The life devoted to science of the 'father' of the Nobel Prize

Swedish inventor and businessman Alfred Nobel never married, researched dynamite that killed his brother, and devoted all his fortune to the Nobel Prize.

Alfred had a difficult childhood in Stockholm. He was born on October 21, 1833, to Immanuel Nobel and Andriette Ahlsell Nobel. Immanuel was an engineer and inventor. Alfred's father built bridges and buildings and experimented with different ways of breaking rocks. The same year Alfred was born, his father's business failed and had to close. In 1837, Immanuel decided to seek his fortune elsewhere by moving to Finland and Russia. Alfred's mother left Stockholm to take care of the family. Alfred had two older brothers, Robert, born in 1829, and Ludvig, born in 1831. Coming from a wealthy family, his mother ran a vegetable shop to help support the family.

Portrait of Alfred Nobel. (Photo: Britannica).

After a while, Immanuel's business in St. Petersburg, Russia, began to flourish. He opened a machine shop supplying equipment to the Russian army, and convinced the Tsar and his generals that water mines could prevent enemy ships from attacking St. Petersburg. These mines had prevented the British Royal Navy from approaching St. Petersburg during the Crimean War of 1853-1856. With his success in Russia, Immanuel moved his family to St. Petersburg in 1842. In 1843, Alfred's younger brother Emil was born. All four brothers attended elementary school with tutors. Their lessons included natural sciences, languages, and literature. By the age of 17, Alfred could speak and write in Swedish, Russian, French, English, and German.

In Paris, Alfred worked in the private laboratory of Professor T. J. Pelouze, a renowned chemist. There he met the young Italian chemist Ascanio Sobrero. Three years earlier, Sobrero had invented nitroglycerine, a highly explosive liquid that was considered too dangerous for practical use. Alfred became interested in nitroglycerine and its uses in construction. When he returned to Russia after his studies, he worked with his father to develop nitroglycerine into a commercially viable explosive.

After the Crimean War, Alfred's father's business was not doing well and he decided to return to Sweden. Alfred's two brothers, Robert and Ludvig, stayed in Russia to save the family business and became successful. After the Nobel family returned to Sweden in 1863, Alfred focused on developing nitroglycerine as an explosive, but the experiments resulted in several deaths, including his younger brother Emil. The government decided to ban the experiment in Stockholm.

Alfred did not give up and moved on to experimenting with barges or flat-bottomed boats on Lake Mälaren. In 1864, he began mass-producing nitroglycerine but continued to experiment with different additives to make it much safer. Through his experiments, he found that mixing nitroglycerine with a fine sand called kieselguhr could turn the liquid into a paste and shape it into sticks. These sticks could then be placed in a borehole. This invention was born in 1866. Alfred patented the material the following year. He named it dynamite. He also invented a type of detonator to go with it. This series of inventions helped reduce the cost of many construction projects such as digging tunnels, blasting rocks, building bridges and roads, etc.

The demand for explosives and detonators in the construction industry was so high that Alfred opened factories in 90 places. He lived in Paris but often flew to factories in more than 20 countries. He worked extensively in Stockholm (Sweden), Hamburg (Germany), Ardeer (Scotland), Paris and Sevran (France), Karlskoga (Sweden) and San Remo (Italy) . He also experimented with the production of synthetic rubber, artificial leather and silk . At the time of his death in 1896, he owned 355 patents.

Alfred had no family of his own. When he advertised for a secretary in the newspaper, an Austrian woman named Bertha Kinsky von Chinic und Tettau got the job. After a short time in the job, she returned to Austria and married Count Arthur von Suttner. Alfred and Bertha von Suttner maintained a friendship and correspondence for many years. Bertha became increasingly active in the peace movement. Later, when Alfred spoke of his desire to establish a Nobel Prize, he included a prize for an individual or organization that promoted world peace.

Alfred died in San Remo, Italy on December 10, 1896. In his last will, he left the bulk of his fortune to award the Nobel Prizes to individuals who had made outstanding contributions in the fields of medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and peace. In 1901, the first Nobel Prizes were awarded in Stockholm, Sweden and Kristiania (now Oslo), Norway, and have continued to this day (the Nobel Prize in Economics was added later in 1968).