ALIMKHAN YERMEKOV
He was born in Temirshin Volost of Karkaraly Uezd of Semipalatinsk region (now Aktogay municipality, Karaganda region). He graduated from Karkaraly tree-form municipal academy in 1905. The same year he entered the Semipalatinsk Masculine Gymnasium and graduated in 1912. Then he entered Tomsk Technological Institute where he met with G.N. Potanin.
During the October Revolution in 1917 he was a fifth-year student but he had to interrupt his study because of these events. In 1917 the All-Kazakh Congress of Alash Party held in Orenburg. The government of Alash-Orda headed by Alikhan Bukeykhanov was elected at the congress. Alikhan Yermekov entered the government along with other representatives of advanced national intelligentsia.
Alash-Orda movement has considered as a counter-revolutionary one for many years whereas his heads suffered persecutions and repressions as enemies of the nation. In 1920 A. Yermekov being the member of the Central Executive Committee of Kazakh SSR was sent to Moscow where at the session headed by V.I. Lenin he made a report on the state of Kazakh people. During the process of a long discussion he achieved resumption of very important territories to Kazakhstan which earlier belonged to Russia. Among them are Korostylev Steppes, Akmola and Semipalatinsk regions including the north coast of the Caspian Sea.
Nowadays these territories have a significant value: the capital of the Republic - Astana city is now in Akmola region.
In 1920 A. Yermekov became chairman of the Board on Region Management under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.
In 1921 he opened a two-stage school and teaching academy in Karkaralinsk. In 1925 he was invited to Semipalatinsk city and was elected as chairman of the State Planning of Kazakhstan in Orenburg. Since 1926 he as one of the high qualified experts he engaged in the work of Tashkent universities and then in Almaty universities. He worked in the Kazakh Teaching University, Almaty Animal Health Institute.
In 1935 he was received the rank of professor of mathematics and theoretical mechanics by the State Commission for Academic Degrees and Titles of the USSR.
The first Kazakh mathematician, professor, author of the textbook on high mathematics in Kazakh language, scholar of a number of European languages he was the sample of the man of great erudition. In 1932-1936 he developed and published mathematician terminology in Kazakh language for technical universities - the first textbook of this discipline in Kazakh language.
In autumn 1937 he leaved for Moscow and was appointed as the holder of the chair of mathematics in Kuibyshev Plan Institute where he worked till 1938. The same year he was arrested and convicted for ten years. He was in prison till 1947. In 1948 he was repeatedly arrested for 10 years. This was the third wave of arrests.
In 1955 he was released and moved to Karaganda city. Since 1955 he worked in Karaganda Polytechnic University. In 1958 he reached retirement.
The first Kazakh professor of mathematics who made a significant contribution to the development of Kazakhstan was completely rehabilitated on March, 7, 1955.
Some of the streets in Karagnda and Karkaraly, specialized House of Books, secondary school Nr. 131 in Agadyr were given his name. A monument in honor of active leaders of Alash-Orda as A. Bukeikhanov, A. Yermekov and Zh. Akbayev was opened in 1998 in Aktogay.
Source: Kazakhstan, National Encyclopedia, Volume 2.