#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. The city in the Arctic became the highlight of the excursion program for traveling along the Yenisey. In the late 1950s, Norilsk was included in guidebooks. Today it’s interesting to look through them: some have ceased to be attractions, and some have not come true at all. Here is a quote from such a collection published in 1969.
“The history of Norilsk probably began with the winter of 1942, when on Soviet Army Day, senior worker Nikolay Smirnov lit firewood at the bottom of a water jacket. This was the combine’s start-up. Two weeks later, the first ladle of molten metal was poured into the barrel of the first converter. On April 29, the nickel cathode was removed from the bath. And on May Day, an old monoplane took off from the Dudinka airfield, having 1100 kilograms of the first Norilsk nickel on board. A front awaited it, as it needed tanks and planes. Squadrons were removed from the front to send them to Norilsk for nickel.
These are the facts of history. What is the current state of Norilsk, the world’s northernmost industrial city? Here is everything northern on the globe: a theater and a television center, an industrial institute and a wide-screen cinema, multi-storey buildings and an indoor swimming pool, clinics and shops, hospitals and a mechanized laundry… Here is the northernmost state farm in the world, the Norilsk state farm, which supplies city residents with milk and vegetables. And this is on permafrost. This is both firmament and swamp at the same time. Digging a pit here is sometimes more difficult than in rocky soil; but permafrost can easily swallow a car, a house, a village…
An interesting document is a note by the polar explorer Sidorov On Means to Extricate the North of Russia From its Plight. The note was submitted to the “highest name” at the end of the last century. There was the Russian throne heir’s educator’s resolution, General Zinoviev: “Since in the North there is constant ice, arable farming is impossible and no other trades are unthinkable. Thus, in my and my friends’ opinion, it is necessary to remove the people from the North to the internal parts of the state, and you are busy doing the opposite and you explain about some Gulf Stream, which cannot exist in the North. Only crazy people can pursue such ideas”.
One can perceive this conclusion as a historical curiosity. You can look at it another way. Under the conditions of tsarist Russia, the very idea of encroaching on the North looked fantastic.
Majestic ensembles of streets and squares have been erected in Norilsk. Leninsky prospekt and Octyabrskaya square with the monument to Lenin make a particularly strong impression on guests. A local guide tells tourists:
“Our city is growing and expanding. A new theater is being built, designed to seat 1300 spectators. And next door they will build a multi-storey hotel, a palace of pioneers, a department store, a cinema, and a wedding palace. Sports lovers will receive a good gift – the house of physical education with an indoor hockey field, a gym, and an athletics arena. Many families of metallurgists, miners, and builders of Norilsk celebrate housewarming in comfortable houses”.
On Gornaya Street, tourists are shown a small old house number 23.
“This is our relic”, say the Norilsk residents. “The building housed the construction headquarters when the city was founded in the 1930s”.
What is especially surprising and pleasing is that everywhere there are beautiful buildings, elegant decoration, convenience in everything and, most importantly, an abundance of flowers: in canteens, schools, theaters and workshops. Flowers, flowers, flowers…
“Yes, this is typical for our city”, says the guide. “People try to arrange their lives in such a way that the seventieth parallel, the tundra, and the polar night are felt as little as possible. Therefore, the city is built up with houses that are beautiful on the outside and comfortable on the inside: with running water, refrigerators, and bathrooms. Winter botanical gardens, gyms and cinema halls are set up at schools. Every frail tree is nursed in the park, and fresh vegetables are obtained in greenhouses with the help of artificial daylight…”
In the History Spot’s previous publication, we told that the Norilsk thermal power plant’s whistle could be heard 50 kilometers from Norilsk.
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