New project about the mining industry united St. Petersburg, the Urals and Siberia

On September 26, 2019, the Presidential Library, the Altai Regional Center and the Shishkov Altai Regional Research Library presented the new interregional historical project Mining and Metallurgical Industry in Russia, 18th c. – early 20th c., which comprises about 600 items: archival and museum documents, articles, monographs, photographs and maps, which illustrate the development of the mining industry in the Urals, Siberia and eastern Kazakhstan.

The following organizations took part in the presentation via videoconferencing: the National Library of the Altai Republic, the Library and Museum Center of Pavlovsky district, Altai Territory, the State Research Library of Krasnoyarsk Territory, the Fyodorov Kemerovo Regional Research Library, the Pushkin Tomsk Regional Research Library, the Domozhakov National Library of the Republic of Khakassia, the Novosibirsk State Regional Research Library, the Belinsky Sverdlovsk Regional Research Library and the Chelyabinsk Regional Research Library. The event was broadcast live on the Presidential Library’s Youtube channel.

The history of mining on the territory of modern Russia can be traced back to ancient times. Traces of mine workings can be found in the Black Sea regions, Altai, the Urals, in the lower reaches of the Volga River and other places. Foreign mining experts were invited to Russia in the 15th century during the reign of Ivan III. The Stoneworks Prikaz was established in 1584. New mineral deposits were discovered as Russia expanded eastwards. The epoch of the Petrine reforms in the early 18th century witnessed the appearance of the full-fledged national mining and metallurgical industry. In the 19th century the Russian Empire was the leader among the European states in cast iron and copper smelting, and in 1840 it became the country with the largest precious metal production in the world.

In the 18th century Altai became the main region of non-ferrous metallurgy in the country. On October 9 the Barnaul Copper Smelting Plant will mark 280 years since its foundation. The city of Barnaul - the capital of Altai Territory – appeared here. And this is not the only example when administrative and economic centers of the Urals and Siberia developed near mines or metallurgical enterprises.

Yelena Bezrukova,  Minister of Culture of Altai Territory, noted: “The interregional historical project Mining and Metallurgical Industry in Russia, 18th c. – early 20th c. spotlights the influence of the mining industry on the life of regions”.

“Our cooperation with the Presidential Library began in 2010”, said Tatyana Yegorova, one of the initiators of the project, Director of the Altai Regional Library. - And when the library housed the regional center in 2015, the scope of cooperation expanded even more. We watched the activities of our colleagues and our closest neighbors from Tomsk, Novosibirsk, Kemerovo, etc. We followed their work under the auspices of the Presidential Library. And only in 2018 we dared to offer our own project”.

The Presidential Library’s electronic collections feature a lot of publications on mining industry: A Reply of Verkhoturye Voivode Concerning the Arrival of Foreigner Ivan Yazverov for Ore Deposits Exploration and Construction of Ironworks (1700) , M. V. Lomonosov’s book on metallurgy (1763), books Geological Sketch of Povenetsky District of Olonets Governorate and Its Ore Deposits (1877) by A. A. Inostrantsev and The Malyi-Khingan Iron Ore District (1936) by M. N. Dobrokhotov.