Educational and scientific dimensions of agricultural mechanical science at Kyiv polytechnic institute (1898 - 1929): institutional transformations, personalities, achievements

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to highlight the main milestones of establishment, development and activity of academician P. M. Vasylenko Department of Agricultural Machines and System Engineering of National University of Bioresources and Nature Management of Ukraine during the first twenty years of its operation, initially a subdivision of Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (1898 – 1922), and then as a structural subdivision of Kyiv Agricultural Institute (1922 – 1929) through the prism of personalized achievements of lecturers and employees regarding the establishment and development of domestic agricultural engineering and testing systems of agricultural machinery for agricultural needs, expansion of archival searches of students and followers of the Department founder – Professor K. H. Schindler, and their creative achievements in the field of industry science and education. The Research Methodology. The article is based on general scientific – analysis, synthesis, classification and historical methods – problem-chronological, comparative and historical, retrospective. Chief focus was on the biographical method as a means of reconstructing the creative work of scholars who made a significant contribution to ensuring scientific and educational activities of the Department. The scientific novelty of the research consists in elucidating the formation process significance of one of the first departments of the educational institution in relation to its projected modern European future through the formation and representation of the best representatives' achievements of the time in the field of industry education and science, who deserve to be immortalized in the pantheons of the Ukrainian memory. The conclusions relate to the period of 1898 – 1929 in the history of the modern NUBiP of Ukraine in general and especially after K. H. Schindler was removed from the position as Professor at KPI, Dean of the Mechanical Department, Head of Kyiv Station for testing agricultural machines and tools and, of course, Head of Department in 1911. It is for the first time in the modern history of Ukraine that an attempt has been made to bring historical justice to the figure of Professor O. O. Khokhriakov as the head of the Department in 1911 – 1912 and to determine that after him, during the period of 1912 – 1915, the Department was initially headed by Professor P. R. Sliozkin and clarify that he had not been in charge since 1911, and from 1915 to 1924 – Professor L. P. Kramarenko was the head of the Department. In addition, to elucidate the previously unknown pages in the Department activity in the field of branch science from the end of 1924 to October of 1929, its Head – Professor P. F. Vovk. The focus is on the participation of employees of the Department of Mechanical Science and Mechanical Engineering at KPI in the establishment and activities of the leading creative associations, in particular The Kyiv Agronomic Society, which became the first and the only specialized scientific society during the imperial era in the history of Ukraine and the forerunner of the Agricultural Scientific (later – Scientific) Committee of Ukraine, which, in turn, through the Scientific Advisory Council at the National Research Council of the UkrSSR from May 22, 1931, in the form of All-Ukrainian Academy of Agricultural Sciences became the forerunner of modern National Academy of Agricultural Sciences of Ukraine. The lack of reliable archival documents made it impossible to reproduce a comprehensive and balanced contextual picture of the course of all events and facts with a full personalized content in the extracts for the sake of the future of one of the most effective and innovative areas of industry research of the second half of the 19th – the beginning of the 20th centuries – domestic agricultural engineering and testing of agricultural machinery for its needs.