Boris Anastasyevich Kordemsky (May 23, 1907, Kiknur, Vyatka Governorate — March 29, 1999) was a Soviet and Russian mathematician, teaching methodologist, and popularizer of recreational mathematics, a Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences (1957), and an associate professor. A native of a territory that now forms part of Kirov Region, he spent most of his life working in Moscow. He is widely known as the author of the book "Mathematical Ingenuity" (*Matematicheskaya smekalka*), which has been translated into many languages of the world.[1]

Origins and Education

He was born into a family of elementary school teachers in the selo of Kiknur in Vyatka Governorate; according to other sources, his father was a priest, Anastasy Ivanovich Kordemsky.[1] After finishing secondary school in 1924, he worked as a teacher at a school for the barely literate. From 1926 to 1930 he studied in the mathematics department of the 2nd Moscow State University (now Moscow State Pedagogical University).[1]

Teaching and Scholarly Work

In 1931 he was sent to teach in the Kuzbass, and from 1932 he taught mathematics at Moscow School No. 353. With the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, he worked as an electrician at a defense plant; in January 1943 he was recalled from the plant and assigned to the Military Academy of Chemical Defense, where he taught for more than thirty years, including fifteen years as head of the Department of Higher Mathematics.[1] In 1957 he defended his Candidate's dissertation, "Extracurricular Ingenuity Problems as One Form of Developing Mathematical Initiative in Adolescents and Adults," and received the title of associate professor.[1] Alongside this, he taught at a number of other Moscow educational institutions, beginning in 1939.[2]

For more than thirty years he ran the "Entertaining Page" column in the journal *Matematika v shkole* (Mathematics in School), and he published in the journals *Kvant*, *Yuny tekhnik*, and *Nauka i zhizn*, as well as in the *Children's Encyclopedia* and the newspaper *Pionerskaya pravda*.[1] He was the author of more than 70 articles and books on recreational mathematics.[2] His works include "Essays on Mathematical Ingenuity Problems" (1958), "Mathematics Studies Chance" (1975), "Captivating Schoolchildren with Mathematics" (1981), "Great Lives in Mathematics" (1995), "The Amazing World of Numbers" (co-authored with A. A. Akhadov, 2nd ed. 1996), "Geometry Helps Arithmetic" (co-authored with A. I. Ostrovsky, 2nd ed. 1994), and "The Amazing Square" (co-authored with N. V. Rusalev, 2nd ed. 1994); he also prepared for publication the book "Mathematical Teasers" (*Matematicheskie zavlekalki*).[2]

"Mathematical Ingenuity"

Kordemsky's principal work was the book "Mathematical Ingenuity," addressed primarily to schoolchildren. The first edition appeared in 1954; by 1972, when the English translation was published, the book had gone through eight editions in Russian and had been translated into Ukrainian, Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian. Outside the USSR it was published in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Germany, France, China, Japan, and Korea. By 1994 the book had gone through ten editions.[1][2]

The Nizhny Novgorod Connection

Boris Kordemsky was born in Kiknur, a selo in Vyatka Governorate that is now part of Kirov Region and lies near the historical borders of the Nizhny Novgorod lands. It was his small homeland that shaped the beginning of his biography: he finished secondary school here and in 1924 began his teaching career.[1]

Sources

  1. litmir.club — Author: Kordemsky Boris Anastasyevich — 2 books — Read, Download — Litmir Electronic Library
  2. gufo.me — Kordemsky, Boris Anastasyevich — Pedagogical Terminology Dictionary
  3. labirint.ru — Author: Kordemsky Boris Anastasyevich — New Releases 2026 — Labirint Online Bookstore
  4. eac-ras.ru — Mathematical Library — EAC RAS
  5. tbclib.ru — Virtual Reference — Tula Library System
  6. chitaina.ru — Egerev Viktor Konstantinovich, Zaytsev Vladimir Valentinovich, Kordemsky Boris Anastasyevich