Education
In 1924 graduated with honors from Kharkiv Technological Institute with a Major in Internal Combustion Engines.
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Konstantin Chelpan
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Head of the Engineering Design Bureau of the Kharkiv Locomotive Factory, chief designer of the T-34 tank engine. Politically repressed and executed under a mass persecution ordered by Joseph Stalin. Politically rehabilitated after death.
Born on May 27, 1899 in Cherdakly, Yekaterinoslav Governorate, Russian Empire (now Kremenivka, Donetsk People"s Republic, Novorossiya), to Fyodor Myhailovich Chelpan and Elizaveta Khalangot.
Both parents were Greeks. After graduating from Mariupol Realschule in 1919, took part in the Russian Civil War.
From 1924 to 1937 worked at the Kharkiv Locomotive Factory as a Designer, Head of the Diesel Department, Lead Designer, and Head of the Engineering Design Bureau. In 1928-1929 had practical training in Germany, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Konstantin Chelpan was the head designer of the famous T-34 tank diesel engine V-2, for which he was awarded the Order of Lenin.
The engine consisted of lightweight aluminum alloy, and was the first case of a diesel engine being used in a tank, which made it a groundbreaking weapon.
From 1927 was a senior lecturer at Kharkiv Technological Institute. Konstantin Chelpan was arrested on December 15, 1937 during the first days of Greek Operation of People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs. He was charged with leading a Greek nationalist counter-revolutionary organization, as well as consipring to sabotage the Kharkiv Locomotive Factory. After being interrogated and tortured he confessed to being a spy.
On February 4, 1938 he was sentenced to execution by shooting.
The sentence was carried out in Kharkiv prison on March 10, 1938 and covered up. On August 6, 1956, Konstantin Chelpan was rehabilitated by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics. However only in 1988 his true cause of death was revealed.
In 1994 one of the streets in the village of Cherdakly was named after Konstantin Chelpan. In 2000 a book entitled Life story of famous Ukrainian Greeks.
The case of Konstantin Chelpan by G. Zakharova was published.
In 2001 a commemorative plaque was placed on the house, where Konstantin Chelpan had spent his last years.
Achievements
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Born
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Died
March 10, 1938 (aged 38) -
Nationality
Russian Empire