#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. After graduating from the university in 1940, Iyevlev was sent to the Severonickel (Eng.: North nickel) plant in Monchegorsk to launch and master the electrolytic nickel’s industrial production. Severonickel was evacuated in the Second World War’s beginning, and Ivan Iyevlev came to Norilsk with it.
Iyevlev headed the Severonickel’s electrolytic workshop, he took up the same work in Norilsk. He was appointed the electrolytic workshop’s head of the Small metallurgical plant and then of the Large metallurgical plant which provided the country with strategic raw material – nickel during the war years.
On April 29, 1942, the Norilsk Combine’s end product, electrolytic nickel was first produced at the Small metallurgical plant. Ivan Iyevlev pulled out the first nickel cathode from the bath, it was cut into plates as a keepsake. Later Iyevlev handed over his plate to the city museum. So he became the first person to hold a pure Norilsk nickel plate in his hands.
Ivan Iyevlev even developed a peculiar tradition associated with his creation – northern nickel. On April 29, 1943, exactly one year after the first electrolytic nickel obtained at the Small metallurgical plant, he received the first cathode nickel at the Large metallurgical plant.
Iyevlev ended the Norilsk period as a deputy chief engineer – chief metallurgist. In the difficult post-war period, he was directly involved in the launch and capacities’ development of the Nickel, Copper, Cobalt and Coke chemical plants, as well as the precious metal concentrates, sulfuric acid, chlorine and alkali bisulfate production’s workshops.
Iyevlev was taken to Moscow, to the Main Directorate of the Mining and Metallurgical Industry in 1950. There he received a state award: for the development and implementation of new methods for producing metals at the Combine.
In the History Spot photo project previous publication, we told about the so-called 17th quarter.
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Text: Svetlana Ferapontova, Photo: Nornickel Polar Division archive
