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Eyes on the prize

5 facts about Nobel laureates

In 2001, the Postal Service issued a 34-cent stamp that marked the Nobel Prize’s centennial. This stamp features a profile portrait of Alfred Nobel, the gold medal for peace, and the gold medal for physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature.

Recipients of the Nobel Prize — which honors achievements in peace, economics, physics, chemistry, medicine and literature — receive their award each year on Dec. 10. Here are five facts about the prize and its recipients.

1. Theodore Roosevelt was a first — twice. The country’s 26th president was the first American and the first sitting U.S. president to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906. He earned the award for negotiating a peace settlement in the Russo-Japanese War.

2. Jane Addams was the first American woman to become a Nobel laureate. Addams, an advocate for international peace, won the peace prize in 1931. She founded the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and worked to stop the use of children as industrial laborers in the United States.

3. Ralph Bunche was the first African American to win the award. Bunche received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1950 after arranging a cease-fire during the Arab-Israeli War two years earlier.

4. The United States has more Nobel laureates than any other nation. The United Kingdom, Germany, France and Sweden round out the top five nations that are home to exemplary minds in peace, literature, science and economics.

5. USPS has honored the award with a stamp. In 2001, to celebrate the Nobel Prize’s 100th anniversary, the Postal Service issued a 34-cent stamp featuring a profile portrait of award patron Alfred Nobel and drawings of the gold Nobel medal. Each prize consists of a medal, a diploma and a cash award. Additionally, more than two dozen laureates — including Roosevelt, Addams and Bunche — have appeared on stamps.

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