Gurevich, Mikhail Iosifovich

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GUREVICH, MIKHAIL IOSIFOVICH

GUREVICH, MIKHAIL IOSIFOVICH (1893–1976), Soviet aviation constructor. Gurevich was born in 1893 in the village of Rubanshchina which is in today's Kursk district, Russia. He graduated from the airplane construction faculty of the Kharkov Technological Institute in 1925. In 1929 he began working in the aviation industry and from 1938 to 1957 held the rank of deputy chief constructor and from 1957–1964 chief constructor. He received the degree of doctor of technological sciences in 1964. Together with Ar. I. Mikoyan in 1940 he planned and built the high-speed fighter plane the MiG-1 (the name being an abbreviation of Mikoyan and Gurevich). After being upgraded, as the MiG-3, this plane was widely employed during World War ii. After the war, the same duo designed the first Soviet supersonic jet fighters (also part of the MiG series). Gurevich was awarded the order of the U.S.S.R., the Stalin Prize (in 1941, 1947, 1948, and 1953), and the Lenin Prize (in 1962). He was designated a Hero of Socialist Labor in 1957.

[The Shorter Jewish Encylopaedia in Russian]