Switzerland Gotthard Louis Favre (b/w photo)

The Swiss engineer Louis Favre was born on 19 July 1879 after a heartbeat from the almost completed Gotthard tunnel, after an old woodcut. A native of Geneva, Favre made his way from a small craftsman to a building contractor. In the 1870s, Favre was the leading contractor in the construction of the Gotthard railway tunnel, then the longest railway tunnel in the world, and its completion was a technical masterpiece. The construction work lasted from 1871 to 1880. In addition to considerable technical and geological problems, Louis Favre had to fight with the financing bank. In 1875 there was a bloody strike of the Italian tunnel workers. The promised 8-year construction period was delayed by about 1 year, which ruined the Favre family financially. Louis Favre himself had already died of a heart attack a few months earlier during a control tour in the tunnel.