One recent Nobel Prize winner found out that he was granted the award in an unusual way.
Robert Wilson walked over to his neighbor’s house, Paul Milgrom, whom he also advises, at 2:15 a.m. on Monday to notify him that they were the joint winners of the Nobel Prize for economics regarding their work with auction theory and inventions of auction formats.
“It’s Bob Wilson,” he said when Milgrom finally responded. “You won the Nobel Prize, and so, they’re trying to reach you, but they cannot. They don’t seem to have a number for you.”
The #NobelPrize committee couldn’t reach Paul Milgrom to share the news that he won, so his fellow winner and neighbor Robert Wilson knocked on his door in the middle of the night. pic.twitter.com/MvhxZcgutZ
— Stanford University (@Stanford) October 12, 2020
He appeared momentarily stunned by the news, only saying, “Wow,” until Wilson’s wife joked that he should pick up the phone when representatives from the group called him to notify him of the award selection.
In a video posted to social media via Stanford University, Milgrom said, “I was asleep, and the doorbell rang at 2 in the morning, and I saw Bob’s face, and he was knocking at the door and telling me that they were trying to call me and that we had won the Nobel Prize in economics.”
Wilson in the video explained that he “had turned off both his landline and his cellphone, so I just came over” after “the Nobel people asked that would I please go over and knock on his door.”
“We’re enthusiastic about what we do. We like it. And it’s exciting. It’s a great life to be able to live this way.” -Robert Wilson and Paul Milgrom, winners of the 2020 #NobelPrize in economic sciences for their path-breaking discoveries in auction theory pic.twitter.com/K9i0d7fjJ5
— Stanford University (@Stanford) October 13, 2020
