Vladimir Vladimirovich Bogachev
Vladimir Vladimirovich Bogachev was a Russian and Soviet geologist and paleontologist, Doctor of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences, professor, and Honored Scientist of the Azerbaijan SSR.
Biography
Born 19 February 1881 in Novocherkassk into the family of mining engineer Vladimir Fyodorovich Bogachev. He was the eldest of seven children.He studied at the Novocherkassk Men's Gymnasium. He engaged in painting, and his works were exhibited by the Imperial Academy of Arts in 1900 at the Paris World's Fair.
In 1900, he enrolled at Kharkiv University's medical faculty but transferred in 1901 to Saint Petersburg Imperial University's physics and mathematics faculty, graduating in 1905. During his university years, he published 14 scientific papers.
From 1905 to 1911, he taught natural history at the Novocherkassk Gymnasium and worked as a specialist in hydrogeology and soil science for the regional agronomist of the Don Host Oblast.
From 1907, he was an assistant in the geology department at Yuryev University, and in 1910, he became a Privatdozent there.
In 1912, he moved to Tiflis but continued lecturing at Yuryev University. In Tiflis, he worked as a geologist for the Caucasian Mining District and as a professor at higher women's courses.
In 1917, he returned to Novocherkassk, where he served as a docent at the Don Polytechnic Institute, becoming a professor in 1920. Without defending a doctoral dissertation, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences in 1937.
From 1921, he was a professor at the Azerbaijan Polytechnic Institute and Azerbaijan University.
Starting in 1925, he conducted paleontological excavations and research at the Binagadi asphalt lake.
In 1940, he became head of the General Geology Department at Rostov State University following the sudden death of Professor N. A. Grigorovich-Berezovsky.
During the German occupation, he was in Rostov-on-Don, continuing to teach at Rostov University and participating in the reorganization of the Museum of the History of Don Cossacks in Novocherkassk.
— Bogachev wrote in the "Novocherkassk Bulletin" on 29 September 1942.
Repression
In 1943, he was arrested by the NKVD. He spent some time in Saratov Prison and was convicted by the military tribunal of the NKVD troops of Rostov Oblast on 5–6 June 1943 under Article 58, paragraph 1a, to 10 years of imprisonment followed by 5 years of disenfranchisement. From archival documents: "From 1944 to 1946, Bogachev worked in a special laboratory in Moscow; in the following seven years, he worked in a research laboratory in the camps of Ukhta and Vorkuta." He was released in 1953.Later years
After his release, he returned to the Don region.From 1956 to 1959, he worked at the Crimean Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, which was establishing the Institute of Mineral Resources in Simferopol.
From 1960, he lived in Baku, working at the Azerbaijan Scientific Research Institute for Oil Extraction.
He died on 11 December 1965 in Baku and was buried in Sumqayit.
Family
Brother — Georgy Vladimirovich Bogachev — mining engineer and hydrogeologist of the Caucasus and Central Asia.First wife — Olga Orovna Bogacheva — philologist, children:
- Alexey — entomologist, Institute of Zoology of the Ukrainian SSR Academy of Sciences, Kyiv.
- Anastasia — translator, physician.
- Dmitry — entomologist.
- Marina, physician.
Scientific Work
He studied the origin and evolution of freshwater fauna, the history of freshwater and brackish-water faunas of Eurasia, the North Caucasus, the Eastern Caucasus, Western Siberia, and Kazakhstan. He researched Cenozoic mollusks, describing over 500 species of Tertiary and Quaternary freshwater mollusks, and studied butterflies of the Don region, the Miocene of Novocherkassk, among other topics. He was the first researcher of the Binagadi Quaternary fauna site. Bogachev discovered many unknown species of extinct animals: a Miocene whale and dolphin, Pliocene dolphin, aurochs, gazelle, deer, and others.In 1912, he published a book in Yuryev titled Atlantis: Mythical Atlantis and Geological Atlantis. Soviet scientist Nikolai Feodosievich Zhirov called Bogachev the founder of Russian scientific atlantology.
At the request of Don Ataman P. N. Krasnov, Bogachev quickly wrote the book Essays on the Geography of the Great Don Host, published in 1919. Bogachev emphasized that "the borders of the Host had undergone historical transformations by the time of writing". The following year, the Bolsheviks completely abolished the Oblast of the Great Don Host as a political entity.