Sergei Nicholaevitch Winogradsky, 1856-1953

Sergei Nicholaevitch Winogradsky was born in Kiev on 14 September 1856. His father, Nikolai Konstantinovitch Winogradsky, was a native of Bessarabia who graduated at Kiev University, and after a period in the civil service became a bank director. His banking connexions brought him a considerable fortune and he acquired estates in the Province of Podolia in South Russia. Sergei’s mother, Natalia Viktorovna Skoropadskaia, came from an old Ukrainian family from the Province of Tchernigov. He had a sister and two brothers, of whom the elder achieved distinction as a musician. Sergei Winogradsky himself spent his childhood in Kiev where he entered the second classical gymnasium at the age of 10 and passed out with distinction at the age of 16. In 1873 he entered Kiev University and studied science for two years, but, becoming dissatisfied with the teaching, he left in his third year and joined the Imperial Conservatoire of Music in St Petersburg, where he studied the piano under Leshetitski, who later taught Paderewski. This period of musical studies left a deep impression on Winogradsky’s character, but he did not find complete satisfaction in a musical career and decided to return to natural science. In 1877, therefore, he entered the science faculty of the University of St Petersburg where he began by studying chemistry under Menshutkin and later took plant physiology as a special subject under Famintzin. While still an undergraduate he married Zinaida Alexandrovna Tichotzkaia, a native of Kiev, and a childhood friend.