Bronnitsy
Encyclopedia
Bronnitsy is a town in Moscow Oblast
Moscow Oblast
Moscow Oblast , or Podmoskovye , is a federal subject of Russia . Its area, at , is relatively small compared to other federal subjects, but it is one of the most densely populated regions in the country and, with the 2010 population of 7,092,941, is the second most populous federal subject...

, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, located 54.5 kilometres (33.9 mi) southeast of downtown Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 and 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) west of Bronnitsy station of the Moscow-Ryazan
Ryazan
Ryazan is a city and the administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Oka River southeast of Moscow. Population: The strategic bomber base Dyagilevo is just west of the city, and the air base of Alexandrovo is to the southeast as is the Ryazan Turlatovo Airport...

 railroad. The town lies geographically within Ramensky District
Ramensky District
Ramensky District is an administrative and a municipal district , one of thirty-eight administrative and thirty-six municipal districts in Moscow Oblast, Russia. Its administrative center is the town of Ramenskoye...

 but is administratively incorporated as a town under oblast jurisdiction
City of federal subject significance
City of federal subject significance is an umbrella term used to refer to a type of an administrative division of a federal subject of Russia which is equal in status to a district but is organized around a large city; occasionally with surrounding rural territories.According to the 1993...

. Population: 11,900 (1967).

Local economy relies on food processing
Food processing
Food processing is the set of methods and techniques used to transform raw ingredients into food or to transform food into other forms for consumption by humans or animals either in the home or by the food processing industry...

 and packaging, construction services and jewellery
Jewellery
Jewellery or jewelry is a form of personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, and bracelets.With some exceptions, such as medical alert bracelets or military dog tags, jewellery normally differs from other items of personal adornment in that it has no other purpose than to...

 manufacturing. Bronnitsy is listed among the twenty-two historical towns of Moscow Oblast.

Existence of Bronnitsy is attested since 1453. The village emerged as a stopover station on the highway between Moscow and Ryazan (present-day M5 road
M5 highway (Russia)
The Russian route M5 is a major trunk road running across a distance of 1879 km from Moscow to the Ural Mountains. It is part of the European route E30 and the Trans-Siberian Highway....

), and its population and economy traditionally tended to horses. The House of Romanov stables, established in Bronnitsy by 1634, evolved into stud farm
Stud farm
A stud farm or stud in animal husbandry, is an establishment for selective breeding of livestock. The word "stud" comes from the Old English stod meaning "herd of horses, place where horses are kept for breeding" Historically, documentation of the breedings that occur on a stud farm leads to the...

s supplying riding horse
Riding Horse
The Riding Horse is a type of show horse in the UK. Riding horses can be any breed, but are generally warmbloods or Thoroughbred crosses.The breeding and showing of riding horses is overseen by the British Show Horse Association.-Showing the riding horse:...

s to the cavalry. In the 1780s the administrative reform of Catherine the Great turned the village into a proper small town with a grid plan
Grid plan
The grid plan, grid street plan or gridiron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid...

 and a growing merchant community. In the second half of the 19th century Bronnitsy was gradually industrialized, becoming a town of small textile mills and jewelers.

Bronnitsy had a minor role in the military history of the Time of Troubles
Time of Troubles
The Time of Troubles was a period of Russian history comprising the years of interregnum between the death of the last Russian Tsar of the Rurik Dynasty, Feodor Ivanovich, in 1598, and the establishment of the Romanov Dynasty in 1613. In 1601-1603, Russia suffered a famine that killed one-third...

 and Napoleon's invasion of Russia, when it became the farthest point of French advance after the fall of Moscow, but were spared from military action and destruction. Its key landmarks are the five-domed cathedral of Archangel Michael (completed in 1705), the church of Entry into Jerusalem (1845) and the neoclassical
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...

 cavalry barracks.

Geography

Historical center of Bronnitsy stands on the southern bank of narrow and shallow Lake Belskoe, a former path of Moskva River
Moskva River
The Moskva River is a river that flows through the Moscow and Smolensk Oblasts in Russia, and is a tributary of the Oka River.-Etymology:...

 that is now completely cut off the river. Narrow and flat land between the lake and the river is in part occupied by fifteen soccer fields and the Olympic Reserve school, specializing in training rowing
Rowing (sport)
Rowing is a sport in which athletes race against each other on rivers, on lakes or on the ocean, depending upon the type of race and the discipline. The boats are propelled by the reaction forces on the oar blades as they are pushed against the water...

 athletes; the lake itself serves as a rowing channel. Two small islands on the lake are uninhabited, the lake itself is spanned with a pedestrian suspension bridge
Suspension bridge
A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. Outside Tibet and Bhutan, where the first examples of this type of bridge were built in the 15th century, this type of bridge dates from the early 19th century...

.

The Moscow-Ryazan road, which once ran through Bronnitsy, now bypasses the city center north of the A-107 Ring Road and returns to the old track south from it. Sovietskaya Street, the segment of the M5 road that passed through Bronnitsy, is still an important street, passing through the town center. A-107, the main east-west corridor, crosses the city and Moskva River a few blocks south from Lake Belskoe. The old and narrow bridge across the Moskva River causes traffic queues that have sometimes reached ten kilometers. In August 2008 the poor condition of the bridge due to it's extensive usage led to a ban on truck and heavy bus traffic over the bridge, further aggravating congestion. One year later city administration agreed to proceed with the construction of a second two-lane bridge next to the old one, but no funds have yet been firmly allocated.

Most of the town's territory retained traditional single-family houses. Midrise housing concentrates in the southern part of Bronnitsy along A-107.

Demographics

  • 1780: 500
  • 1787: 1,500
  • 1836: 1,500
  • 1897: 3,800
  • 1926: 3,800
  • 1939: 6,100
  • 1959: 10,100
  • 1979: 14,200
  • 1989: 16,100
  • 2002: 18,232
  • 2007: 18,600
  • 2010: 21,102

Etymology

Toponyms
Toponymy
Toponymy is the scientific study of place names , their origins, meanings, use and typology. The word "toponymy" is derived from the Greek words tópos and ónoma . Toponymy is itself a branch of onomastics, the study of names of all kinds...

 starting with Bron- (plural Bronnitsy, Broniki; singular Bronnikovo, Brontsa etc.) are common to all Eastern Slavic territories, from Bronytsia
Bronytsia
Bronytsia is a village in Drohobych Raion, Lviv Oblast, in south-west Ukraine.From 1918 to 1939 the village was in Lwów Voivodeship in Poland.- References :*...

 in Lviv Oblast
Lviv Oblast
Lviv Oblast is an oblast in western Ukraine. The administrative center of the oblast is the city of Lviv.-History:The oblast was created as part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic on December 4, 1939...

 of Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

 to Bronnikovo in Chita Oblast
Chita Oblast
Chita Oblast was a federal subject of Russia in southeast Siberia, Russia. Its administrative center was the city of Chita. It had extensive international borders with China and Mongolia and internal borders with Irkutsk and Amur Oblasts, as well as with the Buryat and the Sakha Republics. Its...

 of Russia. Each of these towns and villages has a different etymology
Etymology
Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts in these languages and texts about the languages to gather knowledge about how words were used during...

 behind its name. In case of Bronnitsy in Moscow Oblast, all proposed versions were contested and none gained a solid preference of the historians.
  • The most popular version derives Bronnitsy from bron (modern , armor), suggesting that Bronnitsy was a settlement of armorer
    Armorer
    An armourer or armorer is a member of a military or police force who maintains and repairs small arms and weapons systems, with some duties resembling those of a civilian gunsmith....

    s. This version, however, contradicts history of medieval Bronnitsy.
  • Distantly related explanations suggest the existence of a notable bronnik - an armored warrior, or a person named Bronislav.
  • Another explanation connects Bronnitsy to bran (брань, fight or battle), referring to the struggle against Tatars
    Tatars
    Tatars are a Turkic speaking ethnic group , numbering roughly 7 million.The majority of Tatars live in the Russian Federation, with a population of around 5.5 million, about 2 million of which in the republic of Tatarstan.Significant minority populations are found in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan,...

    .
  • The most plausible version derives Bronnitsy from obsolete bronka, a word originally meaning oat
    Oat
    The common oat is a species of cereal grain grown for its seed, which is known by the same name . While oats are suitable for human consumption as oatmeal and rolled oats, one of the most common uses is as livestock feed...

     spikes
    , later spikes of any cultivated cereal
    Cereal
    Cereals are grasses cultivated for the edible components of their grain , composed of the endosperm, germ, and bran...

    . Bronnitsy emerged as a station on a yam highway
    Yam (route)
    Yam is a supply point route messenger system employed and extensively used and expanded by Genghis Khan and used by subsequent Great Khans and Khans.Relay stations were used to give food, shelter and spare horses for Mongol armies messengers...

    , and its grain caches were essential for feeding yam horses. Bronnitsy, presumably, were the feeding troughs placed along the highway.


The latter version is supported by the fact that another, and older, village once named Bronnitsy, present-day Bronnitsa on Msta River
Msta River
Msta is a river in Tver Oblast and Novgorod Oblast of Russia. Msta starts from the Mstino Lake in the Valdai Hills north of the town of Vyshny Volochyok and flows into Lake Ilmen. Up to mid-19th century, Msta had been a part of an important water trade route connecting the Baltic and Black seas...

, also evolved as a yam station.

Rurikids and early Romanovs (1453–1780)

Bronnitsy were first mentioned, as Bronniche in the 1453 testament of Sophia of Lithuania
Sophia of Lithuania
Sophia was the only daughter of Vytautas the Great of Lithuania and his first wife Anna. On January 21, 1391, while her father was engaged in the Lithuanian Civil War, she married Vasili I of Russia. She was the longest serving consort of Russia.After his death in 1425 she became regent for their...

; she bequeathed Bronnitsy and other villages of her private domain around Kolomna
Kolomna
Kolomna is an ancient city and the administrative center of Kolomensky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia, situated at the confluence of the Moskva and Oka Rivers, southeast of Moscow. The area of the city is about . The city was founded in 1177...

 to her grandson Yury. Wars of the 15th and 16th centuries spared the village; the first, although insignificant, military action took place during the Time of Troubles
Time of Troubles
The Time of Troubles was a period of Russian history comprising the years of interregnum between the death of the last Russian Tsar of the Rurik Dynasty, Feodor Ivanovich, in 1598, and the establishment of the Romanov Dynasty in 1613. In 1601-1603, Russia suffered a famine that killed one-third...

. In 1606 prince Vasily Mosalsky troops, engaged against Ivan Bolotnikov
Ivan Bolotnikov
Ivan Isayevich Bolotnikov was the leader of a popular uprising in Russia in 1606–1607 known as the Bolotnikov rebellion . The uprising was part of the Time of Troubles in Russia.-Biography:...

's rebels, passed three verst
Verst
A verst or werst is an obsolete Russian unit of length. It is defined as being 500 sazhen long, which makes a verst equal to 1.0668 kilometres ....

s from Bronnitsy. In 1618 Hetman
Hetmans of Ukrainian Cossacks
Hetman of Ukrainian Cossacks as a title was not officially recognized internationally until the creation of the Ukrainian Hetmanate. With the creation of Registered Cossacks units their leaders were unofficially referred to as hetmans, however officially the title was known as the "Senior of His...

 Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny, acting in accord with Władysław IV Vasa
Władysław IV Vasa
Władysław IV Vasa was a Polish and Swedish prince from the House of Vasa. He reigned as King of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from 8 November 1632 to his death in 1648....

, stayed in Bronnitsy on his march from Serpukhov
Serpukhov
Serpukhov is a city in Moscow Oblast, Russia, which is situated at the confluence of the Oka and the Nara Rivers. It is located south from Moscow on the Moscow—Simferopol highway. The Moscow—Tula railway passes through the town. Population: -History:...

 to Moscow.

Mikhail Romanov owned Bronnitsy as his private domain, and kept there royal stables with up to 190 horses (the first written evidence of tsar's stables in Bronnitsy is dated 1634). Romanovs of the 17th century maintained Bronnitsy merely as a household item and the village evolved in relative prosperity, evidenced by the construction of the Cathedral of Archangel Michael, launched in 1690s and completed in 1705. Peter I
Peter I of Russia
Peter the Great, Peter I or Pyotr Alexeyevich Romanov Dates indicated by the letters "O.S." are Old Style. All other dates in this article are New Style. ruled the Tsardom of Russia and later the Russian Empire from until his death, jointly ruling before 1696 with his half-brother, Ivan V...

 reformed it into a productive stud farm
Stud farm
A stud farm or stud in animal husbandry, is an establishment for selective breeding of livestock. The word "stud" comes from the Old English stod meaning "herd of horses, place where horses are kept for breeding" Historically, documentation of the breedings that occur on a stud farm leads to the...

. He granted Bronnitsy to Alexander Menshikov;. after his fall in 1727 control over the village and government-owned stud farms passed to statesman Pavel Yaguzhinsky who "managed" the business into a ruin. Statesman Artemy Volynsky, Yaguzhinsky's nemesis, took control of the stud farms in 1733. The business recovered slowly; by the time of Volynsky's treason trial in 1740 the farm in Bronnitsy had 221 horse and specialized into breeding riding horse
Riding Horse
The Riding Horse is a type of show horse in the UK. Riding horses can be any breed, but are generally warmbloods or Thoroughbred crosses.The breeding and showing of riding horses is overseen by the British Show Horse Association.-Showing the riding horse:...

s. The next manager, Alexander Kurakin, increased the number of horses to 277 in less than a decade.

Microhistory
Microhistory
Microhistory is the intensive historical investigation of a well defined smaller unit of research...

 of Bronnitsy of the period, despite substantial surviving archives, has not been properly collated and published yet. Everyday life of the town in the 17th and 18th centuries remains, largely, unknown, apart from a few unusual events that attracted attention of the imperial government. For example, when nearby Kolomna
Kolomna
Kolomna is an ancient city and the administrative center of Kolomensky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia, situated at the confluence of the Moskva and Oka Rivers, southeast of Moscow. The area of the city is about . The city was founded in 1177...

 was hit by the plague of 1770–1772
Russian plague of 1770-1772
The Russian plague epidemic of 1770—1772, also known as the Plague of 1771, was the last massive outbreak of plague in central Russia, claiming between 52 and 100 thousand lives in Moscow alone...

, the priests of Bronnitsy refused to respect quarantine
Quarantine
Quarantine is compulsory isolation, typically to contain the spread of something considered dangerous, often but not always disease. The word comes from the Italian quarantena, meaning forty-day period....

 enforced by civil authorities and kept on organizing potentially hazardous mass processions. The Holy Synod
Holy Synod
In several of the autocephalous Eastern Orthodox churches and Eastern Catholic Churches, the patriarch or head bishop is elected by a group of bishops called the Holy Synod...

 had to press on archbishop
Archbishop
An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...

 Feodosy who, in turn, personally pressed the priests into obedience.

Growth and the French invasion

In 1781, Bronnitsy, then having a population of five hundred, became the administrative center of an uyezd
Uyezd
Uyezd or uezd was an administrative subdivision of Rus', Muscovy, Russian Empire, and the early Russian SFSR which was in use from the 13th century. Uyezds for most of the history in Russia were a secondary-level of administrative division...

 of Moscow Governorate
Moscow Governorate
Moscow Governorate , or Government of Moscow, was an administrative division of the Russian Empire, which existed in 1708–1929....

. Catherine II
Catherine II of Russia
Catherine II, also known as Catherine the Great , Empress of Russia, was born in Stettin, Pomerania, Prussia on as Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg...

 granted the former village a town charter and a coat of arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...

 featuring golden horse on a green field, a nod to Bronnitsy stud farms. Influx of petty bureaucrats resulted in a significant growth in population and construction of the first public buildings; the new grid plan
Grid plan
The grid plan, grid street plan or gridiron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid...

 was approved in 1784 and by 1787 population tripled. It leveled at around 1,500 until the middle of the 19th century.

In September 1812 Bronnitsy and Bogorodsk
Noginsk
Noginsk is a town and the administrative center of Noginsky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia, located east of the MKAD ring road on the Klyazma River. Population:...

 became the farthest points reached by the French troops in Napoleon's invasion of Russia. After the surrender of Moscow on September 14 the main Russian Army retreated south-east along the Ryazan
Ryazan
Ryazan is a city and the administrative center of Ryazan Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Oka River southeast of Moscow. Population: The strategic bomber base Dyagilevo is just west of the city, and the air base of Alexandrovo is to the southeast as is the Ryazan Turlatovo Airport...

 road, "cautiously" shadowed by Murat
Joachim Murat
Joachim-Napoléon Murat , Marshal of France and Grand Admiral or Admiral of France, 1st Prince Murat, was Grand Duke of Berg from 1806 to 1808 and then King of Naples from 1808 to 1815...

's cavalry. On September 17 Kutuzov made a sharp westward turn to Podolsk
Podolsk
Podolsk is an industrial city and the administrative center of Podolsky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Pakhra River...

; a small task force continued movement to Ryazan, impersonating the whole army. Murat missed Kutuzov's turn and did not discover the deception until he reached Bronnitsy. Although by September 21 Napoleon suspected the Russian maneuver, the French lost the track of the Russian Army for two days and waged a wide pursuit that culminated in the Battle of Tarutino
Battle of Tarutino
The Battle of Tarutino was a part of Napoleon's invasion of Russia. The battle is sometimes called the Battle of Vinkovo or the Battle of Chernishnya after the local river. Many historians claim that the latter name is more fitting because the village of Tarutino was 8 km from the described events...

. Murat's raid, accompanied with inevitable plunder and fires, was the last foreign incursion into Bronnitsy ever (World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 spared the town).

After the war of 1812 Bronnitsy slowly evolved as a typical small trading town and served as a base of a cavalry regiment; the former cavalry barracks, built in Empire style, are attributed either to Vasily Stasov
Vasily Stasov
Vasily Petrovich Stasov was a Russian architect.-Biography:Stasov was born in Moscow....

 or to Alexander Kutepov. Rotunda
Rotunda (architecture)
A rotunda is any building with a circular ground plan, sometimes covered by a dome. It can also refer to a round room within a building . The Pantheon in Rome is a famous rotunda. A Band Rotunda is a circular bandstand, usually with a dome...

 of Jerusalem church, standing near the Cathedral of Archangel Michael, was built in the 1840s by Alexander Shestakov in late neoclassical style
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...

. Its pseudo-Russian red brick belltower was erected in 1850s in apparent mismatch to historical churches. These landmarks survived despite a number of sweeping fires; the worst recorded fire of 1861 destroyed 115 houses. Another major fire struck in 1863, yet despite the damages Bronnitsy still had one inn, two pubs, and 118 trading outlets; two hundred families held trading patents but the town's finances were poor and could not even pay for paving the unbearably impassable main square.

In 1850s and 1860s Bronnitsy became home to notable members of the declining Russian nobility
Russian nobility
The Russian nobility arose in the 14th century and essentially governed Russia until the October Revolution of 1917.The Russian word for nobility, Dvoryanstvo , derives from the Russian word dvor , meaning the Court of a prince or duke and later, of the tsar. A nobleman is called dvoryanin...

. Decembrist
Decembrist revolt
The Decembrist revolt or the Decembrist uprising took place in Imperial Russia on 14 December , 1825. Russian army officers led about 3,000 soldiers in a protest against Nicholas I's assumption of the throne after his elder brother Constantine removed himself from the line of succession...

 Mikhail Fonvizin (1787–1854) and his wife Natalya, a local landowner, retired to Bronnitsy after exile to Siberia. Fonvizin died soon upon return; the widow married another decembrist, Ivan Pushchin (1798–1859). Both Fonvizin and Pushchin were buried near the Cathedral of Archangel. Retired Army colonel Alexander Pushkin (1833–1914), son of poet Alexander Pushkin, served as the justice of the peace
Justice of the Peace
A justice of the peace is a puisne judicial officer elected or appointed by means of a commission to keep the peace. Depending on the jurisdiction, they might dispense summary justice or merely deal with local administrative applications in common law jurisdictions...

 in Bronnitsy in 1862–1866, administering the Emancipation reform of 1861
Emancipation reform of 1861
The Emancipation Reform of 1861 in Russia was the first and most important of liberal reforms effected during the reign of Alexander II of Russia. The reform, together with a related reform in 1861, amounted to the liquidation of serf dependence previously suffered by peasants of the Russian Empire...

. His son, also Alexander Pushkin (1863–1916), born in Bronnitsy, became judge of Bronnitsy uezd in 1890 and since 1897 later managed the whole zemstvo
Zemstvo
Zemstvo was a form of local government that was instituted during the great liberal reforms performed in Imperial Russia by Alexander II of Russia. The idea of the zemstvo was elaborated by Nikolay Milyutin, and the first zemstvo laws were put into effect in 1864...

 of the town and country.

Industrialization

Railroad boom of the 1860s bypassed Bronnitsy: eponymous Bronnitsy railroad station, operating since 1864, was actually built 12 verst
Verst
A verst or werst is an obsolete Russian unit of length. It is defined as being 500 sazhen long, which makes a verst equal to 1.0668 kilometres ....

s from the center of the town, on the opposite bank of the river. The dam and bridge across the river were built by local contractor Smorchkov in 1872.
Residents were eagerly leaving Bronnitsy for industrial and service jobs in Moscow: by 1882 Bronnitsy uezd, Podolsk
Podolsk
Podolsk is an industrial city and the administrative center of Podolsky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Pakhra River...

 uezd, Serpukhov
Serpukhov
Serpukhov is a city in Moscow Oblast, Russia, which is situated at the confluence of the Oka and the Nara Rivers. It is located south from Moscow on the Moscow—Simferopol highway. The Moscow—Tula railway passes through the town. Population: -History:...

 uezd and Moscow uezd were the leading suppliers of manpower to the metropolis. Bronnitsy uezd was sending twice as many men as densely populated and far better industrialized Bogorodsk uezd
Noginsk
Noginsk is a town and the administrative center of Noginsky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia, located east of the MKAD ring road on the Klyazma River. Population:...

.

Relative share of migrants to total population, however, was less than in the western uyezds of Moscow Governorate. Bronnitsy gradually became a minor textile industry
Textile industry
The textile industry is primarily concerned with the production of yarn, and cloth and the subsequent design or manufacture of clothing and their distribution. The raw material may be natural, or synthetic using products of the chemical industry....

 hub and its factories employed a substantial share of the remaining population, especially under-age girls. By the end of the 19th century one quarter of all local girls under the age of twelve and 65% of the girls under the age of fourteen were employed in the industry, compared to only 7% and 23% for Volokolamsk
Volokolamsk
Volokolamsk is a town and the administrative center of Volokolamsky District of Moscow Oblast, Russia, located on the Gorodenka River, not far from its confluence with the Lama River, northwest of Moscow. Population: -History:...

 uezd. Jewelers emerged in Bronnitsy uezd earlier, in the middle of the 19th century, and by 1900 there were 737 independent, predominantly male craftsmen. The largest jewellery business, in nearby Sinkovo, employed around twenty workers. Cost of living in Bronnitsy was very low, at least according to imperial government: the 1902 Army regulations placed it in the seventh grade of housing costs - just a notch above the cheapest eighth grade, or two and a half times cheaper than Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 and Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...

.

Mayor Alexander Pushkin (the third) struggled to improve the performance of peasant households; increase in average area of a family lot, he reasoned, would enable a switch from obsolete three-field crop rotation
Crop rotation
Crop rotation is the practice of growing a series of dissimilar types of crops in the same area in sequential seasons.Crop rotation confers various benefits to the soil. A traditional element of crop rotation is the replenishment of nitrogen through the use of green manure in sequence with cereals...

 to intensive farming methods. He set up five model farms attended by qualified agronomist
Agronomist
An agronomist is a scientist who specializes in agronomy, which is the science of utilizing plants for food, fuel, feed, and fiber. An agronomist is an expert in agricultural and allied sciences, with the exception veterinary sciences.Agronomists deal with interactions between plants, soils, and...

s and provided subsidized loans to the peasants. In twenty years of his tenure the uezd opened 25 new elementary schools, two high schools for boys and one high school for girls. Despite Pushkin's efforts, cultural split between landed peasants and urbanized classes widened to a point of armed conflict. During the 1905 Russian Revolution liberal-minded teachers and medics supported the political changes while the peasants distrusted their promises, fearing a return to dreaded serfdom system. On one occasion the peasants stormed and burnt down a school building housing a convention of zemstvo
Zemstvo
Zemstvo was a form of local government that was instituted during the great liberal reforms performed in Imperial Russia by Alexander II of Russia. The idea of the zemstvo was elaborated by Nikolay Milyutin, and the first zemstvo laws were put into effect in 1864...

 employees who barely escaped the mob.

The town slowly grew until World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. By 1914 Bronnitsy hospital acquired an X-ray machine, one of the first in the region. According to Bronnitsy Museum staff, in 1914 the Fifth Air Company of Bronnitsy operated from a military airfield near the town; local pilot Konstantin Savitsky, distantly related to the Pushkin family, and lieutenant Mikhail Lyaschenko were killed there in an accident in April 1914. In November 1914 the company left Bronnitsy; a different air wing was based there from 1917 to 1919. According to pilot Ivan Spirin, in 1924 Moscow-Bronnitsy-Moscow route was used to test new instrument flying
Instrument flight rules
Instrument flight rules are one of two sets of regulations governing all aspects of civil aviation aircraft operations; the other are visual flight rules ....

 technologies.

Soviet period

In 1920s the town housed two competing cells of the Militant Atheists Union reporting directly to the national Union in Moscow. Population, however, remained superstitious: in 1926 Bronnitsy were swept with an outbreak of alleged demonic possession
Demonic possession
Demonic possession is held by many belief systems to be the control of an individual by a malevolent supernatural being. Descriptions of demonic possessions often include erased memories or personalities, convulsions, “fits” and fainting as if one were dying...

 blamed on a local homosexual healer. The temples of Bronnitsy were closed in 1930s and used as archive
Archive
An archive is a collection of historical records, or the physical place they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or organization's lifetime, and are kept to show the function of an organization...

s; they were struck off heritage register
Russian cultural heritage register
The national cultural heritage register of Russia is a data bank of historically or culturally significant man-made immovable properties – landmark buildings, industrial facilities, memorial homes of notable people of the past, monuments, cemeteries and tombs, archaeological sites, and cultural...

 during Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...

's anti-religious campaign, but survived to date. Religion persisted, sometimes literally underground: parents of Alexey Vdovin (born 1958) belonged to the Catacomb Church
Russian True Orthodox Church
The Russian True Orthodox Church is a denomination that separated from the Russian Orthodox Church during the early years of Communist rule in the Soviet Union. While the True Orthodox Church in Russia was never a single organization, many of its followers were labeled Josephites, after...

 (in the 1980s Vdovin himself initiated destruction of monument to Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...

 and repossession of churches in his hometown; he became a radical nationalist, activist of Pamyat
Pamyat
Pamyat is a Russian nationalist organization identifying itself as the "People's National-patriotic Orthodox Christian movement." The group's stated focus is preserving Russian culture.- History :...

 and co-founder of the Russian National Union
Russian National Union
The Russian National Union was a Neo-Nazi party in Russia. The party should not be confused with Russian National Unity, a larger group with similar roots, although with no direct connection....

).

Human losses of Bronnitsy during the terror campaigns of the 1930s have been only partially estimated. By 2007 t300 out of 31,000 victims of political terror in Moscow Oblast
Moscow Oblast
Moscow Oblast , or Podmoskovye , is a federal subject of Russia . Its area, at , is relatively small compared to other federal subjects, but it is one of the most densely populated regions in the country and, with the 2010 population of 7,092,941, is the second most populous federal subject...

 were identified as residents of Bronnitsy.

During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 Bronnitsy served as the southern vortex of Moscow's inner radar
Radar
Radar is an object-detection system which uses radio waves to determine the range, altitude, direction, or speed of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. The radar dish or antenna transmits pulses of radio...

 arc; the 337th air defence battalion, equipped with RUS-1 Reven (later RUS-2 and RUS-2c) radars, was based there since March 1941. In 1945 Bronnitsy housed one of five displaced persons camp
Displaced persons camp
A displaced persons camp or DP camp is a temporary facility for displaced persons coerced into forced migration. The term is mainly used for camps established after World War II in West Germany and in Austria, as well as in the United Kingdom, primarily for refugees from Eastern Europe and for the...

s for the repatriation of American and British prisoners of war from the USSR. Front-line action did not reach Bronnitsy but the town and country lost so many men that after the war the government resorted to returning "political" prisoners of Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...

 to take up administrative jobs.

On April 16, 1964 Bronnitsy witnessed a mass riot after a local resident died in police custody. A mob of around 300 attacked the jail; police did not dare to use firearms and there were no more casualties. Eight of the protesters were prosecuted in court. It was added to the list of the historical towns of the Moscow Oblast in 1990, and gained the status of a city of regional subordination, along with a new charter, in 1992. A gas explosion occurred in a five story apartment at 15:45 on 17 October 2011, resulting in two people killed and 15 wounded. It was apprently due to human error.

Economy

The largest employer in Bronnitsy, a jewellery factory, dates back to a cooperative
Cooperative
A cooperative is a business organization owned and operated by a group of individuals for their mutual benefit...

 established in November 1924. According to the factory's website, at that time all local craftsmen processed no more than 100 kilograms of gold per annum, compared to present-day four metric tons per annum. The cooperative was reformed into a factory in 1956; in 1963 it absorbed another former cooperative from nearby Sinkovo. The factory relocated into its current buildings, constructed since 1968, in 1972. According to its website, it employs around seven hundred people in Bronnitsy alone, or 10% of the town's workforce.

NII-21 (21st research institute of the Ministry of Defence) is Russian military's primary facility for testing wheeled vehicles. Establishment of NII-21 in the 1950s was followed with much-needed professional training facilities; Moscow Motorway Institute (MADI) operates a branch in Bronnitsy since 1959.

The town's revenue for 2010 is set at around 15 million US dollars; around half of it is collected locally through taxes, the balance is remitted from regional and federal funds. In 2009 fraud in the city hall became a subject of criminal case; deputy mayor committed suicide in jail.

Education and sports

Bronnitsy has four high schools (one catering to the working youth) and a road workers' college. Two Moscow-based undergraduate-level schools, the Motorway Institute, and the Agricultural Engineering University, operate their branches here.

Bronnitsy and Lake Belskoye are home to two Olympic Reserve boarding schools (high school level and college level), specializing in rowing and canoeing and association football. Local football team, FC Fabus, has competed in Russia's Second League since 1995 with no significant results.

Since March 1996, Bronnitsy has hosted a competition in winter beach running (held on the next to last weekend of November and the second weekend of March).

Lake Belskoye and Moskva River regularly host sport fishing events. Attempts to acclimatize common carp
Common carp
The Common carp is a widespread freshwater fish of eutrophic waters in lakes and large rivers in Europe and Asia. The wild populations are considered vulnerable to extinction, but the species has also been domesticated and introduced into environments worldwide, and is often considered an invasive...

 and grass carp
Grass carp
The grass carp is a herbivorous, freshwater fish species of family Cyprinidae, and the only species of the genus Ctenopharyngodon. It is cultivated in China for food, but was introduced in Europe and the United States for aquatic weed control...

 in Belskoe Lake failed (carp catch usually has no point value in fishing competitions). Silver carp
Silver carp
The silver carp is a species of freshwater cyprinid fish, a variety of Asian carp native to north and northeast Asia. It is cultivated in China....

 (Hypophthalmichthys molitrix), released in 1993, survived and established a viable population despite very long sexual maturity
Sexual maturity
Sexual maturity is the age or stage when an organism can reproduce. It is sometimes considered synonymous with adulthood, though the two are distinct...

 period (12 to 13 years in Belskoe Lake). One silver carp, caught in 2006, reached 130 centimeters in length and weighed over 20 kilograms.

Sources

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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