Q 01/05

In which year was dynamite patented?

A) 1867

B) 1871

C) 1876

D) 1885

Answer · why

A) 1867

1867: Nobel patented dynamite in Britain in May 1867 and in Sweden that October, with a US patent following in 1868.

Q 02/05

About 90% of which American monument was carved with dynamite rather than chisels?

A) Mount Rushmore

B) Stone Mountain

C) Devils Tower

D) The Lincoln Memorial

Answer · why

A) Mount Rushmore

Mount Rushmore's 'powdermen' cut their charges so exactly that they blasted to within a few inches of the finished faces. In 14 years of work on the c...

Q 03/05

In which city was Alfred Nobel born in 1833?

A) Stockholm

B) Gothenburg

C) Uppsala

D) Malmö

Answer · why

A) Stockholm

Stockholm was no easy start: his father's business failed the very year Alfred was born, and his mother ran a small grocery shop to feed the family. T...

Q 04/05

In which country was dynamite invented, at Geesthacht?

A) Sweden

B) Norway

C) France

D) Germany

Answer · why

D) Germany

Germany, not his native Sweden: Nobel moved there in 1865 and built his works at Krümmel, outside Hamburg. It became the world's first dynamite factor...

Q 05/05

What did Ascanio Sobrero make of his own discovery, nitroglycerin?

A) A sure fortune

B) Too dangerous

C) A lamp fuel

D) A new fertiliser

Answer · why

B) Too dangerous

Too dangerous to use, he warned anyone who would listen. Decades later, thinking of all the people it had killed, he said he was almost ashamed to adm...