Ocean Floating Safe Co. signed by Menotti Nanni - 1918 dated Autograph Stock Certificate - Inventor and Photographer

Stock. "Additional Clause" paper attached at upper left. Rare!

Menotti Nanni, a Chicago-based inventor and photographer, founded the Ocean Floating Safe Company in the early 20th century. The company’s mission was to safeguard valuable cargo during maritime disasters, particularly after the Titanic’s sinking and during World War I. Nanni’s invention, the “floating safe,” was a cylindrical steel chamber designed to remain watertight, secure, and buoyant. It was intended to keep valuables afloat even if the ship itself sank. Nanni personally demonstrated his invention, showcasing its safety capabilities during a notable 1918 event at Battery Park, New York City. He locked himself inside the device and was submerged in the harbor to prove its effectiveness.

The company entered the market during a time of heightened anxiety about ocean liner safety. Despite the high-stakes demonstrations, including a 1921 test in Baltimore where thousands witnessed Nanni emerge from the harbor, the invention faced technical challenges and mixed results. While the company’s certificates, featuring an ornate scene of a sinking ship, reflected the urgency of the era, the floating safe was part of a broader, creative, but sometimes impractical, push for maritime safety equipment during the 1920s. Nanni continued his inventing career into the 1930s, later focusing on duralumin safety lifeboats and submarines.

Menotti Nanni (1885–1973) was an Italian inventor based in Brooklyn, New York, who gained prominence in the early to mid-20th century for his innovative and often theatrical demonstrations of maritime safety technology. Nanni was born in Mercato Saraceno, Italy, and later immigrated to the United States.

Nanni is best known for designing “unsinkable” survival gear and specialized vessels, frequently employing himself as the test subject. In 1918, Nanni demonstrated an ocean-floating safe designed to safeguard valuables during shipwrecks. To demonstrate its safety, he secured himself within the device and submerged it in the water at Battery Park for a minute.

In the 1930s, in collaboration with his sons Martin and Nino, Nanni conceived a novel type of enclosed spherical lifeboat intended to be launched directly from a ship’s deck. In 1932, Nanni tested a specialized unsinkable cabin designed to float to the surface even in the event of a shipwreck. Nanni worked closely with his sons on his maritime projects. His career was documented through numerous press photographs capturing his public demonstrations in New York City.

Although his inventions received extensive coverage by news services such as Bain News Service, they are generally regarded today as curiosities of early 20th-century maritime innovation. 

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