Igor Ivanovich . . . . The A to Z of Slightly Strange Unknown Victorian Inventors and Explorers

Igor Ivanovich

Having learnt his trade as a set builder in the Bolshoi Ballet Igor Ivanovich was an expert at making a swan out of a roll of gaffer tape some old boxes and an old bicycle dragged out of the canal. And he probably would have never become an inventor had it not been for his fool hardy attempt at smuggling a set of the Barometric Bellows past the Russian customs after a tour by the Bolshoi Ballet in Britain. But he was forced to find new employment and adapted his many skills to producing sophisticated mechanical devices that appealed to the wealthy elite of Europe. As he often said . . . I hate the common man with his flat cap, football and meat pies laughing and singing in their ale houses. Yes sadly Igor Ivanovich was a bit of an elitist snob.

But he could make wonderful mechanical birds and insects which became known as  Ivanovich Intrigues and although not a practical invention they were much admired by Elizabeth Romanova who kept a large collection of Ivanovich Intrigues at her palace in Russia. For a time he was quite a celebrity, but one day as he walked to his workshop he took a short cut through one of the poorer parts of Saint Petersburg. Where he was recognized by a group of young street urchins who were keen to see one of his mechanical wonders.  However Igor Ivanovich looked at the children and stated that no device of his should ever to shown to horrid small street urchins and he demanded that they hid their heads in shame.  Unfortunately a large crowd of football supports eating meat pies and singing and laughing had just left the local ale house and overheard Igor Ivanovich’s words and it did not go down well.  When Igor Ivanovich recovered consciousness he found himself conscripted into the Russian navy for twenty five years. Sadly he never recovered from the hardship of navy life and spent his last few years locked in the Moscow State Lunatic Asylum (not one of the more enlightened hospitals of the day)  with an old bicycle wheel on his head convinced he was a penguin…………