Azerbaijani Who Outdared the Nobel Brothers

Azerbaijani Who Outdared the Nobel Brothers

Shamsi Asadullayev started his career as a cart-man in the oil industry and realized great projects and achieved tremendous successes thanks to his strenuous efforts and ability. He first created a private oil tanker fleet among oil and gas owners in Azerbaijan and Russia, and oil was transported only by oil-tank steamers. Then, Sh. Asadullayev applied and used oil pipeline, and for this merit his name was placed on a par with Nobel Brothers. Later on, Sh. Asadullayev was titled as 'Nobel Brothers’ Blighter '. As soon as Nobel Brothers opened their bureaus in Russia and Turkestan, Iran, even in Finland, in the blink of an eye, Sh. Asadullayev's office appeared right by theirs.

By selling oil for a lower price, Sh. Asadullayev attracted customers on his side. Thus, Sh. Asadullayev became one of the richest men in Azerbaijan. As a philanthropist, he invested a large amount of money to the construction of the Baku Realni School (now Azerbaijan State University of Economics (ASUE). Sh. Asadullayev, a man without education, took under his auspices the largest Transcaucasian Aleksandrov Teachers’ Institute in Tbilisi and he established a scholarship named after his own name. In this way, Sh. Asadullayev managed to increase the quota allocated to Muslim students. He had  the church in Kaluga repaired at his own expense and donated one of his mansions in Vozdvijenka district in Moscow to the Muslim community in this city. A private school for Muslim children was opened in that building.

The Azerbaijani  philanthropist is well-known in Astrakhan, Russia. According to research work conducted by Eldar Idrisov, there was a petrol reserve of the society titled ‘Caucasus and Mercury’ in this settlement which later on was named for Sh. Asadullayev as Asadullayevo. The society was dealing with transportation of oil products from Baku to Astrakhan. Asadullayevo settlement is located on Mansur island. Till 1918, Department of Local Ethnography and State Property of Astrakhan gave for rent the territory of the island to entrepreneurs. Although Asadullayevo settlement was not registered as a residential community until the October Revolution, Sh. Asadullayev's oil bridge was on this island. The 'Mazut' society, including mazut plant, oil reservoir, storage warehouses, bridges for ships, oil transportation fleet were located in the territory of nowadays settlement then.

At that time, as the transportation of workers from Astrakhan to the island was not economically viable, the Oil Production Society decided to build residential buildings on the island. The buildings for workers and their families were built in the form of barracks. After the October Revolution, all vessels, reservoirs were nationalized and after 1918, the name of Asadullayevo settlement was officially marked on the map. Although a rapid growth was observed in the island until 1985, during the reconstruction period the oil reserves were liquidated there. Nevertheless, Asadullayev's memory lives today in the name of the settlement.

 

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