The humble genius Dmitri Mendeleev
What famous Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev? Immediately I recall the periodic law discovered by him, which formed the basis of the periodic system of chemical elements. Still can come to mind his "Discourses on the combination of alcohol with water," which initiated the myth of the invention of the scientists of Russian vodka. However, this is only a small part of the creator’s genius heritage. It is difficult to even imagine all the scientific, philosophical and journalistic activities of this person. The famous Russian chemist Lev Chugayev wrote: “Mendeleev was an unsurpassed chemist, a first-class physicist, a fruitful researcher in the field of meteorology, hydrodynamics, geology, chemical technology departments, a profound expert in Russian industry, an original thinker in the national economy, the state mind that was not destined unfortunately, to become a state man, but who understood the tasks and saw the future of Russia is much better than the representatives of the official government. ” Along with Albert Einstein, many call Mendeleev the greatest scientist of all time. What, in fact, was Dmitry Ivanovich?
Everyone who knew the legendary chemist, noted his amazing, extraordinary appearance: “Long shoulder-length silver-fluffy hair, like a lion's mane, high forehead, big beard, - all together made Mendeleev’s head very expressive and beautiful. Concentrated eyebrows, a penetrating gaze of clear and clear blue eyes, a tall, broad-shouldered, slightly stooped figure gave the appearance of features of expressiveness and uniqueness comparable to the mythical heroes of the past years.
Dmitry Mendeleev 8 was born on February 1834 of the year in the ancient city of Tobolsk in the family of Ivan Pavlovich Mendeleev and Maria Dmitrievna Kornilyeva. He was the seventeenth, last child. The mother of the future scientist came from a family of notable merchants who founded the first Tobolsk printing house in 1789. His father graduated from the Petersburg Pedagogical Institute and worked as a director of a local classical gymnasium. In the year of Dmitry's birth, his father's vision deteriorated sharply, he had to leave the service, and all the worries fell on Maria Dmitrievna, who after moving the whole family to the village of Aremzyanskoe, assumed the role of managing the glass factory that produced the dishes for the pharmacists.
In 1841, Dmitry entered the gymnasium. Surprisingly, the future of the star studied quite badly. Of all the subjects he liked only physics and mathematics. Aversion to classical learning remained with Mendeleev for life. In 1847, Ivan Pavlovich died, and his mother and children moved to Moscow. Despite persistent attempts, the young Dmitri Ivanovich was not allowed to enter Moscow University. Graduates of the gymnasium, according to the rules of those years, were allowed to go to universities only in their own districts, and the Tobolsk gymnasium belonged to the Kazan district. Only after three years of trouble, Mendeleev managed to get into the Physics and Mathematics Faculty of the Main Pedagogical Institute in St. Petersburg.
The situation of this closed educational institution, due to the small number of students and the extremely caring attitude towards them, as well as their close relationship with professors, provided ample opportunities for the development of individual inclinations. Here the best scientific minds of that time, outstanding teachers who knew how to plant a deep interest in science into the souls of their students, taught. Mikhail Ostrogradsky taught mathematics to Mendeleev, Emily Lenz taught physics, Fedor Brandt taught zoology, and Alexander Voskresensky taught chemistry. Dmitry Ivanovich loved chemistry the most at the institute. It is also worth noting that after the first year of study, the future scientist showed health problems, in particular, he had regular blood on his throat. Doctors diagnosed the disease as an open form of tuberculosis and announced to the young man that his days were numbered. However, all this did not prevent Mendeleev from completing the Department of Natural Sciences with a gold medal in 1855.
After graduating from the institute, Dmitry Ivanovich went to places with a milder climate. For some time he worked in the Crimea, then in Odessa, and after defending his master’s thesis he returned to the Northern capital at St. Petersburg University. On the recommendation of the "grandfather of Russian chemistry" Alexander Resurrection Mendeleev in 1859, he went on a trip abroad. During her, he traveled to Italy and France. Having visited Germany, he decided to live in this country for a while. He chose the city of Heidelberg, where famous chemists worked, and at the same time there was a large Russian colony.
Dmitry Ivanovich’s short work at a new place showed that the famous Bunsen laboratory did not have the instruments he needed, the scales were “far too poor”, and “all the interests of scientists are, alas, most school.” Mendeleev, independently purchasing all the necessary equipment in Germany and France, organized his own home laboratory. In it, he investigated the capillarity, discovered the temperature of absolute boiling (critical temperature), proved that the vapor heated to absolute boiling temperature cannot be turned into a liquid by any increase in pressure. Also in Heidelberg, Dmitry Ivanovich had an affair with local actress Agnes Voigtman, as a result of which the German woman became pregnant. Subsequently, the scientist sent money to her born daughter until she grew up and married.
At 1861, Dmitry Ivanovich returned to his native Petersburg University, got a job at the Department of Organic Chemistry, and wrote the famous textbook book, Organic Chemistry. In 1862, Mendeleev marries Feozwe Nikitichna Leshcheva. It is known that for a long time his elder sister Olga bent on his marriage. At the same time, the second edition of "Organic Chemistry" was published, and its twenty-eight-year-old author received the "Demidov Prize" in 1000 rubles, for which he went on a honeymoon trip to Europe. In 1865, the scientist defended his doctoral dissertation on the topic of combining alcohol with water, setting out his own theory of solutions. His measurements formed the basis of alcoholmetry in Russia, Germany, Holland and Austria.
Soon after the birth of his son Vladimir (in the future graduate of the Marine Corps), Dmitry Ivanovich acquired a small estate, Boblovo, near Klin. His whole life, starting with 1866, was inextricably linked with this place. He and his family went there in early spring and returned to St. Petersburg only in late autumn. The scientist respected and loved physical labor, in Boblov Mendeleev had an exemplary cattle yard with breeding cattle, a stable, a dairy, a thresher, and an experimental field on which the scientist conducted experiments with various fertilizers.
After defending his doctoral thesis, Mendeleev headed the department of general chemistry at St. Petersburg University. He intensively conducted experiments, wrote the popular work "Fundamentals of Chemistry", spoke with absolutely amazing lectures that were always collected by full audiences. Dmitry Ivanovich's speech was not easy and smooth. He always started sluggishly, often hesitated, picking up the right words, made pauses. His thoughts overtook the pace of speech, which made it a bunch of phrases that were not always grammatically correct. Historian Vasily Cheshikhin recalled: "He said that a bear was walking through a bush." The scientist himself said: “They burst into my audience not for the sake of beautiful words, but for the sake of thoughts.” His words have always sounded passion, conviction, confidence, rigorous argumentation - with facts, logic, calculations, experiences, results of analytical work. According to the richness of the content, depth and pressure of thought, the ability to capture and captivate the audience (there was a saying that Mendeleev’s lectures even sweat the walls), according to the ability to inspire, convince listeners, turn them into like-minded people; that the brilliant scientist was a brilliant, albeit somewhat peculiar speaker. An impressive and energetic gesticulation, as well as the timbre of the voice - a sonorous, pleasant to the ear baritone attracted attention.
In the 1869 year, at the age of thirty-five, at the meeting of the recently formed Russian Chemical Society, Mendeleev introduced his chemical colleagues to his new article, The Experience of a System of Elements Based on Their Atomic Weight and Chemical Similarity. After its further development, the famous article “The law for chemical elements” appeared in 1871 - in it, Dmitry Ivanovich presented the periodic system, in fact, in its modern form. In addition, he predicted the discovery of new elements for which he left empty spaces in the table. Understanding the periodic dependence gave Mendeleev the opportunity to correct the atomic weights of the eleven elements. The scientist not only predicted the presence of a number of not yet open elements, but also presented a detailed description of the properties of three of them, which, in his opinion, will be discovered before the others. Mendeleev's article was translated into German, and its prints were sent to many famous European chemists. Alas, the Russian scientist, not only did not wait for them from a competent opinion, but even an elementary answer. None of them appreciated the importance of the perfect discovery. Attitudes toward the periodic law changed only in the 1875 year, when Lecoq de Buabodran discovered gallium, which by its properties was strikingly similar to one of the elements predicted by Mendeleev. And the Basics of Chemistry written by him (which included, among other things, the periodic law) turned out to be a monumental work, in which for the first time a vast amount of factual material accumulated in various branches of chemistry was presented in the form of a coherent scientific system.
Mendeleev was a staunch enemy of everything mystical and could not help but respond to his passion for spiritualism, which had mastered a part of Russian society in the seventies of the 19 century. Such foreign news as the call of spirits and the “table twirling” with the participation of various kinds of mediums were widely spread in Russia, and the opinion was that spiritualism was “the bridge between the knowledge of physical phenomena and the comprehension of the psychic”. At the suggestion of Dmitry Ivanovich, in 1875, the Russian Physical and Chemical Society organized a commission to study “mediumistic” phenomena. The most well-known foreign mediums (the Petty brothers, Mrs. Claire, and some others) were invited to visit Russia with the aim of holding their sessions in the presence of commission members, as well as supporters of the existence of the possibility of invoking spirits.
The most elementary precautions taken by members of the commission at seances dispelled the atmosphere of mystery, and the special manometric table designed by Mendeleev, defining pressure on him, led to the fact that the “spirits” flatly refused to communicate. The verdict of the commission at the end of the work said: “Spiritistic phenomena stem from conscious deception or unconscious movements, and the spiritualistic doctrine is a superstition ...”. Mendeleev himself wrote the following lines on this: “I decided to fight against spiritualism, after Butlerov and Wagner began to preach this superstition ... But professors should act against the authority of the professorship. The result was achieved: abandoned spiritualism. I do not regret that I was busy a lot. ”
After the publication of "Fundamentals" chemistry in the life of a great scientist fades into the background, and his interests are shifted to other areas. In those years, the only petroleum product valued was kerosene, used only for lighting. Mendeleev concentrates all his attention on oil. Back in 1863, Dmitry Ivanovich analyzed Baku oil and gave valuable advice on its processing and transportation. In his opinion, the reduction of transport costs could bring the transportation of kerosene and oil by water in bulk vessels and pumping them through pipelines. In 1876, a scientist crosses the Atlantic Ocean to familiarize himself with the organization of oil business in the state of Pennsylvania and attend an industrial exhibition in Philadelphia. Upon his return, he sadly wrote: "The sole purpose of the masses was to gain ... A new dawn on the other side of the ocean is not visible." Under the pressure of the Russian Technical Society, which supported all Mendeleev’s conclusions on the trip to America, the “buy-off” system of oil sites, which exists in Russia and led to barbaric use of fields without introducing technical innovations and installing expensive equipment, was canceled. And by the year 1891 was organized transportation of oil in accordance with the requirements of Dmitry Ivanovich. The cost of transport while dropped three times.
In 1877, after Dmitry Ivanovich returned from the United States, his sister Ekaterina Kapustina with her children and granddaughter moved to his university apartment. Through them, he met Anna Ivanovna Popova, a gifted Don Cossack student at a conservatory and school of drawing, the daughter of a retired Cossack colonel. It should be noted that his relationship with his wife by this time became extremely tense. Dmitry Ivanovich felt alienated and lonely in the family. It is not surprising that he fell in love with this charming and cheerful artist, who was twenty-six years younger than the scientist. After almost five years of dating, Mendeleev finally decided to make an offer to Anna Ivanovna.
In 1880, Anna Ivanovna went to Italy for an internship, and Theozva Nikitichna - the scientist's wife - agreed to divorce. Mendeleev and Popova decided that, while the matter of divorce was going to drag out, we didn’t show up together in Petersburg. Dmitry Ivanovich went to her in Italy, and then they visited Spain together, Cairo, some time lived on the Volga. All summer 1881 Feozva Nikitichna was with her daughter in Boblov, and then moved into a new St. Petersburg apartment, which Mendeleev rented for him and fully furnished. In addition, he gave the former wife a full university salary, and later he and her daughters built a dacha on the shore of the Gulf of Finland. The divorce case ended with the fact that Dmitriy Ivanovich was punished with church penance for a period of seven years, during which he was denied the right to marry. However, in January 1882 in Kronstadt, a priest of the Admiralty Church married Mendeleev with Anna Ivanovna, for which he was defrocked the next day. The new marriage was much happier. Soon they had a daughter, Lyuba, who became Blok’s wife in the future, two years later, his son Ivan, and in the 1886 year, twins Vasily and Maria.
The genius scientist loved his children deeply, sincerely and tenderly. He said: "I experienced a lot in life, but I don’t know anything better than children." An illustrative example - Dmitri Mendeleev became the first Russian chemist invited by the British Chemical Society to take part in the famous Faraday Readings. Dmitry Ivanovich was supposed to 23 May 1889 of the year to make a report in London on the topic “Periodic legitimacy of chemical elements”, however, having learned from a telegram that Vasily was ill, he immediately returned home.
N. A. Yaroshenko. DI Mendeleev. 1886. Butter
As one of the founders of the organization of the aeronautics department, Mendeleev helped A.F. Mozhaisky and K.E. Tsiolkovsky, with Makarov worked on the development of the first domestic icebreaker, was engaged in the creation of aircraft and submarine. Studies of the compressibility of gases allowed him to obtain the equation, now known as the "Mendeleev-Clapeyron," which formed the basis of modern gas dynamics. Dmitry Ivanovich paid great attention to the problems of research of the Arctic Ocean, the issues of improving navigation in the country's internal reservoirs. In 1878, Dmitry Ivanovich presented the work “On the Resistance of Liquids and Aeronautics”, in which he not only gave a systematic account of existing views on the resistance of the environment, but also gave his own original ideas in this direction. Nikolai Yegorovich Zhukovsky highly appreciated the book, calling it "the main guide for those involved in ballistics, aeronautics and shipbuilding." All income from the sale of the monograph Mendeleev donated to support the development of domestic research in aeronautics. In accordance with his ideas, the Sea Experimental Basin was built in Petersburg, in which new models of ships were tested. In this pool, Admiral S.O. Makarov together with the future academician A.N. Krylov studied the issues of flooding of ships.
Dmitry Ivanovich himself took part in the development of air spaces. There is a known case when a scientist consciously decided on a step associated with a high risk to life. In August, 1887 he climbed a balloon to a height of about three kilometers in order to observe a solar eclipse. The weather was non-flying, the scientist literally forced the pilot out of the basket, because the wet aircraft could not lift two. Mendeleev himself had no experience of piloting in a balloon. Saying goodbye to friends, he said with a smile: “I’m not afraid to fly, I’m afraid that during the descent the men will be taken for hell and beaten." Fortunately, the unit, having stayed in the air for about two hours, landed safely.
In 1883, Mendeleev's attention turned to the study of aqueous solutions. In his work, he used all the accumulated experience, the latest instruments, measurement methods and mathematical techniques. In addition, he designed the tower of an astronomical observatory and dealt with the problems of measuring the temperatures of the upper atmosphere. In 1890, Dmitry Ivanovich had a conflict with the Minister of Education. After working at St. Petersburg University for twenty-seven years, Mendeleev left him, but his scientific activity was far from over. Already after some time, he invented a smokeless, pyrocolloidal powder, superior to the French, pyroxylin.
From 1891, Dmitry Ivanovich as an editor of the chemical engineering department took an active part in the Brockhaus-Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary, and he also authored many articles that adorn this publication. In order to determine the possibilities of increasing the industrial potential of Russia in 1899, Dmitry Ivanovich went to the Urals. There he collected data on reserves of local ores, examined metallurgical plants. On the results of the trip, Mendeleev wrote: “The belief in Russia that has always lived in me has increased and strengthened after a close acquaintance with the Urals.”
And in 1904, his “cherished thoughts” began to appear, concluding the scientist's testament to the offspring, judgments on various issues relating to the state, public, economic life of Russia. Many of the thoughts expressed by Mendeleev look absolutely modern. For example, about patriotism: “Some of the current extreme individualists are already trying to present patriotism or love for the fatherland in a thin form, declaring that it is time to replace it with an aggregate of love common to all of humanity.” Or about the defense of the country: “Russia waged many wars, but most of them were purely defensive in nature. I am confident that, in front of Russia, despite our peaceful efforts, there are still many defensive wars, if it is not fenced off by a strong army to such an extent that it would be scary to start a feud with her in the hope of grabbing a part of her territory. ” On economics: “... one combination of capitals and tramps cannot evoke or create in itself the national welfare."
In 1892, Dmitri Mendeleev headed the depot of exemplary measures and weights, which later became the Main Chamber of Weights and Measures. He laid the foundations of national scientific metrology - the direction of the extremely important in any scientific work, giving scientists confidence in the correctness of their results. He began this work with the creation of a national system of standards, the implementation of this project took Mendeleev seven years. Already in 1895, weighing accuracy in the Main Chamber reached a record high - thousandths of a milligram when weighing one kilogram. This meant that when weighing, for example, one million rubles (gold coins), the error would be one-tenth of a penny. In 1899, the son of Mendeleev died from his first marriage - Vladimir, married to Varvara Lemoh, the daughter of a famous artist. The death of his beloved son was a terrible blow for the scientist.
By the end of the nineteenth century, Mendeleev occupied in the Russian society a unique place as a universal expert who advised the government on a multitude of national economic and scientific problems. He was an expert in the field of aeronautics, smokeless powders, petroleum, higher education reform, customs tariff, setting up a metrological business in Russia. He was openly called a genius, but he didn’t like it very much, immediately became angry: “What kind of genius am I? He worked all his life, so he became so. ” The scientist did not like ceremonies, fame, awards and orders (of which he had a great multitude). He liked to talk with simple people, he said: "I love to listen to men clever speeches." When he was thanked, he could run away shouting: “Nonsense is all, stop ... Nonsense, nonsense!”. The appeal "Your Excellency" did not tolerate the spirit, warned visitors about this in advance, otherwise it could cut off a person in half a word. I asked myself to contact only by name and patronymic. Also, the chemist did not recognize any ranks and ranks, many were shocked, others were outraged. He bluntly stated: "I am not one of the present who gently creep." I couldn’t tolerate it when someone was being talked about badly with him or boasted of his “white bone”.
He dressed Mendeleev is also very simple and modest, he preferred a wide woolen jacket at home. He did not follow the fashion, relying on his tailor in everything. His moderation in food was noted. His friends believed that it was precisely because of his temperance in food and drink that he lived such a long life, despite the presence of hereditary tuberculosis. It is known that Dmitry Ivanovich loved tea, brewing it in his own way. With a cold, Mandeleev used the following method of self-treatment: he wore high fur boots, a dressing gown with fur, and drank several glasses of strong and sweet tea. After that, he went to bed, expelling the disease by the sudron. He loved the scientist to bathe in the bathhouse, but he rarely used the home bathroom. And after the bath, he drank tea again and said that he "feels like a birthday boy."
At home, the scientist had two favorite activities - making luggage and playing chess. Sticking luggage, boxes, cases for albums, travel boxes and various boxes relaxed him after hard work. In this field, he achieved excellence - glued clean, solid, neat. In old age, after the problems with vision began, he glued to the touch. By the way, some neighbors on the street knew Dmitry Ivanovich precisely as a suitcase master, and not a great chemist. He also played great chess, rarely lost, and could delay his partners until five in the morning. His constant rivals were: a close friend, the artist A.I. Kuindzhi, physical chemist V.A. Kistyakovsky and chemist, student Butlerov A.I. Humpback. Unfortunately, smoking was another passion of the scientist. He smoked cigarettes or heavy rolls all the time, even when he was taking notes. Having an extraordinary appearance, in thick puffs of tobacco smoke, he seemed to the staff "an alchemist and a magician who can turn copper into gold."
Throughout his life, Dmitri Mendeleev worked enthusiastically and passionately, not sparing himself. The work, he said, gave him "the fullness and joy of life." He concentrated all his knowledge and all his will on one thing and stubbornly walked towards his goal. The closest assistants of Dmitry Ivanovich testified that he often fell asleep at the table with a pen in his hand. According to legend, the system of chemical elements appeared to Mendeleev just in a dream, but it is known that when asked how he made the discovery, the scientist once grumbledly answered: “I may have been thinking about it for twenty years, but you think: I sat, sat and ... is ready. "
In general, Mendeleev surprisingly combined two beginnings - a cool temper and kindness. Everyone who knew the scientist recognized his difficult character, incredible flashes of arousal, short temper bordering on anger. However, Dmitri Ivanovich easily withdrew, he built his relations with employees, basing on their business skills, appreciating the industriousness and talents of people. And at the expense of swearing, Mendeleev had his own excuse: “Do you want to be healthy? Swear yourself right and left. He who does not know how to swear, keeps everything in himself, will soon die. ” In addition, he was always ready to help people, no matter how: financially, by petition or good advice. The initiative was often taken from him, Dmitry Ivanovich in the society was an influential person, and his requests, as a rule, were successful.
Mendeleev died of pneumonia 20 January 1907 year in St. Petersburg at the seventy-second year of life. The funeral of the scientist, arranged at the expense of the state, became a genuine national mourning. It is impossible to believe, but Dmitry Ivanovich was buried by almost the entire city, and the table was carried in front of many thousands of mourning columns.
After himself, Mendeleev left over 1500 works. “I myself am amazed,” said Dmitry Ivanovich, “which I just didn’t do in my academic life.” The merits of a great scientist received recognition from the entire world powers. Mendeleev was an honorary member of almost all existing at that time scientific communities. Special attention to his name enjoyed in the UK, where the chemist was awarded the medals of Faraday, Copileus and Devi. It is impossible to list all the students of Mendeleev, they worked in various fields in accordance with the widest scientific interests of Dmitry Ivanovich. His students can rightly be considered an outstanding physiologist Ivan Sechenov, the great shipbuilder Alexei Krylov, a chemist Dmitry Konovalov. The favorite student of Mendeleev was Professor Cheltsov, the head of the Marine Science and Technology Laboratory, to whom the French, without success, offered one million francs for the secret of smokeless powder.
Monument to Dmitry Mendeleev and his periodic table, located on the wall of the VNII Metrology Institute. Mendeleev in St. Petersburg
Mendeleev once said about himself: “I did not serve one iota either for my wealth, for my brute force, or for my capital. ... I tried only to give fruitful real business to my country, being confident that education, equipment, politics and even the defense of Russia are now unthinkable without the development of industry. " Mendeleev firmly believed in the future of Russia, constantly stated the need to develop its wealth. He put an enormous amount of effort into defending the priority of Russian science in the discovery of periodic law. And how did Dmitry Ivanovich survive and get upset when, at the beginning of 1904, a part of the Russian squadron was destroyed in the outbreak of the Russian-Japanese war. He did not think about his seventieth birthday, but about the fate of the Fatherland: "If the British come forward and come to Kronstadt, then I will definitely go to war." In his testament to children, he wrote: “By working, you can do everything for your loved ones and for yourself ... Acquire the main wealth - the ability to conquer yourself.”
According to the materials of the book V.I. Boyarintsev "The great Russian scientist Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleev"
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