Nikolay Aleksandrovich Bugrov (1839–1911) — the foremost Nizhny Novgorod merchant, grain industrialist, financier, property owner, patron of the arts, and philanthropist, who donated 45% of his net income to charitable causes.
For all of that, the merchant Bugrov Was a sharp and nimble operator,— Though evenings found him flush and restless, He never played the spendthrift, reckless, He knew his income was so vast No whim of his could make it pass, No fancy could undo his store, But whence did all that income pour? From those cramped corners, nooks, and dens Where people lived on sweat and labor. That's where the merchant cast his nets And hunted like a seasoned neighbor! From there he raked his profits in, From there those copper coins would spin Into the merchant's quiet backwaters And turn to millions — not of coppers But rubles now, the solid kind, The merchant's true and trusted find. The poor folk, living far from heaven, Enriched this hulking merchant-lord, Turning their money into power — Into another's strength, not their own.
Demyan Bedny
"A millionaire, a major grain trader, owner of steam mills, a dozen steamships, a flotilla of barges, and vast forests — N. A. Bugrov played the role of an appanage prince in Nizhny Novgorod and across the Nizhny Novgorod Governorate. A Old Believer of the 'priestless' persuasion, he built out in an open field, a mile from Nizhny Novgorod, a large cemetery enclosed by a high brick wall, with a church and a 'skete' within it — while peasant men were sentenced to a year in prison under Article 103 of the Penal Code simply for holding secret prayer meetings in their own cottages. In the village of Popovka, Bugrov erected an enormous building — an almshouse for Old Believers — and it was widely known that this almshouse was a breeding ground for sectarian 'scripturalists.' He openly supported secret sectarian sketes in the forests of the Kerzhenets and on the Irgiz, and was in general not only an active defender of sectarianism but a firm pillar upon which the 'ancient piety' of the Volga Region, the Urals foothills, and even parts of Siberia rested. The head of the state church, the nihilist and cynic Konstantin Pobedonostsev, wrote — in 1901, it seems — a report to the Tsar on Bugrov's hostile, anti-church activities, yet this did nothing to stop the millionaire from stubbornly going his own way. He addressed the volatile Governor Nikolai Baranov with the familiar 'ty,' and I saw him in '96, at the All-Russia Exhibition, slap Witte jovially on the belly and, stamping his foot, shout at the Minister of the Imperial Court, Vorontsov. He was a generous philanthropist: he built a fine flophouse in Nizhny Novgorod, an enormous building with 300 apartments for widows and orphans, fitted it out with a splendidly equipped school, arranged the city's water supply, built and donated to the city a building for the city duma, gave the zemstvo gifts of timber for rural schools, and in general spared no money for works of 'charity.'"
As early as the 1880s, the Bugrovs — father Aleksandr Petrovich and son Nikolay Aleksandrovich — built at their own expense a flophouse accommodating 840 people, a Widows' Home for 160 widows with children, and also contributed to the construction of the city's water supply. In memory of this, a "Benefactors' Fountain" was erected on Sofronovskaya Square bearing the inscription: "This fountain was built in memory of the honorary citizens of the city of Nizhny Novgorod: F. A., A. A., and N. A. Blinov, A. P. and N. A. Bugrov, and U. S. Kurbatov, whose donations made it possible for the city to construct a water supply in 1880, on the condition that the residents of Nizhny Novgorod would use it free of charge forever."
The prudent N. A. Bugrov did not make a habit of donating cash to charity — his charitable resources came instead from rental income and interest on a 'perpetual' deposit. The houses and estates belonging to Bugrov in Nizhny Novgorod served not only his personal interests. Income from property that he donated to the city was directed toward aid for the destitute and the needy. In 1884, for instance, Bugrov donated to the city an estate on Gruzinskaya Street and a capital sum of 40,000 rubles for the construction of a public building that would yield an annual income of no less than 2,000 rubles. This money was designated "annually, in perpetuity, as relief for fire victims of Semenovsky Uyezd."
Bugrov applied the same principle when financing the famous Widows' Home, opened in Nizhny Novgorod in 1887. In addition to interest on a substantial capital sum (65,000 rubles) held at the Nikolaevsky Bank, the shelter's budget was supplemented by income (2,000 rubles per year) generated by two of Bugrov's houses on Alekseevskaya Street and Gruzinskiy Lane, which the merchant donated to the city. Upon a submission by Governor Nikolai Baranov dated January 30, 1888, an Imperial High Permission was granted to name the Widows' Home the "Nizhny Novgorod City Public Widows' Home in the Name of the Blinovs and the Bugrovs."
Bugrov's assistance to the famine-stricken during the dire years of 1891–1892 was striking in its scale and sincerity, especially against the backdrop of the generally perfunctory response from others. He agreed to sell the Provincial Food Commission all of his purchased grain at cost price — 1 ruble 28 kopecks per pood — forgoing all profit entirely (at the time, Nizhny Novgorod landowners were holding grain prices at 1 ruble 60 kopecks).
The Bugrovs paid particular attention to the education of gifted children. Among other initiatives, a scholarship was established in the town of Semyonov for "a peasant boy of outstanding ability" — the first recipient was a pupil from the village of Khakhaly, Nikolay Vorobyov, in 1912.*
"'Give me power,' he said, narrowing his good eye to the thinness of a knife blade, 'and I would stir up the whole nation — the Germans and the English would be astonished! I would give medals and decorations for work — to joiners, machinists, working men, men with black hands. Succeed at your trade — there's your honor and glory! Keep on competing. And if, along the way, you've stepped on someone's head — never mind! We don't live in a desert; you can't get through without giving someone a shove! When we've raised up all the land and set it to work — then there'll be more room to breathe. Our people are good; with such a people you could overturn mountains, plow up the Caucasus. Only one thing must be remembered: you would not, in your son's hour of carnal temptation, lead him yourself to a loose woman — would you? Well, in the same way you cannot plunge the people headfirst into our commotion straightaway — they will choke, they will suffocate in our acrid smoke! You must go carefully.'» Maxim Gorky, "N. A. Bugrov"