Vladivostok

For a long time the Russian government was looking for a stronghold in the Far East; Okhotsk, Ayan, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, and Nikolaevsk-on-Amur played this role in turn. By the middle of the 19th century, the search for an outpost reached a dead end: none of the ports met the necessary requirement: to have a convenient and protected harbor, close to the trade routes. The Governor-General of Eastern Siberia Nikolay Muravyov-Amursky signed the Treaty of Aigun, began active exploration of the Amur region, and later, as a result of signing the Treaties of Tianjin and Beijing, to Russia were annexed, including the territory of modern Vladivostok. The name Vladivostok itself appeared in the middle of 1859, was used in newspaper articles and denoted the bay. June 20 (July 2) 1860 transport Siberian Flotilla "Manzhur" under the command of Lieutenant-Captain Alexei Karlovich Shefner delivered the military unit to the Golden Horn Bay to establish a military post, which is now officially called Vladivostok.

The port can be considered the best of all. It resembles Olga in many ways, but only smaller, cozier, but warmer and more cheerful. However, the same oaks around, the same picturesque mountains. In lowlands rivers murmur; there are a lot of springs in the banks. Our post the other day, with its white tents, looks good in the group of not yet cut down and just cleared oak trees..

- The first days of the port in the description of the ethnographer Sergei Maximov.

October 31 (November 12) 1861 the first civilian settler, merchant Yakov Lazarevich Semenov, arrived in Vladivostok with his family. 15 (27) March 1862 the first act of his land purchase was recorded, and in 1870 Semenov was elected the first headman of the post. Local self-government emerged. By this time, a special commission decided to designate Vladivostok as the reference port of the Russian Empire in the Far East.. In 1871 the main naval base of the Siberian military flotilla, the rate of military governor and other maritime departments were transferred to Vladivostok from Nikolaevsk-on-Amur.

However even after that, attempts to build the main naval base of Russia in the Far East in the Gulf of St. Olga didn't stop. In 1879, the military ministry's commission even made such a decision, leaving only commercial port functions to Vladivostok. Advocates of Vladivostok, along with numerous protests organized even a campaign in the press to protect Vladivostok. In order to final resolve the issue in the spring of 1879, Major-General M.P. Tikhmenev, an officer of the General Staff, was sent to the Far East. Along with other assignments, he was assigned to conduct a detailed military and strategic study of the Russian coast of the Sea of Japan, including the military and economic significance of places 'claiming to be a military port. Tikhmenev's decisive choice in favor of Vladivostok and the aggravation of relations with China finally settled the dispute.

In the 1870s, the government encouraged resettlement in the South Ussuriyskiy region, which contributed to an increase in the population of the post: the first census of 1878 there were 4163 inhabitants. It adopted the city charter, established the City Duma, the post of mayor, adopted the coat of arms, although officially Vladivostok was not recognized as a city.

Because of the constant threat of attack by the British navy, Vladivostok was also actively developing as a naval base.

In 1880 the post officially received the status of the city. In the 1890s there was a demographic and economic boom associated with the completion of the Ussuri branch of the Trans-Siberian Railway and the Chinese Eastern Railway. According to the first Russian census 9 (21) February 1897, Vladivostok had 28,993 inhabitants, and ten years later the city's population tripled.

The first decade of the twentieth century was characterized by a prolonged crisis caused by the political situation: the government's focus on Port Arthur and the port of Far East. As well as the Boxer Rebellion in Northern China 1900-1901, the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, and finally the first Russian revolution led to stagnation in the economic activity of Vladivostok.

From 1907, a new stage in city's development began: loss of Port Arthur and the Far East made Vladivostok the main Russian port on the Pacific Ocean again. The port-franco regime was introduced, and up to 1914 (before the First World War) the city experienced rapid growth, becoming one of the economic centers of the Asia-Pacific region.. Vladivostok's population exceeded 100,000, with great national diversity: Russians accounted for less than half of the population at that time.. Large Chinese, Korean and Japanese communities formed in the city. The social life of the city flourished; many public associations, from charity to hobby groups, were created..

During World War I there were no active military operations in the city. However, Vladivostok became an important transshipment point for the importation from Allied and neutral countries of military equipment for the troops, as well as raw materials and equipment for industry.

Immediately after the October Revolution, during which the Bolsheviks came to power, a "Decree on Peace" was announced - and, as a result of the Brest Peace Treaty concluded between the Leninist government and Germany, Soviet Russia withdrew from World War I. On October 30 the sailors of the Siberian Flotilla decided to "unite around the single power of the Soviets" - the power went to the Bolsheviks. However, on June 29, 1918, Czechoslovakian troops overthrew Soviet power in the city, and in the fall, U.S. (August 15, 1918), Japanese, Italian, and Canadian troops entered.

Throughout 1919, the region was engulfed in guerrilla warfare. To avoid war with Japan, the Far Eastern Republic was proclaimed on April 6, 1920, at the suggestion of the Soviet leadership. The Soviet authorities officially recognized the new republic in May, but in Primorye, where there were significant forces of the White movement, there was a revolt and the Priamursky Zemsky Krai arose..

In October 1922 troops of the People's Revolutionary Army of the Far Eastern Republic under the command of Hieronim Uborevich occupied Vladivostok, forcing out the White Army formations. In November the Far Eastern Republic was dissolved, becoming part of the RSFSR.

By the time of the establishment of Soviet power, Vladivostok was in decline: retreating Japanese army forces had taken all material values out of the city. Life was paralyzed: there was no money in the banks, the equipment of enterprises was stolen. Because of mass emigration and repression, the city's population dwindled to 106,000. In 1923-1925, the government adopted a plan of "restoration triennium," which resumed the activity of the commercial port, which became the most profitable in the country in 1924-25. The reconstruction period was notable for its peculiarities: The Far East did not catch up with wartime communism, but immediately found itself in the situation of the New Economic Policy.

In 1925 the government decided to accelerate the industrialization of the country. The first five-year plans changed the face of Primorye, making it an industrial region, in part as a result of the creation of numerous concentration camps in the region. In the 1930s and 1940s, Vladivostok served as a transit point for the delivery of prisoners and goods for the Sevvostlag of the Soviet supertrust Dalstroy. The notorious Vladivostok transit camp was located in the city.. In addition, in the late 1930s and early 1940s, the Vladivostok Labor Correctional Camp (Vladlag) was located near the Vtoraya Rechka station..

Vladivostok was not a place of combat operations during World War II, although there was a constant threat of attack from Japan. In the city, the first in the country, a "Defense Fund" was created, to which Vladivostok residents carried personal valuables. During the war Vladivostok handled imported cargo (lend-lease) almost 4 times more than Murmansk and almost 5 times more than the Arkhangelsk port group..

The Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR "Questions of the Fifth Navy" on August 11, 1951, in Vladivostok was introduced a special regime (in force since January 1, 1952); the city becomes closed to foreigners.  It was planned to remove not only foreign consulates from Vladivostok, but also the merchant and fishing fleet, and to move all regional government bodies to Voroshilov (now Ussuriysk). However, these plans were not put into practice.

During the "Khrushchev Thaw," Vladivostok received special attention from the state authorities. Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev visited the city for the first time in 1954 in order to finally decide whether to assign it the status of a closed naval base or not.. It was noted that at that time the urban infrastructure was in a deplorable state. In 1959, Khrushchev visited the city again. As a result, it was decided to accelerate the development of the city, which was formalized by the Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR of January 18, 1960. "On the development of Vladivostok".. In the '60s, a new streetcar line was built, a trolleybus was launched, and the city became a huge construction site: residential neighborhoods were built on the outskirts, and new public and civic buildings were constructed in the center..

In 1974, the 38th U.S. President Gerald Ford paid an official visit to Vladivostok to meet with General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Leonid Brezhnev. At the meeting a protocol to the ABM Treaty and the Treaty on Restriction of Underground Nuclear Testing were signed, which helped curb the arms race.^[.

September 20, 1991 RSFSR President Boris Yeltsin signed a decree № 123 "On the opening of the city of Vladivostok for visiting by foreign citizens," with the entry into force which on January 1, 1992 Vladivostok was no longer a closed city.

The collapse of the Soviet Union had a major impact on the city's economy. State defense enterprises were deprived of orders, resulting in non-payment of wages and unemployment. Surviving fishing enterprises mostly switched to exporting fish and seafood to Japan. In the 1990s, Vladivostok became a center for illegal fishing, as well as timber smuggling and reselling Japanese cars. Due to declining living standards, the birth rate dropped and migration to the country's central regions intensified: while in 1992 the city's population was 648 thousand people, by 2010 it was 578 thousand.

At the beginning of the twenty-first century there was an improvement in the social and economic situation.

November 4, 2010 Vladivostok was awarded the title "City of Military GloryIn 2012, a stele was erected to commemorate the occasion.

In September 2012, Russky Island hosted the APEC summit. To prepare for the summit, the government has invested about 20 billion dollars in the development of the city's infrastructure. The main objects of construction were: the bridge over the Golden Horn Bay and the bridge to Russky Island, a new air terminal complex "Knevichi".

In 2012, for the APEC summit in Vladivostok, the most modern in Russia Far Eastern Federal University campus and an embankment were built on Russky Island on the bank of Ajax Bay. FEFU is the largest educational, research and innovation center in the Far East, attracting scientific environment and high-tech businesses from Russia and abroad. Students from Russia and Asian countries study there

There are four theaters in Vladivostok and more than 30 museums. The Primorsky Art Gallery has a collection of Russian, Soviet and foreign paintings and drawings that numbers over 5000 items. When the gallery was founded in 1929, it received the canvases from Hermitage Museum, Russian Museum and Tretyakov Gallery's funds, but the greater part of the collection consists of works by modern seaside artists and sculptors.

The Primorsky Opera and Ballet Theater opened in 2013. The technical equipment of the theater building and its acoustic system are among the best in Russia. The glass façade made according to the "cube-in-cube" principle became an architectural peculiarity of the building.