Frederick the Winter King

Frederick V known as Frederick the Winter King, a grandson of William of Orange, was born on Aug 26 in 1596– and died on Nov 29 in 1632. He was king of Bohemia for one winter from 1619 to 1620 and elector palatine from 1610 to 1623.

The Protestant estates of Bohemia revolted against the Roman Catholic King Ferdinand (Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II) and chose Frederick as the head of the Protestant union against Catholic Austria at the beginning of the Thirty Years’ War.

Influenced by his minister Christian of Anhalt, Frederick accepted but did not receive the aid expected from his father-in-law, James I of England, and from the Protestant Union against Ferdinand.

He was soon abandoned by his allies and was routed in the Battle of White Mountain. He was defeated by the German Emperor Ferdinand II. In 1622 he went into exile in Holland.
Frederick the Winter King

Raphael

Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (April 6 or March 28, 1483 – April 6, 1520), known as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance.

His family name was Sanzio: he was born in the city of Urbino, in the pontificate of Sixtus IV. His father, Giovanni Sanzio, was a painter for court of Urbino but of no professional celebrity, he was considered to possess superior judgment.

In the court of Urbino, Raphael was exposed to some of the best artists and thinkers from around the world, Because of his father’s connections in the court, Raphael began training to be an artist.

The great fame of Michael Angelo Buonaroti, and Leonardo da Vinci, induced him to visit Florence and the careful examination of the works of those eminent artists enlarges his ideas and enabled him to improve his style.

After residence of some time at Florence Raphael, was recalled to Urbino by the death of his parents. He remained there to execute some works for the duke and the churches and then return to Florence where he continued his laborers and studies.

His reputation afterwards called him to Rome in 1509, where Pope Julius II, employed him in decorating with frescoes the chambers of the Vatican. Pope hired Raphael as scriptor brevium. It was here that he first displayed the full extent of his admirable genius; and his pictures of the doctors of the churches and the school of Athens are still regarded as some of the most wonderful production of the art.
Raphael

Otto von Bismarck (1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898)

Otto von Bismarck unified Germany under a conservative government and altered the balance of power in nineteenth century Europe. He founded the German Empire in 1871 and served as its chancellor for 19 years.

Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck was born in Schönhausen to the Junker family of Prussia in 1815, the year peace was restored to Europe after the tumultuous Napoleonic Wars.

He was the fourth of six children – four sons and two daughters - of whom the eldest was born in 1807 and the youngest in 1827.

In his youth he preferred drinking and duels to his law studies in Berlin and his later duties as a civil servant.

Otto von Bismarck in 1874

In 1847, desirous of more excitement and power than he could find in the country, he reentered public life. Four years later he began to build a base of diplomatic experience as the Prussian delegate to the Parliament of the Germanic Confederation.

In 1849, the Prussian king arrested the Frankfurt Assembly, Bismarck expressed his approval. His support of the Prussian monarchy won him a post in the government and in 1862 he was appointed chancellor.

When he took office, Prussia was widely considered the weakest of the five European powers, but under his leadership Prussian won a war against Denmark in 1864, the even Weeks’ War in 1866, and the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71).

Through these wars he achieved his goal of political unification of a Prussian-dominated Germane Empire.

He was not a political gambler but a moderate who waged war only when all other diplomatic alternatives had been exhausted and when he was reasonably sure that all the military diplomatic advantages were on his side.

In 1890 William II dismissed Bismarck. In 1898 the frustrated ‘Iron Chancellor’ died.
Otto von Bismarck (1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898)

Ingvar Kamprad – the founder of IKEA

Ingvar Kamprad’s paternal family was German and of aristocratic origin.  Kamprad’s grandfather, Achim Erdmann emigrated from Germany to Småland with his wife and three children in 1894, and established a 449 hectares farm near the village of Agunnaryd.

Ingvar Kamprad was born in the village of Pjätterydnear, near Agunnaryd, on March 20, 1926. He was a tough upbringing: Sweden in the late 1920s and early 1930s was difficult place in which to grow up.

By the time he was ten years old he was already running a business buying matches wholesale in Stockholm and reselling them to neighbors in the village at a tidy profit. He realized that, if he bought them wholesale in Stockholm, he could sell them to his neighbors at a price that was considered cheap and still make a healthy profit.

He later involved in the importation and sale of pens and office equipment and created his own company at the age of seventeen, before entering the business school in Göteborg.

When Kamprad was 17, in 1943, his father gave him a sum of money as a reward for his school performance, and he used this to set up a business he called IKEA.

His business had outgrown local delivery and he began to sell by mail order. Newspaper advertisements stimulated demand, and the local milk cart and train network solved his distribution problems.

Furniture from local producers was introduced in 1948, and in 1951 the now iconic catalogue appeared.

In 1953 he opened his first showroom, offering his customers the opportunity to buy quality locally made furniture at prices below those of his competitors. Later Swedish furniture makers union boycotted Ingvar Kamprad and he was forced to have his furniture made in Poland.

Over the 1970s, and 1980s the company expanded across Europe; in 1985, it opened its first store in Philadelphia; and in 1987 it was in the UK.

By 2012, there were over 150,000 employees and more than 300 stores throughout the developed world.
Ingvar Kamprad – the founder of IKEA