In St. Petersburg, on the Petrograd embankment, you can see an unusual monument, which is a fancy bronze tree. A large bird is hiding in its branches, and the roots go to a granite pedestal. The inscription "Alfred Nobel" is embossed on one of the faces. A photograph of the monument is in our article.
Nobels in Russia
The place for the monument was not chosen by chance. The embankment of Bolshaya Nevka near the Vyborg side has the most direct relation to the life of an outstanding scientist, engineer and entrepreneur. Here, until 1999, there was a world-famous engineering plant. It was founded in 1862 by Ludwig Nobel and bore his name. In 1917, the company was nationalized and renamed Russian Diesel. However, the hero of our article is not Ludwig, but his younger brother - Alfred Nobel.
The Nobel family lived in Russia for a long time. Father and sons were engaged in the industrial production of engines, components for machines and mechanisms. Nobels worked in the oil industry. They established the extraction, processing and transportation of black Baku gold. Their merit lies in equipping the Russian army and navy with mines, bombs and shells.
Not only commerce was the inheritance of the family. They gave a lot of effort and money to charity - established scholarships, funded research, medical and cultural institutions.
Origin of the surname
Nobel’s biography was tracked only from the 17th century. His paternal grandfather was a barber named Nobelius. In those days, this profession, in addition to cutting hair and shaving bristles, also included surgical operations - bloodletting and tooth pulling. In 1775, the ancestor reduced his surname.
Childhood
Alfred Nobel was born in Stockholm on October 21, 1833. Father, Emanuel Nobel, left Sweden with his family in 1842. By the time of the arrival in our country of eight children, only four were alive - Alfred, Emil, Robert and Ludwig. At home, the family was truly in poverty. Father interrupted by casual earnings. He was a talented person - versed in architecture, construction, possessed the talent of an inventor. His last attempt to ensure a decent life for his wife and children in the homeland was the organization of an enterprise for the production of elastic fabrics, but things did not go in Sweden, and he went to Russia, first to the north, to Finland, which was then part of the empire, and then - St. Petersburg.
Life in Russia
Our country was on the rise - the era of the development of large industrial enterprises began. This time was always warmly recalled by older brothers and Alfred Nobel himself. A brief biography of all three is in almost every encyclopedic dictionary.
Emanuel Nobel pretty quickly settled in a new place. The head of the family was engaged in the production of lathes and equipment for them, as well as the manufacture of metal cases for the mines invented by him. Soon he moved the family here. Emanuel Nobel and his wife Andrietta settled in a large and comfortable house, hired good private teachers for the children, and acquired au pair assistants.
All sons were remarkably talented and hardworking people. Parents gave them a good education and taught them to work. Alfred Nobel was no exception. The biography testifies that, in addition to his native language, he was fluent in Russian, German, French and English. At 17, Alfred went for three years to France, Germany and the United States, where he continued his education.
Returning to Russia, Nobel Alfred got a job in his father’s company, producing ammunition for the Crimean military campaign. In 1856, the war ended, and the manufactory, Emmanuel Nobel, in order not to go bankrupt, demanded an early reorganization. This was done by Ludwig and Robert, and Alfred with his parents and younger brother Emil returned to Sweden.
Return to Sweden
In Stockholm, Alfred set about implementing long-standing ideas from the field of mechanics and chemistry. He worked very successfully and even patented three inventions.
Alfred's parents settled in a suburb of Stockholm. On his estate, Emmanuel set up an experimental laboratory in which he conducted detonation experiments.
The only explosive used at that time in military affairs was black powder. About the explosive properties of nitroglycerin then already knew. The Italian chemist Askagno Sobrero first synthesized it in 1847, but so far no one has been able to “tame” the dangerous chemical compound. The danger was the rapid transition of a substance from any state to an easily exploding gas.
After several encouraging experiments, Emmanuel connected his son to his business. Alfred Nobel (a brief biography contains such information) went in search of sponsors. By 1861, it was found in France. He gave a loan of one hundred thousand francs. Work with explosives was not interesting to the future “father of dynamite,” as Alfred Nobel later became known. However, he did not want to refuse help to the parent and became involved in his experiments.
Two years later, Nobel Alfred came up with a device in which nitroglycerin was placed in a separate, hermetically sealed tank, and the detonator in an adjacent, so-called capsule. This element was cast from metal. Thus, the probability of an accidental explosion was practically excluded. With a further improvement of the invention, black powder was replaced by mercury.
During one of the experiments in the laboratory, a powerful explosion occurred that claimed the lives of eight people. Among them was Emil. His father survived the death of his youngest son, and soon he suffered a blow that confined him to bed for almost seven years, until his death in 1872, when he was 71 years old.
Interesting Facts
Alfred Nobel was a famous book reader. He passionately loved books. In his library, in addition to the works of scientists, there were also novelties of fiction. Most of all, Nobel liked French and Russian writers. Victor Hugo, Guy de Maupassant, Honore de Balzac are contemporaries of our hero. All new items were acquired by him immediately. He read the novels of I. S. Turgenev in both French and Russian. But Emil Zola, fashionable at that time, was unsympathetic to him.
Alfred Nobel was not only a chemical scientist, but also a philosopher. He had a doctorate. The Christian, naturalist and philosopher coexisted quite harmoniously in it.
Failed writer
Alfred Bernhard Nobel never dreamed of becoming the king of dynamite, although he patented this exploding composition. Business was not his favorite thing. If he could choose his fate, he would become a writer. From his writings, only one play is preserved in poetry - “Nemesis” about Beatrice of Chechnya.
But fate was such that at first he had to help his father, then he took responsibility for his enterprises and the people who worked for them. Alfred Nobel was an exceptionally responsible person. He himself was involved in monitoring the process, recruiting personnel, conducting business correspondence, following bookkeeping, marketing products, negotiations with suppliers, advertising, etc. Alfred Nobel saw great prospects in the use of explosives for peaceful purposes. Nobel explosives were used in America to build a railway in the Sierra Nevada. I must say that Alfred Nobel invented not only dynamite.
In 1865, he founded his first foreign company headquartered in Hamburg.It is impossible to work with the production of explosives and not have accidents in the track record. Nobel constantly had to solve issues related to such situations. Failure to comply with safety regulations is a disaster. In a series of accidents - and the plant in Hamburg. Nobel’s greatest desire is to make safe explosives and put them at the service of peaceful purposes.
Trip to the USA
In 1866, Nobel went to the United States with the goal of opening a new enterprise, which will provide an opportunity to improve things. The business world of this country did not like the Swede. His opinion about the partners was this: local entrepreneurs have too much desire to get money. It robs the pleasure of communication. The actions taken by American businessmen to achieve their mercantile goals overshadow their joy and make us constantly remember the true motives of their behavior.
Dynamite
In 1867, a series of experiments to create a safe explosive was successful. Alfred Nobel has patented a new invention - dynamite. This is a powder from a mixture of a chemically inert substance and nitroglycerin. The porous marine mineral kieselguhr, the fossilized remains of the marine plant diatom, was used as an inert substance. Dynamite could be poured into drilled holes and blown using a cord connected to the detonator. Thus, a person carrying out demolition work could be at a safe distance from the place of the explosion.
Ballisticitis
The next discovery was the so-called explosive jelly - a mixture of nitroglycerin with gunpowder. Then Nobel Alfred created plastic ballistic smokeless explosives. A few years later, British scientists - Sir F. Abel and Professor J. Dewar - based on the discovery of Nobel created an explosive cord. They patented it as a novelty in the production of explosive mixtures, but this is at least incorrect, since cordite is a derivative of ballistite. Albert Nobel tried in court to challenge this discovery, but his opponent was the British government, and he lost.
The scientist had to contest the rights to patents in courts many times. The price for success was a large number of theft of secrets of the technology for the production of various types of explosive materials. Competitors also haunted.
Socialist
Alfred Nobel was often called a socialist, but he did not consider himself as such. Nobel was against giving women the right to vote and was very doubtful of the rationality of a democratic model of governance, but despotism also hated him. Workers at Nobel enterprises had such social security as those who worked for other owners could envy. He rightly believed that well-educated, with high moral principles, well-fed and healthy personnel would bring more benefits to the enterprise than the roughly exploited masses of limited people.
Nobel Alfred spent a lot of money on improving the work of workers and strengthening technical safety measures at his enterprises. History has preserved several remarkable cases from life that clearly demonstrate the personality of this person. So, for example, he made a wedding present in the amount of 40 thousand francs to his cook, who was going to get married, and the secretary doubled the monthly salary in similar circumstances. He donated a lot of money to the French Lutheran church.
The good of the world is above all
Alfred Nobel was convinced that his inventions should serve the cause of peace. Explosives invented by him and produced in his factories have served excellently in this field. In the second half of the 19th century, with the invention of the steam engine, there was a big leap in the development of the economy. Railways began to be actively built, tunnels laid. Dynamite was also used to clear channels and deepen the bottom of ponds when laying shipping lanes.
As for the use of explosives in military affairs, here Nobel was of the opinion that if the two warring parties are armed equally, then there will be no military clashes.
Anna Desry
The life of such a person could not but interest others. Constantly under the watchful eye of competitors and the media, and Nobel Alfred. His personal life is still full of unsolved secrets. He managed to preserve the secret of intimate life and relationships with women. Nobel did not keep diaries, and he did not let his friends and acquaintances into his soul. Until now, no one can say for sure whether he was married and whether he had children. Even surviving letters do not shed light on this question. And yet, several of his novels were made public.
Alfred's first love was Anna Desry, the daughter of a pharmacist, whom he wanted to marry, but did not have time, because, according to one version, the girl fell ill and died. According to another version, Anna preferred to him a certain mathematician, Mr. Franz Lemarges. According to rumors, this was the reason why mathematics was not included in the premium kit, which was subsequently established by Nobel Alfred. In any case, his personal life remained unsettled for many years.
Sarah Bernhardt
Alfred's interest in life was aroused by the famous French actress Sarah Bernhardt. Nobel saw her in the Comedy Francaise and fell in love at first sight, or rather, from the very first performance. She took possession of his heart so much that he wrote about Sarah's mother. Andrietta Nobel said that in France, where he is currently, novels with actresses are very popular. Here, passion, and happiness, and torment, etc. All this causes sympathy among the French, and a broken heart is a matter of pride. In Sweden, such relationships are considered the height of stupidity. It is no accident that in the old days actors were not allowed to bury in the cemetery. People of this profession do not develop their own souls. Their personalities are a mix of personalities of the characters played.
Sophie hess
Another woman captivating Nobel is twenty-year-old flower shop saleswoman Sophie Hess. This union was fragile and, most likely, would have remained unknown if, after Nobel’s death, Sophie had not filed a claim against inheritance to the tycoon’s executives. She lived on the support of Nobel for 19 years and even presented herself to her neighbors as Madame Nobel, but there was no official registration of relations, neither were there any joint children. In addition to the above, the girl soon started a parallel romance and told her lover that only money and generosity connected her with the Nobel.
Bertha Kinsky
Interestingly, in the same year, 1876, the 43-year-old Nobel met another interesting lady who became his friend until the end of her life. This is the 33-year-old Countess Berta Kinsky, later von Zutner. Alfred Nobel could very well marry her. My wife would be perfect. This is exactly what Nobel needed, but something went wrong here. Nevertheless, they maintained good relations until the death of Alfred. Bert inspired him to allocate part of his fortune to the award of a peace prize, for she herself was involved in the process of preserving humanity from unleashing the Third World War. Subsequently, at the beginning of the 20th century, Bert von Zutner was awarded this prize among the first nominees.
Premature obituary
It so happened that, in fact, the most militaristic and most famous invention of Alfred Nobel has served the cause of protecting peaceful life on Earth for a hundred years. At the beginning of his career as a dynamite tycoon, he did not plan to bequeath all the earned capital to charity affairs. But as they say, man assumes, but life disposes. What is gossip about a man after his death, Alfred Nobel also learned in his declining years. The biography has preserved such a detail from his life.
In 1888, Alfred's brother, Ludwig Nobel, died. Journalists messed up something and published newspaper articles reporting Alfred's death.He was called a man who made a fortune in blood, and a merchant of death. These articles shocked the mother. She became seriously ill, and died a year later. Alfred Nobel also could not indifferently endure the attack of journalists. He went to Italy, where he settled in a secluded villa in San Remo. There he equipped a laboratory and was engaged in experiments on the synthesis of artificial rubber and silk.
Nobel Prize
During these years, Nobel began to seriously think about how to dispose of his huge fortune. He ensured reliable management of enterprises and control over the distribution of profits. In addition to the costs of maintaining the operation of plants, it must be accumulated to pay five annual bonuses to the people who have brought the greatest benefit to mankind. He attributed literature, medicine, physics and chemistry to the most useful industries. The fifth prize was intended for those people who made the most impressive contribution to the preservation of peace between individual countries. Thus, Alfred Nobel’s inventions have been working and benefiting people for more than a hundred years, although dynamite has not been produced for a long time on such a scale as in former times.
About a year before his death, Alfred Nobel finished work on his famous will. He died in Italy on December 10, 1896.
