Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski Bench

The Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski Bench is a bronze monument unveiled on 10 June 2022 on the square named after him in the Turzyn district of Szczecin. According to the Wikipedia entry, it is the first monument to this inventor in the world.

Who he was

Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski was born in 1862 in Gatchina near St Petersburg, and came from a Polish noble family. As an electrical engineer, in 1888 he constructed a three-phase alternating-current generator, and in 1889 a three-phase induction motor with a squirrel-cage rotor. He is regarded as a pioneer of three-phase current technology.

Why a monument in Szczecin

In 2001 the City Council gave his name to the square, and in September 2001 a pink granite boulder with a commemorative plaque was unveiled there. More than 20 years later the Association of Polish Electrical Engineers, together with the Polish Section of the IEEE, applied for a new monument next to the boulder. The sculpture was made by Prof. Marian Molenda, who used three photographs of the inventor.

What it looks like

The monument weighs about 400 kg and shows a life-size figure. Doliwo-Dobrowolski sits on a bench with one leg crossed, looks towards the building of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of the West Pomeranian University of Technology (ZUT), holds a cowboy hat in his left hand and in his right a sheet with the most important patents concerning electrical machines. Sponsors' logos are placed on the back of the bench.

Practical information

• Location: Michał Doliwo-Dobrowolski Square in Turzyn, between Sikorskiego and Bema Streets and Bohaterów Warszawy Avenue.
• The monument stands in an open space. Not far away, about a kilometre from here, is the Szczecin Central Cemetery.