Professor of mathematics N.N. Parfentiev and the reorganization of Kazan University in the early decades of Soviet rule

This article continues a series of the authors’ previous publications dedicated to Nikolai Nikolaevich Parfentiev, a prominent professor of mathematics at Kazan University. Here, his work as a dean of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics in the post-revolutionary years is explored. His important role in the organization of the educational and research processes during the early decades of the Soviet era is demonstrated, as well as his initiatives to sustain and further advance Kazan University’s school of mathematics, celebrate the centennial of the discovery of non-Euclidean geometry by N.I. Lobachevsky, and establish the Research Institute for Mathematics and Mechanics. Some thoughts on the scholar’s research trip abroad in 1928 are provided. Using archival documents, published sources, and the memoirs of contemporaries, N.N. Parfentiev’s diverse contributions to the development of Soviet higher education in physics and mathematics are analyzed. Photographs from the Kazan University History Museum and T.Yu. Mirakova’s family archive are included.

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2. Laptev B.L. Nikolai Nikolaevich Parfentiev. In: Rasskazy o kazanskikh uchenykh [Stories about Kazan Scholars]. Kazan, Tatar. Kn. Izd., 1983, pp. 20–26. (In Russian)

3. Al’pin Yu.A., Ezhova S.A. “Our first steps were hard...”: N.N. Parfentiev and the establishment of the Workers’ Faculty at Kazan University (dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the Workers’ Faculty). Gasyrlar Avazy – Ekho Vekov, 2019, no. 4, pp. 144–155. (In Russian)

4. Ezhova S.A., Al’pin Yu.A. Professor of mathematics N.N. Parfentiev: A member of Russia’s intelligentsia during the transformative period between the epochs. Uchenye Zapiski Kazanskogo Universiteta. Seriya Gumanitarnye Nauki, 2022, vol. 164, no. 6, pp. 51–68. doi: 10.26907/2541-7738.2022.6.51-68 (In Russian)

5. Khabibrakhmanova O.A. Collision with Soviet reality: Adaptive strategies of N.N. Parfentiev, Professor of Mathematics at Kazan University. Vestnik Udmurtskogo Universiteta. Seriya Istoriya i Filologiya, 2019, vol. 29, no. 4, pp. 669–673. (In Russian)

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