Leonid Alekseyevich Kulik (

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

: Леонид Алексеевич Кулик; 19 August 1883 – 14 or 24 April 1942) was a Soviet

mineralogist Mineralogy is a subject of geology specializing in the scientific study of the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical (including optical) properties of minerals and mineralized artifacts. Specific studies within mineralogy include the proces ...

who is noted for his research into

meteorite A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the ...

s. He was born in

Dorpat Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after the Northern Europe, Northern Europe, European country's political and financial capital, Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 91,407 (as of 2021). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres ...

, (now Tartu,

Tartu County Tartu County ( et, Tartu maakond or ''Tartumaa'') is one of 15 counties of Estonia. It is located in eastern Estonia bordering Põlva County, Valga County, Viljandi County and Jõgeva County. The area of Tartu County is , which covers 6.9% of t ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

), and was educated at the

Imperial Forestry Institute Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imperial, Nebraska * Imperial, Pennsylvania * Imperial, Texas ...

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

and the

Kazan University Kazan (Volga region) Federal University (russian: Казанский (Приволжский) федеральный университет, tt-Cyrl, Казан (Идел буе) федераль университеты) is a public research uni ...

. He served in the Russian military during the

Russo-Japanese War The Russo-Japanese War ( ja, 日露戦争, Nichiro sensō, Japanese-Russian War; russian: Ру́сско-япóнская войнá, Rússko-yapónskaya voyná) was fought between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire during 1904 and 1 ...

, then spent some time in jail for revolutionary political activities. He then served with the Russian military during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Following the war he became an instructor, teaching mineralogy in

Tomsk Tomsk ( rus, Томск, p=tomsk, sty, Түң-тора) is a city and the administrative center of Tomsk Oblast in Russia, located on the Tom River. Population: Founded in 1604, Tomsk is one of the oldest cities in Siberia. The city is a not ...

. In 1920 he was offered a job at the Mineralogical Museum in St. Petersburg. In 1927, he led the first Soviet research expedition to investigate the

Tunguska event The Tunguska event (occasionally also called the Tunguska incident) was an approximately 12-megaton explosion that occurred near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in Yeniseysk Governorate (now Krasnoyarsk Krai), Russia, on the morning of June 30, ...

, the largest

impact event An impact event is a collision between astronomical objects causing measurable effects. Impact events have physical consequences and have been found to regularly occur in planetary systems, though the most frequent involve asteroids, comets or me ...

in recorded history, which had occurred on 30 June 1908. He made a reconnaissance trip to the region, accompanied by Nikolay Ivanovich Fedorov and others, and interviewed local witnesses. He circled the region where the trees had been felled and became convinced that they were all turned with their roots to the center. However he did not find any meteorite fragments from the impact. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

he again fought for his country, this time in a paramilitary militia. He was captured by the

German army The German Army (, "army") is the land component of the armed forces of Germany. The present-day German Army was founded in 1955 as part of the newly formed West German ''Bundeswehr'' together with the ''Marine'' (German Navy) and the ''Luftwaf ...

and died in a

prisoner of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of wa ...

camp of

typhus Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposure. ...

Honors

Asteroid An asteroid is a minor planet of the inner Solar System. Sizes and shapes of asteroids vary significantly, ranging from 1-meter rocks to a dwarf planet almost 1000 km in diameter; they are rocky, metallic or icy bodies with no atmosphere. ...

2794 Kulik is named for him. * The crater Kulik on the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

is named after him.

References

External links

Virtual Exploration Society: Leonid Kulik
at www.unmuseum.org
Шышанаў В. У пошуках «беларускага дзіва» // Культура. 2002. №14. 13-19 красавіка. С.14.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kulik, Leonid Alekseyevich 1883 births 1942 deaths Russian mineralogists Russian military personnel of the Russo-Japanese War Russian military personnel of World War I Soviet military personnel of World War II Soviet prisoners of war Saint-Petersburg State Forestry University alumni People from Tartu Deaths from typhus