Nobel Prizes are awarded for the first time from a fund (initially $9.2 million) established by Alfred B. Nobel of 1866 dynamite fame, who has added to his fortune by investments in Russia’s Baku oil fields. “Inherited wealth is a misfortune which merely serves to dull a man’s faculties,” said Nobel in 1895, and he has willed that his fortune be invested in safe securities “the interest accruing from which shall be annually awarded in prizes.”