Borzov Aleksandr Aleksandrovich
(29.07(10.08).1874–06.03.1939)

The famous Russian geographer, an outstanding teacher, a multilateral scientist.
Born and received secondary education in Voronezh. He was the son of a courtyard peasant and landowner Severtsov (brother of the famous explorer of Central Asia). At the cost of great efforts, the mother managed to give the “illegitimate” son a gymnasium education, and it was even harder for him to make his way to higher education. After graduating from the gymnasium, Borzov entered the natural department of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Moscow University, where he worked under the guidance of an outstanding scientist, Professor D.N. Anuchin. He quickly emerged among the few geography students with his scientific outlook and purposefulness. However, it was not without complications. For participation in student unrest, Borzov was expelled from the university and sent to the city of Aleksin under police supervision. He managed to pass state exams only in 1899.
After completing his studies in 1900, Borzov, who was in material need, entered the Rumyantsev Library as a registrar, where he worked for 35 years, having organized a department of geography and cartography, an information bureau, and at the end became the chief scientific consultant of the library. Borzov combined scientific work, service in the library with teaching in high school, and in all spheres of his work he achieved outstanding results. He compiled a brilliant, according to contemporaries, textbook "Pictures on the Geography of Russia". Unfortunately, only the first part was published; The second part, which included a description of the Caucasus, Central Asia and Siberia, was printed, but for some unknown reason, disappeared without a trace. According to Yu.M. Shokalsky "loss for our geography is unrewarding ...".
In 1912, Borzov passed his master's examinations, two years later he began giving lectures at Moscow University. Since 1918 he is a professor, and since 1923 the head of the department of geography of this university.
The contribution of Borzov to the study of the relief and geomorphology of the Russian Plain is great. He led expeditionary works in the Moscow region, the basin of the southern Bug, the southern Urals and other areas. He was first tasked with the systematic geomorphological survey of the territory of the USSR.
Borzov established a scientific school of geomorphology. He developed a series of visual aids on geography for high school. Together with D.N. Anuchin Borzov organized a research institute of geography at Moscow University and an educational geographic museum.
After the death of Borzov and shortly before his own Yu.M. Shokalsky, who knew Borzov well, wrote: “Alexander Alexandrovich did not leave us a great number of works, but the point is not arithmetic. What they have written always contains some new thought, a new observation - the result of his always active thought and ability to see in the phenomena that many passed by. This is the best proof of his talent. ”
He died in Moscow. He was buried at the Novodevichy cemetery. A stele of light gray, medium-grained granite with the image of an 8-pointed cross.
Bay and glacier on the Barents coast of the northern island of New Earth. In 1913, G.Ya. Sedov called the Bay the name of Cesarevich Alexei. Renamed in the 1920s.
The river on the Taimyr River to the south-west of the Teresa Klavenes Bay, a tributary of the Goltsovaya River.