With a particular pleasure I fulfill the wish of the Council of the Mining Institute to share my memories of I.P. Dolbnya. It is not enough to say that I.P. was a talented, skillful teacher who achieved amazing results; he was an exceptional teacher, a teacher-artist who had perfectly mastered the secrets of his art. He not only knew how to ignite in the cadets a lively, exciting interest in mathematics, but he managed to awaken a love for it even among the irreconcilable enemies of this “royal” science.