The Rise Of Australasia

Chapter 95: Chapter Ninety-Five: 1901 Ends (Please Subscribe!)

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By the end of December 1901, the winners of the Victoria Awards had been finalized, thanks to the collective efforts of European professors and scientists before the start of the new year.

There were several opinions during the selection process of the Victoria Awards, but there wasn’t much controversy after the winners were finalized.

Interestingly, the first Nobel Prize, which was historically announced in December as well, made no appearance this year.

Despite unclear reasons, there was no news about the Nobel Prize, even after the Victoria Awards had announced their winners.

This was indeed good news for the Victoria Awards, as they benefited from less competition and gained more fame.

The recipient of the first Victoria Physics Prize was German William Conrad Roentgen, a renowned physicist, also the professor of Physics at Munich University and director of its research lab.

William won the prize based on his discovery of the X-ray, an invention seen as the start of the physics revolution in the 20th century. He is considered one of the most distinguished physicists of the 20th century.

The Victoria Chemistry Prize was awarded to Dutch scientist Van Hove. He deserved the prize for his revolusionary work on chemical dynamics and law of osmotic pressure.

The Victoria Medical Award was bestowed upon the German bacteriologist and immunologist Berlyn. Berlyn discovered Diphtheria Antitoxin and was the first to successfully treat diphtheria with animal antitoxin serum, making him one of the pioneers of serum therapy.

His successful use of diphtheria antitoxin to treat diphtheria in children significantly lowered the disease’s death rate.

Due to this contribution, Berlyn is revered as a savior of children.

In history, he even developed tetanus antitoxin, which was used for battlefield injuries.

Academically, Berlyn’s achievements could rival pioneering bacteriologists Lawson Bast and Cook.

The Victoria Literature Prize was awarded to French writer Sully Prudhomme. As the saying goes, there is no first in literature, and no second in martial arts.

So while there wasn’t much controversy in other categories, literature saw diverse opinions.

Still, Sully Prudhomme’s work including his prose “Destiny”, “Happiness”, “Eyes”, and his books “On Art”, “Impromptu Poetry”, secured his place as the ultimate winner of the Literature prize.

The Victoria Mathematics Prize was awarded to one of France’s greatest mathematicians, Jules Henry Poincare.

Recognized as a leading mathematician of the late 19th and early 20th century, Poincare followed Gauss to have a comprehensive understanding of mathematics.

He is one of France’s greatest mathematicians, and also a theoretical scientist and philosophical scientist.

Poincare contributed significantly to mathematics, physics, and celestial mechanics, and proposed the famous Poincare conjecture in mathematics.

The last award, the Victoria Design Prize, covered any designs from any industry, was awarded to Disel’s Diesel Engine.

Disel’s Diesel Engine can use gasoline and diesel as energy sources, and some unexpected things as an energy source, which is one of the important factors for winning the design award.

Of course, Disel’s decision to move to Australia might have resulted in some bias in Chief David’s final decision.

All in all, with all six awards of the first Victoria Awards announced, the winners only had to wait until the beginning of the new year for the ceremony in Australia to receive their prize money of 50,000 pounds each.

Because Arthur had gone to Europe last year, he didn’t have time to attend the government’s report meeting at the end of the year, postponing it to the beginning of the next year.

However, Arthur managed to make it this year, and the meeting was held successfully.

Overall, the process was the same as last year’s. First, Prime Minister Evan reported overall, then each department gave detailed reports, and Arthur provided comments and decided on tasks and plans for the next fiscal year.

In general, 1901 saw much more development in Australia compared to 1900, as the economy and industries have each begun to take form.

Moving on to the state of industries, due to the start of the industrial railway plan, the Ministry of Industry had to speed up the construction of the industrial area and expand the scale of existing steel factories.

This resulted in the continuous increase of steel output in Australia.

In early 1901, the production output of steel and iron in Australia was 13,000 tons and 19,000 tons respectively.

By the end of the year, production had moved up to 61,000 tons of steel, and 93,000 tons of iron.

Though still a tiny fraction of the output of the great European powers, compared to most non-great power countries, this was already a significant scale of operation.

To achieve this, Australia employed more than 20,000 indigenous people in its industries, in which there were already at least several hundreds of casualties.

However, the limited steel production barely met the demand for railway construction, hence reducing construction speed to an extent.

Besides the significant increase in steel production, the construction of an industrial zone and Arthur’s investment of twenty million pounds brought in dozens of new factories, most government and royal business partnerships, and a few privately-owned enterprises subsidized by the royal family.

There are currently nearly fifty factories in the industrial area, offering more than ten thousand jobs to workers and at least ten thousand construction jobs.

This has made a pretty high contribution to raising Australia’s average population income and economic level, as these jobs were quite well-paid.

Throughout 1901, Australia’s population also saw a significant increase.

It grew from 3,867,100 to 3,996,200, an increase of 129,100 people.

The growth rate was close to 3.3%, with approximately 4.9,000 newborns, 21,000 deaths, and over 100,000 immigrants.

Newborns increased by more than 10,000 from last year, as Australia’s average income rose by more than one pound to over ten pounds.

Migration was also commendable, with a year-round immigration population exceeding 100,000 in 1901. Immigrants from the British Empire approximately accounted for almost 40,000, most of whom were English and Irish. Over 40,000 German immigrants came from all over Germany.

The remaining 10,000 were from other European countries, including France, Spain, Italy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire among others.

Compared to the immigration population of over 60,000 in the previous year, there was a noticeable increase. This was in large part due to the implementation of immigration treaties with Britain and Germany, and there is hope for maintaining such high levels of growth in the future.