A valuable legacy

Enrico Mattei, Eni’s founder, was a key figure in the history of post-war Italy. His work to develop the country and get its economy back on an even keel had an impact that can still be felt today. A talent for business strategy, loyalty, closeness to his family and political commitment were all fundamental to Mattei achieving his dream. He used the resources of the present to build a new future – with the goal of creating a national energy company. He was also a pioneering figure in the cultural arena: in 1958, he founded the Scuola Mattei and promoted an experimental form of research in Eni’s laboratories in San Donato Milanese. As well as his great talent for business, Mattei also nurtured a genuine passion for art and culture. This led him to entrust poet Attillio Bertolucci with the creation of Gatto Selvatico (‘Wild Cat’) magazine. 

The biography: childhood and the quest for independence

Enrico Mattei was born on 29 April 1906 in Acqualagna, in the province of Pesaro, to Antonio Mattei and Angela Galvani. In 1919, his father was promoted from sergeant to marshal in the caribinieri (police), which took the family to Matelica, in the province of Macerata. After elementary school, Enrico attended a technical middle school in Vasto. Financial difficulties within the family and the strict discipline imposed by his father forced him to seek his independence early. His father found him a job at the Scuriatti bed factory as painter, then, in 1923, he was taken on as an apprentice at the Fiore tannery. Mattei’s rise within the company was rapid: first as a labourer, then as a laboratory assistant. At just 20 years old, he was promoted to laboratory head. The higher salary enabled him to help his family and, in 1926, he opened a fabric shop for his mother. In 1927, after military service, he returned to Matelica and became owner of the tannery’s main supplier. Soon, however, the business began to feel the effects of a general economic crisis and it went into decline; in 1929, the tannery closed and Mattei moved to Milan where he set up his first factory with his sister and brother – emulsifying oils for the tanning and textile industries. Thanks to the technical skills he had acquired over the years and his tenacity, in 1934 he founded the Industria Chimica Lombarda, with a factory in Via Tartini, in the industrial suburbs of Milan.

Organisational skills useful for a company and society

In 1936, Enrico Mattei married Greta Paulas, completed an accountancy qualification and enrolled at the Catholic University. In May 1943, he met Giuseppe Spataro, a member of the Christian Democrats, who introduced him to the Milanese leaders of the new party. This brought him into anti-Fascist circles in Milan and, after the fall of Fascism, on 25 July 1943, he joined Marcello Boldrini, an economist at the Catholic University, in the active partisan groups operating in the mountains around Matelica. When he returned to Milan he re-established contact with the local Christian Democratic Party, which in light of his organisational and military skills nominated him commander of the Volunteers for Freedom Corps. This was the first grouping of partisan forces in the Second World War to be recognized by both the Italian Government and the Allies. 1944 saw the creation of a military command for the north of Italy of the National Liberation Committee, of which Mattei was a representative of the Christian Democrats.

An enlightened strategy for a national energy company

In the troubled days following the end of the civil war in Italy, Mattei was appointed to liquidate and oversee the substantial privatization of the Italian state-owned company Agip – which had been established in 1926 to develop the country’s oil industry. Mattei took a different route to achieve a goal that he considered fundamental: to guarantee Italy a national energy company, able to serve the needs of households and developing small and medium-sized enterprises at lower prices than those of the international oligopolies. He doubled the drilling of wells, enhanced mineral exploration in the Po Valley and made the necessary alliances within the government and the major political parties to support him in realizing his dream. Success came in 1953 with the establishment of Eni – after long and tortuous negotiations that had begun in 1947 between those committed to private initiative and those in favor of strong involvement of the state in the economy. Mattei successfully managed to affirm the strategic role of energy for economic development and inspire confidence in the aim of Italian energy independence. He built an international network that would become one of the strengths that Eni could offer in support of Italy’s diplomatic efforts abroad. Indeed, he was one of the first to cultivate a frontier spirit and show respect for different cultures. On 27 October 1962, on a flight from Catania to Milan, his plane crashed near Bascapè, in the province of Pavia, claiming the lives of Mattei, pilot Irnerio Bertuzzi and the American journalist William McHale.