Schack August Steenberg Krogh was born at Grenaa, Jutland, Denmark, on November 15, 1874. He was the son of Viggo Krogh, shipbuilder, and Marie, née Drechmann. Even as a schoolboy August was much interested in the natural sciences and spent a great deal of his time in experimentation. He was greatly stimulated by his teacher…

Presentation Speech by Professor J.E. Johansson, Chairman of the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine of the , on December 10, 1920 Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen. As the first application of a quantitative approach to the field of Physiology, one quotes the calculation on which Harvey based his theory of the…

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Walther Hermann Nernst was born in Briesen, West Prussia, on June 25, 1864. His father, Gustav Nernst, was a district judge. He spent his early school years at Graudentz, and subsequently went to the Universities of Zurich, Berlin and Graz (Ludwig Boltzmann and Albert von Ettinghausen), studying physics and mathematics, before proceeding to Wurzburg (Friedrich…

Presentation Speech by Professor Gerard de Geer, President of , on December 10, 1921 Your Majesty, Your Royal Highnesses, Ladies and Gentlemen. As long ago as the Ice Age, when our species was in its childhood, man found in fire a powerful ally in his fight against cold and darkness, and it helped him make…

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Knut Hamsun (1859-1952) was born in Gudbrandsdalen, Norway, and grew up in poverty in Hamarøy in Nordland. From early childhood he was a shoemaker’s apprentice, but was also a road worker, stonemason, junior-level teacher, and so on. He spent some years in America, travelling and working as a tram driver, and published his impressions, chiefly…

Presentation Speech by Harald Hjärne, Chairman of the Nobel Committee of the , on December 10, 1920 In accordance with the statutes of the Nobel Foundation, the Swedish Academy has awarded the literary Prize for 1920 to the Norwegian novelist Knut Hamsun for his work, Markens Grøde (1917) [Growth of the Soil]. It would be…