Joseph Kovachev (1839 - 1898)

Joseph Antonov Kovachev is a prominent Bulgarian scientist, educator, public and state figure, public figure, Mayor of Sofia, active member of the Bulgarian Literary Society. Born on January 14, 1839 in the Bulgarian town of Shtip (now Republic of Macedonia). Joseph Kovachev graduated from seminary in Belgrade, then the Kiev Theological Seminary. He returned to Bulgaria and until the Liberation is a teacher in Gabrovo, where he was interned in his home town on the orders of Midhat Pasha, Shtip and Prilep. For the first time he used the sonorous method and the class-classroom level learning method. In Shtip he created the first Bulgarian male pedagogical school. His book "school-pedagogy or methodological guide for teachers and managers of national schools" is the first Bulgarian pedagogy textbook. He has also written a number of other teaching aids and textbooks - "Primer on the visual and vocal method", "Guide for initial training in reading and writing in the sonorous method" and others. He was elected MP in the Constituent Assembly in 1879. After that he was elected chairman of the provincial council in Sofia. In 1880 he was elected deputy in the First Ordinary National Assembly Kyustendil district. His other occupations include Secretary of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (1880 - 1881), a member of the State Council (1882) and Mayor of Sofia (1886-1887). From 1888 to the end of his life Kovachev is a professor in pedagogy at the Higher School of Sofia (Sofia University today). He died on October 31, 1898 in Sofia. He and his wife Catherine Kovacheva bequeathed over BGN 1,200,000 lev for Bulgarian nation educational purposes. (Photo: bg.wikipedia.org)