Radio Norway – Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony – December 10, 1963 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
In 1963, American chemist, biochemist, chemical engineer, peace activist, author, and educator Linus Pauling accepted the Nobel Peace Prize for 1962. His tireless campaign against nuclear weapons and their use led to a moratorium on above-ground nuclear weapons testing, followed by the Partial Test Ban Treaty, signed in 1963 by John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev. On the day that the treaty went into force, October 10, 1963, the Nobel Prize Committee awarded Pauling the Nobel Peace Prize for 1962. (No prize had previously been awarded for that year.). They described him as “Linus Carl Pauling, who ever since 1946 has campaigned ceaselessly, not only against nuclear weapons tests, not only against the spread of these armaments, not only against their very use, but against all warfare as a means of solving international conflicts.” Pauling himself acknowledged his wife Ava’s deep involvement in peace work, and regretted that she was not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with him.
The ceremony for the 1962 and 1963 Nobel Peace Prizes was held in the Auditorium of the University of Oslo, 10 December 1963. Gunnar Jahn, Chairman of the Nobel Committee, delivered the 1962 Nobel Peace Prize to Linus Pauling. The 1963 Nobel Peace Prize was divided between the two sister organizations of the Red Cross: the International Red Cross Committee and the League of Red Cross Societies. The Nobel diplomas and medals were presented to Leopold Boissier as representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross and to John A. MacAulay as representative of the League of Red Cross Societies. Linus Pauling made his Acceptance speech, Leopold Boissier spoke on behalf of the International Committee of the Red Cross and John A. MacAulay spoke on behalf of the League of Red Cross Societies.
Here is the Radio Norway shortwave broadcast of that ceremony from December 10, 1963.
