Serving Science, the Fatherland, and the People
A copy of the article from sevosetia.ru — the original is no longer available at the source; the text and photos were recovered from a Wayback Machine archived copy.
2021 has been declared the Year of Science and Technology in our country. Now, more than ever, we need new scientific discoveries, developments, and technologies that will shape progress in many fields of science and engineering in the 21st century. Russian science has given the world many great names and discoveries.
A significant contribution to the development of domestic science was made by scientists born in Alagir and the Alagir gorge, among them Georgiy Mikhailovich Butaev, Georgiy Vasilyevich Khetagurov, Kazbek and Inal Savvich Butaev, Fatima Aslanbekovna Butaeva and her brother Devlet-Girey, Fatima Vasilyevna Khetagurova, Boris Alexandrovich Kaloev, Georgiy Kharitonovich Gabuev, Evdokia Mikhailovna Tsgoeva, and many others.
My story is about the Butaev family, whose members made a significant contribution to the development of domestic science, education, and urban planning. In the village of Alagir lived Mikhail Fyodorovich Butaev with his wife Ekaterina, née Aladzhikova. They had three children — a daughter, Tamara (born 25 June 1912), and two sons, Georgiy (born 1915) and Boris. Before the October Revolution of 1917, Mikhail Fyodorovich was invited to work as a personnel manager at the oil fields belonging to the Nobel oil magnates. The Butaev family moved to Baku.
TAMARA
The eldest daughter, Tamara, had settled on her choice of profession while still young: she decided to become an architect. After finishing secondary school, Tamara Butaeva enrolled in the architecture faculty of the Baku Polytechnic Institute. After graduating, she was assigned to North Ossetia, to a design institute, where she worked for more than 60 years.
Tamara Butaeva rose from a rank-and-file architect to chief engineer of the institute. Her beloved work was the meaning of her whole life. Before the Great Patriotic War, a house of culture and administrative buildings were built to Tamara Mikhailovna's designs in the settlement of Sadon in the Alagir district. She had great plans and ideas, but they were cut short by the outbreak of war. Only in the 1950s did Tamara Butaeva's designs begin to be realised. Built to her designs were: the North Ossetian Opera and Ballet Theatre (1956), the "Spartak" stadium (1960-1962), the "Kavkaz" hotel (1949), the main building of the Gorsky State Agricultural University, and the Vladikavkaz television centre with its 196-metre tower (1959). Also to her credit are the M. Yu. Lermontov Russian Drama Theatre in Grozny, a sanatorium complex in Kislovodsk, and a 16-storey building for the regional computing centre in Pyatigorsk.
Tamara Mikhailovna also devoted much energy and effort to public work. She was a board member, first as secretary and later as chair, of the North Ossetian branch of the Union of Architects of the RSFSR. In 1974 she was awarded the title "Honoured Architect of the RSFSR." For her fruitful creative work Tamara Mikhailovna was awarded the Order of the Badge of Honour. In the 1960s she was repeatedly elected a deputy of the Ordzhonikidze city council.
Over the years of her work at the design institute she trained many young specialists, passing on her rich experience. Her designs repeatedly won awards in competitions both within North Ossetia and beyond. On 1 January 1998 Tamara Mikhailovna passed away. In 2012 a memorial plaque (by sculptor Ruslan Dzhanaev) was installed at 79 Kotsoyev Street, where she had lived. But the most significant monuments to this talented architect are the buildings she designed, which remain landmarks not only of Vladikavkaz and the republic but of other cities across the North Caucasus.
BORIS
The youngest of the Butaev family was Boris. After graduating from the North Ossetian State Medical Institute and completing postgraduate study in Leningrad, he headed the Department of Pharmacology for a number of years, later becoming dean of the medical faculty of the North Ossetian State Medical Institute. Boris Butaev defended his candidate dissertation and became an associate professor. This talented scientist developed several new medications. For his unimpeachable honesty, his uncompromising nature, and his decency, he was held in great respect and esteem among his colleagues and students.
GEORGIY
The eldest son of the Butaevs, Georgiy, attended an evening school for working youth while working days at the oil fields. After finishing school, he enrolled at the M. Azizbekov Azerbaijan Industrial Institute, graduating in 1939. Georgiy always had a thirst for knowledge. After completing the institute he managed to enrol directly into the fourth year of the radio engineering faculty of the All-Union Correspondence Institute of Communications. Before the start of the Great Patriotic War, Georgiy Butaev had already worked in Tuapse and Grozny. He wanted to continue on to postgraduate study, but the war cut those plans short. Georgiy Mikhailovich held an exemption from military service, but despite this he volunteered for the front. Back at the institute he had completed a course of military training and had been given the rank of junior lieutenant.
Georgiy Butaev, commander of the 2nd battery of the 167th artillery regiment, received his baptism of fire in the spring of 1942, in heavy and bloody fighting near Kharkiv. In one unequal engagement with fascist tanks, the gunners of the 2nd battery under Georgiy Butaev's command managed to destroy four enemy tanks, but the commander himself was severely wounded. He was carried from the battlefield and sent to hospital.
After treatment, Georgiy Butaev returned to the ranks and took part in the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk. In August 1943, in fighting on the Kursk salient, Georgiy was severely wounded in the arm and leg by shrapnel from an exploding shell. Once again there was a hospital, after which he was discharged.
Returning to North Ossetia, despite his disability, he immediately went to work as an electrical engineer. In 1946 Georgiy Mikhailovich entered postgraduate study at the Institute of Automation and Telemechanics of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In 1953 he defended his candidate dissertation, and in 1985 his doctoral dissertation. Until 1965 he worked in Moscow, Kyiv, Kharkiv, and other cities of the Soviet Union. In 1964 the leadership of the North Caucasus Institute of Mining and Metallurgy asked G. Butaev to organise a Faculty of Electronic Engineering at the institute. Georgiy Mikhailovich responded immediately and moved to Vladikavkaz. In a comparatively short time, by November 1964, he had succeeded in opening the Faculty of Electronic Engineering. He became dean of the faculty, and later head of the new Department of Industrial Electronics. Georgiy Mikhailovich devoted much effort to working with gifted students, who later successfully defended their own candidate and doctoral dissertations. In 1980, on Georgiy Butaev's initiative, a Department of Electronic Devices was created, which he himself went on to head. Butaev authored 100 scientific works, including textbooks and teaching aids. He holds 25 inventor's certificates. Through his scientific work and his organisational activity, Georgiy Mikhailovich paved the way for the development of the electronics industry in the republic.
For his outstanding service in scientific and pedagogical work, and in training highly qualified engineers and research personnel, he was awarded the title "Honoured Worker of Science and Technology" of the North Ossetian ASSR and of the Russian Federation. Doctor of Technical Sciences, professor, and retired captain, Georgiy Butaev was awarded, for his service in war and peace, two Orders of the Red Star, the Order of
the Patriotic War, First Class, and many medals, including "For Valiant Labour" and the badge "Distinguished Worker of Higher Education." He was repeatedly awarded Certificates of Honour by the Supreme Soviet of the North Ossetian ASSR and by SKGMI. Georgiy Mikhailovich passed away on 29 December 1999.
ZOYA
Georgiy Mikhailovich's wife, Zoya Mironovna Salagaeva, was also a remarkable person in her own right. She worked for more than 60 years in the Department of Russian Literature at North Ossetian State University. Zoya Mironovna held a doctorate in philology, was a professor, and authored more than 100 scholarly works, including four monographs on the history of Ossetian literature, a two-volume academic edition of Ossetian folklore, "Iron Adamy Sfaldystad," "Kosta Khetagurov and Ossetian Folk Art," "From the Nuzal Inscription to the Novel: Problems in the Genesis and Formation of Ossetian Prose," and "Four Studies in Ossetian Prose." For her fruitful pedagogical and scholarly work she was honoured with many awards and titles, among them "Honoured Worker of Science and Technology" of North Ossetia-Alania and of the Russian Federation, as well as "Honoured Worker of Higher Education." Zoya Mironovna Salagaeva passed away in 2011.
FATIMA
Following in her parents' footsteps was Fatima Georgievna Butaeva, who works as a senior researcher at the North Ossetian Nature Reserve. She holds a candidate of biological sciences degree (as a zoologist) and is an associate professor. Fatima Georgievna combined scientific work with teaching. For more than 22 years, until 2017, she worked at North Ossetian State University in the Department of Human and Animal Anatomy and Physiology, and also taught a number of biology-related disciplines in the veterinary pharmacy and biology faculties. Fatima Georgievna is currently working on her doctoral dissertation.
All members of the Butaev family are shining representatives of the Ossetian intelligentsia. They gave much strength, energy, and health so that domestic science could take a step forward. The Butaevs dedicated their fruitful pedagogical and creative work, and their scholarly achievements, to science, to the Fatherland, and to their people.