page_title: Karl Wittgenstein
section_title: Early life and career
hierarchical_section_title: Karl Wittgenstein / Biography / Early life and career
caption_attribution_description: English: Side portrait of Karl Wittgenstein
context_page_description: Karl Otto Clemens Wittgenstein was a German-born Austrian steel tycoon. A friend of Andrew Carnegie, with whom he was often compared, at the end of the 19th century he controlled an effective monopoly on steel and iron resources within the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and had by the 1890s acquired one of the largest fortunes in the world. He was also the father of concert pianist Paul Wittgenstein, philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein and of philanthropist Margaret Stonborough-Wittgenstein.
context_section_description: Karl had resisted in his youth the classical teaching methods which were imposed upon the children of Viennese bourgeoisie. Karl ran away from home at the age of eleven and at the age of seventeen had been expelled from school for an essay he wrote in which he denied the "immortality of the soul". His father, Hermann, continued in his desire to educate his son by hiring private tutors to ensure Karl passed his exams but Karl, again, ran away, staying in Vienna for a couple of months before fleeing to New York with little money and his violin. Monk writes, "He managed nevertheless to maintain himself for over two years by working as a waiter, a saloon musician, a bartender and a teacher (of the violin, the horn, mathematics, German and anything else he could think of)." He returned to Vienna in 1867 and pursued his interest in engineering. After a year of education and an apprenticeship, Karl took the job of a draughtsman on the construction of a rolling mill in Bohemia, a post offered to him by Paul Kupelwieser, the brother of his brother-in-law. Karl rapidly rose through the company eventually taking over Kupelweiser as Managing Director within the space of five years. By the end of the nineteenth century, Karl Wittgenstein had become one of the wealthiest men in Europe and a leading figure in the iron and steel industry. In 1898, he retired from his posts and transferred much of his wealth to foreign equities, principally in the United States which protected the Wittgenstein family from the inflation in Vienna after the first world war.
caption: Side portrait of Karl Wittgenstein, 1910
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