Nicola Romeo (;

Sant'Antimo Sant'Antimo is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Naples in the Italian region Campania, located about 13 km north of Naples. Geography The municipality is located at 67 m above sea level and is 16 km from the ce ...

, 28 April 1876 –

Magreglio Magreglio ( Valassinese lmo, Magrei ) is a small town in the province of Como, Lombardy, Italy. Twin towns * Friedberg, Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the seco ...

, 15 August 1938) was an Italian engineer and entrepreneur mostly known for founding the car manufacturer

Alfa Romeo Alfa Romeo Automobiles S.p.A. () is an Italian luxury car manufacturer and a subsidiary of Stellantis. The company was founded on 24 June 1910, in Milan, Italy. "Alfa" is an acronym of its founding name, "Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili." "A ...

. He served as a senator in the 18th Legislature of the

Kingdom of Italy The Kingdom of Italy ( it, Regno d'Italia) was a state that existed from 1861, when Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia was proclaimed King of Italy, until 1946, when civil discontent led to an institutional referendum to abandon the monarchy and f ...

(XXVIII legislatura del Regno d'Italia

Career

Romeo graduated with a degree in engineering from the Politecnico di Napoli (nowadays

Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...

) in 1899. After that, he worked for a couple of years abroad and completed a second bachelor's degree in electrical engineering in Liège,

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

. In 1911 he returned to Italy and created "Ing. Nicola Romeo e Co.". The company manufactured machines and equipment for the mining industry. As the company became successful he wished to expand and acquired a majority of

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

-based car manufacturing company A.L.F.A. (Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili) in 1915. Only three years later, in 1918, Romeo owned the whole company. A.L.F.A. was renamed to "Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili Romeo". The first car carrying the

badge was the 1921 Torpedo 20/30 HP. The company gained a good reputation for building elegant and safe cars as well as aircraft parts, but in 1927 it came very close to liquidation due to a series of bad investments. During a tense board meeting Romeo was asked to leave the company, although the new CEO Pasquale Gallo persuaded him to stay as president. Romeo officially departed from Alfa Romeo in 1928.

Engineering companies

Nicola Romeo owned a number of engineering companies, not all at the same time. These included: * Ing. Nicola Romeo e Co. * Società Nicola Romeo di

Saronno Saronno (; lmo, Saronn ) is a ''comune'' of Lombardy, Italy, in the province of Varese. It received the honorary title of city with a presidential decree in 1960. With an estimated population of 39,351 inhabitants, it is the most densely populated ...

Costruzioni Meccaniche di Saronno Costruzioni Meccaniche di Saronno was an Italian company producing steam locomotives and cars, active from 1887 to 1918. Origins The origins of the engineering company are to be found in a framework of political agreements of the economic-militar ...

* CEMSA * Officine Ferroviarie Meridionali

Family

In 1905 he married Angelina Valadin, a

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

opera singer and pianist. Together they had seven children; Maurizio, Edoardo, Nicholas, Elena, Giulietta, Piera and Irene.

Death

Nicola Romeo died on 15 August 1938 in his home at Lake Como at the age of 62. Almost seventy years after his death and on the occasion of the 130th anniversary of his birth, the city of

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

dedicated a street to his memory in Rione Lauro, called Via Nicola Romeo.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Romeo, Nicola Italian businesspeople Italian automotive pioneers Italian automotive engineers Italian founders of automobile manufacturers Alfa Romeo people People from the Province of Naples 1876 births 1938 deaths