For a Nobel cause
RAMESH SETH
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Alfred Bernhard Nobel established the Nobel Trust to recognise outstanding contributions in certain fields.
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ALFRED NOBEL: Remembered for the awards he instituted.
Once again the season of Nobel prizes is upon us. First instituted over a hundred years ago and first declared in 1901. Alfred Bernhard Nobel, born on October 21, 1833, in Stockholm Sweden, earned money by investing in deadly dynamite and then used the bulk of his fortune, endowed a nine million dollar fund in his will, to form the Nobel Trust.
The interest earned on this endowment was to be used to give five awards to people whose work most benefited humanity in five fields. The sixth award, in Economics, was constituted 100 years after the original five prizes, by the Royal Swedish Bank, but under the Nobel Trust.
Very few persons have the misfortune of having read their own obituary in a newspaper. It happened with Alfred Nobel. In 1888, when Alfred's brother died, a French newspaper under the mistaken belief that Alfred had died instead of his less famous brother, published an obituary .
In the obituary the newspaper described him as a man who had made it possible to kill more people more quickly than anyone else who had ever lived. What he read horrified Alfred Nobel.
It was not entirely correct that his invention of dynamite brought only death and destruction. In fact it had served humanity in a far larger way by its use in the construction industry.
The Trust
At that moment, Nobel realised two things: that this was how he was going to be remembered, and that this was not how he wanted to be remembered. Shortly thereafter, he established the Nobel Trust. Remarkably, it was the first time that such an award was instituted.
However, the beginning of the Nobel Prizes was not free of controversies. First, his disinherited heirs fought tooth and nail against the endowment but lost. The Swedish King Oscar II was informed that the awards would be a drain on Sweden's resources. As a result Nobel's will could not be fulfilled. However, in 1900 King Oscar had a change of heart and he withdrew his veto. In 1901 the five annual awards were declared. Over the last 100 years this had been the most prestigious event in Sweden. It has not only immortalised Alfred Nobel but Sweden as well.
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