Alfred Nobel

A hero is someone, who is brave and humane, someone generous, who is willing to sacrifice his own benefits to help other people.

Alfred Nobel

I have chosen Alfred Nobel for my hero. He was a chemist, engineer, innovator, armament manufacturer and the inventor of dynamite. He is so famous that the synthetic element Nobelium was named after him.

Alfred Nobel was born in Stockholm, Sweden on 21 October 1833 (died 10 December 1896 in San Remo, Italy). He was the son of an owner of a factory of mines, so he started working with explosives early in his life. He experimented with nitro-glycerine. This substance proved to be very sensitive and would cause many explosions. One day a tragic accident happened, and Alfred’s younger brother died in the explosion. Despite that he did not stop the research, and finally he discovered that he can reduce sensitivity with fossil algae. So he invented the dynamite.

Nobel was a learned man. He spoke several languages and he wrote poetry and drama. He was very interested in social equality and peace for people. In his last will, he used his enormous fortune to institute the Nobel Prizes. This foundation still awards prizes for science (physics, chemistry, medicine), economics, literature, and peace.

In my opinion Alfred Nobel is a hero because he was a brave man, who wanted to help people - to make it easier for them to build roads, help in mining, although unfortunately people also abused his invention for killing one another. When he died he left almost everything that he had to the foundation which sponsors ambitious and hardworking people.