of the University of Rome, for his work in atomic physics. By bombarding the Uranium atom with a stream of neutrons, Fermi formed a new unstable element, Ekarhenium, Number 93. By the same process in 1936, he formed another element, Ekaosmium, Number 94. The overweight, unstable atoms of these new elements showed marked radioactivity. Fermi's further experiments induced this type of radioactivity in more than forty elements.