Invention Timeline - Alfred Nobel, Swedish Engineer; Inventor of Dynamite and Glyoxaline
b. October 21, 1833 and d. December 10, 1896
Swedish engineer. Nitro-glycerine remained unapplied to practical uses until 1864, when Nobel began to develop its industrial value. 1866-’67, dynamite and glyoxaline were invented by him, and in 1876 he patented nitrogellation, blasting gelatin, or explosive gelatin. In 1888 he took out a patent for Nobel’s smokeless powder or ballistite. The manufacture of artificial silk attracted his attention, but he attached more importance to his artificial india-rubber, patented in 1893-’94.
How, then? By thinking. “By patient thought,”
said Newton. By earnest thinking. It is this that
brings the Apollo Belvedere from the block of
marble. It is this that sends the locomotive engine
thundering on its conquering way. It is this that
puts the nitro-glycerine through the backbone of
the mountain. Original men are intense thinkers.
Newton was so smitten with “the wild delight of
thinking” that he once took the tip of the forefinger
of his lady-love to put out the fire in his tobacco
pipe. “The brute!” you say; but he was bringing
brutum fulmen from the heavens.
—Originality: Rev. Elias Nason
1833—Sails to wooden paddles; speed and regularity.
1843—Wood to iron hulls; strength and capacity.
1846—The manufacture of high explosives was begun in Germany with gun-cotton.
1850—Paddles to screws; economy and radius.
