Alfred Krupp

German industrialist, the eldest son of Friedrich Krupp who founded the Krupp works the year before Alfred was born as Alfred Felix Alwyn Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach. In 1826, when he was just 14, both of his parents died, leaving him with the secret of making high quality cast steel and the small family workshop. He designed and developed new machines, including the spoon roll, which made spoons and forks. An honest man, he soon won new customers, and the company expanded. Tall and slim, Krupp was driven to be the best at what he did, and his work became his life.

During the Great Exhibition in London in 1851, he exhibited a 4,300 lb. steel ingot, the largest ever cast, and in 1852, he manufactured the first seamless steel railway tire. Although the company was already flourishing, the real success came when he began making cannons. Krupp guns were used successfully in the Franco-German War of 1870-71, and as a result, the firm became known as "the Arsenal of the Reich."

Originally a small firm with only a few employees, the Krupp works became a large company, eventually employing over 21,000, and Krupp himself became a very wealthy and powerful man. However, he recognized the problems of his workers, and thus he created a program of social welfare, including free medical care, low cost housing, a sickness and burial fund and pensions. As a result, his employees were fanatically loyal to him.

Krupp had a son, Friedrich Alfred, who carried on the family business after his death on 14 July 1887, Essen, Germany.