Golden Names of Russia

Despite the fact that chemistry begins to be studied in the eighth grade and is indispensable in dozens of industries that are crucial for the economy, if an ordinary Russian is asked to name the names of great Russian chemists, the vast majority will limit themselves to Lomonosov and Mendeleev. Only a small part would add a third name - Academician Nikolai Kurnakov.

Russia is often referred to as a raw material country, giving this concept a negative meaning. They say that the subsoil is rich in minerals, but there are problems with value chains.

The Arctic, its harsh nature and complex organizational and technical conditions have always attracted men. To work at drifting stations with the risk of being in icy water at any moment, to drive worn-out all-terrain vehicles in a snowstorm to the next survey, to drill wells in the ice… However, there is a woman’s name in the history of the Arctic, which is firmly connected with the development of polar lands.

The number of people who left Russia after the Civil War of 1917 reaches 2.5 million. For the most part, they were military, scientists, doctors, teachers, engineers, in general, intellectuals - creative, humanitarian and technical. A year later, the Soviet authorities faced a personnel famine and announced an amnesty for ”persons who had participated as ordinary soldiers in White Guard organizations.” All those who had been ”deceived or forcibly drawn into the struggle against Soviet power” were forgiven. The state needed educated people capable of raising the ruined industry.

The railroad complex in Russia is one of the largest in the world. It ranks second in terms of total track length, second only to the USA. But 200 years ago the issue of creating a network of cast-iron roads in the country caused heated debates, and along with supporters there were those who argued that in our climate their construction was impossible and that the cost would significantly exceed the expected return.

The discovery of the largest field in Russia and the seventh largest in the world, called Samotlor, was a resounding victory for Russian geologists and drillers in 1965. At that time, few believed in the prospects of an oil deposit located under a huge lake, surrounded for many kilometres by impassable swamps.

Today, business coaches often hear the ”cautionary tale of the life of Parkes Cadman”, who lived at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. A boy from a poor family, from the age of 11 he was forced to work in a mine as a ”ponyboy” - driving a coal wagon. At the unloading point he always kept a book and for the standard 120 seconds while the cart was being unloaded he managed to read a page or two. In 10 years the young man managed to devour more than a thousand books, as he was convinced that ”only education can get him out of the mine”.

In 1949, the investigation of a large group of geologists, called the ”Krasnoyarsk Case”, resounded throughout the USSR. Twenty-seven people, including 4 academicians and corresponding members of the USSR Academy of Sciences and 10 professors, doctors of geological and mineralogical sciences, were put under investigation. The main accused was Joseph Grigoriev, who, according to the investigation, ”maliciously hid valuable mineral deposits from the Soviet state and deliberately directed research work along a false path”.

His name was known and treated with great reverence by the heads of the largest mining and processing and metallurgical plants in the country, rectors of the relevant universities, and representatives of the academic community. And how not to know - machines of his design work today in at least 40 countries of the world. However, most often the scientist was called not ”Mr Weisberg”, but ”Mr Mekhanobr”. Every family has its own legends, which are passed on from generation to generation. At the Weisbergs such a favourite legend was the following.

The Kalashnikov assault rifle is widely known throughout the world - in a sense, it has become one of Russia’s symbols, along with bears, black caviar and oil. The most widespread small arms in service in one hundred and six countries are included in the Guinness Book of Records: more than 100 million units have been produced to date. The inventor himself was greeted like a film star during his visits to various countries. But who was the man who built one of the largest Russian arms factories that gave the world not only the AK, but also the Mosin rifle?