Chemists’ chemist on vodka

Misha Lemeshko writes:

On the 31-st of January 1865 the author of the periodic table of elements Dmitri Mendeleev defended the doctoral dissertation “On the Combinations of Water with Alcohol”.

People often say that in this piece Mendeleev proved that the solubility is the best for 40% of alcohol and 60% of water, and thereby invented vodka as we know it. Unfortunately, that’s nothing but an urban legend: Russians were drinking vodka long before Mendeleev was even born.