Witold Zglenicki
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Witold Leon Julian Zglenicki (russian: Витольд Згленицкий), coat of arms of Prus II (January 6, 1850, in Stara Wargawa near Kutno – July 6, 1904, in Baku, buried in Wola Kiełpińska near
Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
) - Polish inventor, geologist, metallurgist, oil worker and philanthropist, student of
Dmitry Mendeleev Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev (sometimes transliterated as Mendeleyev or Mendeleef) ( ; russian: links=no, Дмитрий Иванович Менделеев, tr. , ; 8 February Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">O.S._27_January.html" ;"title="O ...
. Called the "father of Baku kerosene" and the "Polish
Nobel Nobel often refers to: *Nobel Prize, awarded annually since 1901, from the bequest of Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel Nobel may also refer to: Companies *AkzoNobel, the result of the merger between Akzo and Nobel Industries in 1994 *Branobel, or ...
". The main philanthropist of Polish science - donor of the then Kasa im. Mianowskiego (liquidated in 1951, reactivated in 1991) and the University of Warsaw.


Curriculum vitae

He studied at the Governor's Gymnasium in Płock (1859-1866), then in the years 1866-1870 he studied at the Mathematics and Physics Department of the Main School of Warsaw (now the
University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw ( pl, Uniwersytet Warszawski, la, Universitas Varsoviensis) is a public university in Warsaw, Poland. Established in 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country offering 37 different fields of ...
) and in the years 1870-1875 at the Mining Institute (Russian: Горный институт) in St. Petersburg. During his studies, he decided to devote himself to mining, seeing the oil industry as an important development factor. Initially (1875) he worked at the Mining Works of the Kingdom of Poland in
Suchedniów Suchedniów is a town in Skarżysko County, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering ...
and at the Metallurgical Works in
Mroczków Mroczków () is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Bliżyn, within Skarżysko County, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, in south-central Poland. It lies approximately north-west of Bliżyn, west of Skarżysko-Kamienna Skarżysko-Kami ...
(1876–1884), where he operated and modernized blast furnaces for iron smelting. In the years 1884–1890 he ran private forges. Combining a state function with running his own successful business resulted in reporting him to the Ministry of Treasury. Zglenicki was accused of appropriating state property and dismissed from Mroczków and suspended from his duties as an official. In the following years, he fought to be reinstated. In 1890 he was employed at the Assay Office in
Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...
; and a year later, in 1891, he was transferred to a similar office in
Baku Baku (, ; az, Bakı ) is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. Baku is located below sea level, which makes it the lowest lying national capital in the world a ...
, where he worked until the end of his life. Initially, he was offered a job in the prestigious
Donetsk Donetsk ( , ; uk, Донецьк, translit=Donets'k ; russian: Донецк ), formerly known as Aleksandrovka, Yuzivka (or Hughesovka), Stalin and Stalino (see also: Names of European cities in different languages (C–D), cities' alternat ...
Basin, but after his refusal, he was transferred to Baku, which at the time was subordinate. As he was passionate about geology, he invested his free time and funds in this activity, searching for oil deposits and new methods of its extraction. He also designed a device for undersea drilling and oil extraction (a drilling rig), becoming an absolute world pioneer in this field. He developed and gave the oil workers a device for measuring the curvature of shafts and a device for measuring the perpendicularity of drilling mining holes. He designated offshore oil plots, specifying their abundance, and established natural deposits in this area. One of the newspapers praised his achievements: "The man who turned Baku into an oil Eldorado". The
Shah Shah (; fa, شاه, , ) is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies.Yarshater, EhsaPersia or Iran, Persian or Farsi, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) It was also used by a variety of ...
of
Persia Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
,
Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar ( fa, مظفرالدین شاه قاجار, Mozaffar ad-Din Ŝāh-e Qājār; 23 March 1853 – 3 January 1907), was the fifth shah of Qajar Iran, reigning from 1896 until his death in 1907. He is often credited with t ...
, distinguished him around 1900 with the Order of the Lion and the Sun for his geological discoveries in this country. The Russian authorities also noticed him, promoting him in 1901 to the rank of collegiate counselor (equivalent to the military rank of colonel). Thanks to the engineer Zglenicki, waterworks were built in Baku, he supported science by helping the Library of the Baku Imperial Branch of the Russian Technical Society, and posthumously (in the years 1909–1912) he co-financed, together with the Rylski family, the construction of a Roman Catholic church (dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary) in Baku, incidentally destroyed in 1938. In his actions, he is a partner of the
Nobel brothers The Petroleum Production Company Nobel Brothers, Limited, or Branobel (short for братьев Нобель "brat'yev Nobel" — "Nobel Brothers" in Russian), was an oil company set up by Ludvig Nobel and Baron Peter von Bilderling. It operated ...
(
Alfred Alfred may refer to: Arts and entertainment *''Alfred J. Kwak'', Dutch-German-Japanese anime television series * ''Alfred'' (Arne opera), a 1740 masque by Thomas Arne * ''Alfred'' (Dvořák), an 1870 opera by Antonín Dvořák *"Alfred (Interlu ...
, Ludwig and Robert) and the
Rothschild family The Rothschild family ( , ) is a wealthy Ashkenazi Jewish family originally from Frankfurt that rose to prominence with Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744–1812), a court factor to the German Landgraves of Hesse-Kassel in the Free City of F ...
. He died in Baku, transported by a saloon wagon to Warsaw, and buried in Wola Kiełpińska near Zegrze near Warsaw. His work was continued in the vicinity of Baku by another Pole - Paweł Potocki.Piotr Franaszek, Paweł Grata, Anna Kozicka-Kołaczkowska, Mariusz Ruszel, Grzegorz Zamoyski: Ignacy Łukasiewicz: ''Prometeusz na ludzką miarę'', PIW Warszawa 2021


Testament

Upon learning unexpectedly about his fatal disease - diabetes, which at that time was incurable - he made a will, bequeathing the income from his oil fields to Polish science (and partly also Russian) and other charities. §8 of the will provided for the creation of a foundation - ″''Jozef Mianowski Fund in Warsaw (Kasa im. Mianowskiego w Warszawie), in order to create endowment capital, with the proviso that the interest from this capital should be used to award prizes, at the discretion of the Fund's Board, for the best works on pan-European literature, art and science, like the
Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...
s''. Among other things, the funds *
Słownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego The Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavic Countries ( pl, Słownik geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego i innych krajów słowiańskich) is a monumental Polish gazetteer, published 1880–1902 in Warsaw Warsaw ( pl ...
(Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland), * Zygmunt Gloger's Encyklopedia staropolska ilustrowana (Old Polish Encyclopedia), * works of Oskar Kolberg and
Samuel Adalberg Samuel Adalberg (1868 – 10 November 1939) was a Polish historian of folklore, literature, a paremiologist and a state official. He is remembered for editing and publishing the first modern book on Polish proverbs. Biography Born in Wars ...
.
Maria Konopnicka Maria Konopnicka (; ; 23 May 1842 – 8 October 1910) was a Polish poet, novelist, children's writer, translator, journalist, critic, and activist for women's rights and for Polish independence. She used pseudonyms, including ''Jan Sawa''. She ...
also benefited from the aid. For a short period, the Fund had at its disposal, thanks to Zglenicki, amounts that exceeded the needs of Polish science and culture at that time. Unfortunately, the will was made only partially with the will of the deceased. After the Bolshevik coup in Russia, the oil fields belonging to the ''Kasa im. Mianowskiego'' were expropriated by the
Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
without compensation. In this way, the capital of the "Polish Nobel Prize" ceased to exist.


Private life

Son: Anatol (1896–1960).


Bibliography

* Andrzej Chodubski: ''Witold Zglenicki „Polski Nobel” 1850–1904'', Płock 1984 * Andrzej Chodubski: ''Górnik, geolog. Witold Zglenicki (1850-1904) „Polski Nobel”'', Płock 2011


References


External links


Biography of "Polish Nobel"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zglenicki, Witold 1850 births 1904 deaths 19th-century Polish geologists Geologists from the Russian Empire Businesspeople from the Russian Empire People from the Russian Empire of Polish descent Businesspeople in the oil industry Saint Petersburg Mining University alumni People from Łęczyca County