Top News Stories from 1908

World Events

World Statistics

Population: 4.378 billion
population by decade
Nobel Peace Prize: Klas P. Arnoldson (Sweden) and Frederik Bajer (Denmark)
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  • Earthquake and resulting tsunami kill 70,000 to 100,000 in southern Italy and Sicily.
  • Petroleum production starts in Middle East.
  • Mysterious Siberian explosion levels hundreds of square miles of forest. Explanations include a comet, meteorite, natural atomic explosion, or crashed UFO.

U.S. Events

U.S. Statistics

President: Theodore Roosevelt
Vice President: Charles W. Fairbanks
Population: 88,710,000
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Economics

Federal spending: $0.66 billion
Unemployment: 8.0%
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.02

Sports

World Series
Chicago Cubs d. Detroit (4-1)
Stanley Cup
Montreal Wanderers
Wimbledon
Women: Charlotte Sterry d. A. Morton (6-4 6-4)
Men: Arthur Gore d. R. Barrett (6-3 6-2 4-6 3-6 6-4)
Kentucky Derby Champion
Stone Street
NCAA Football Champions
Penn (CFRA, HF) (11-0-1) & LSU (NCF) (10-0-0) 1908 Summer Olympics

Entertainment

Entertainment Awards

Nobel Prize for Literature: Rudolf Eucken (Germany)
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Events

  • Arnold Schoenberg's Book of Hanging Gardens released, bringing new style to classical music. Harmony and tonality are replaced by dissonance, creating what many listeners consider to be noise.

Science

Nobel Prizes in Science

Chemistry: Sir Ernest Rutherford (UK), for investigations into disintegration of elements
Physics: Gabriel Lippmann (France), for method of reproducing colors by photography
Physiology or Medicine: Paul Ehrlich (Germany) and Elie Metchnikoff (USSR), for work on immunity
More Nobel Prizes in 1998...
  • Henry Ford develops the first Model T automobile, which sells for $850.
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