Alchevsky, Oleksii

Alchevsky, Oleksii [Алчевський, Олексій; Alčevs’kyj, Oleksij], b 1835 in Sumy, d 7 May 1901 in Saint Petersburg. Mining engineer, industrialist, banker, and philanthropist, husband of Khrystyna Alchevska, and father of the composer Hryhorii Alchevsky, the singer Ivan Alchevsky, and the poet Khrystia Alchevska. Alchevsky owned the Kharkiv Southern Russia Commercial Bank and financed a number of coal-mining and metallurgical firms in the Donets Basin, including the Donetsko-Yuriivskyi metallurgical plant in Yuriivka (later renamed Alchevsk in his honor), today the Alchevsk Metallurgical Complex. He financially supported numerous Ukrainian initiatives, such as a school for the deaf, the Kharkiv Women's Sunday School, and several village schools. Alchevsky committed suicide after being refused a government loan to save his bank and firms, which had gone into a slump following the Russian monetary reform of 1897.

[This article was updated in 2012.]