Spaso House
Encyclopedia
Spaso House is a listed Neoclassical
Revival building at No. 10 Spasopeskovskaya Square in Moscow. It was originally built in 1913 as the mansion of the textile industrialist Nikolay Vtorov
. Since 1933 it has been the residence of the U.S. Ambassador to the USSR and (since 1991) to the Russian Federation.
. New stone houses were built soon afterwards, including two one-story mansions of plaster-covered stone with columned porticos, built by A. G. Shchepochkina, which stand today at number 6 and number 8 Spasopeskovskaya square, on either side of Spaso House.
In 1913 a large lot on the square was sold by Princess Lobanova-Rostovaya to the family of the Russian industrialist Nikolay Vtorov
, who owned the largest textile manufacturing firm in Imperial Russia. Vtorov commissioned the architects Vladimir Adamovich and Vladimir Mayat, two prominent advocates of the neoclassical
style, to build the new mansion. As a student, Adamovich had worked with F.O. Shekhel, the master of Russian Art Nouveau in the early 1900s. They chose the "New Empire" style, which was popular with the Russian business class. The exterior of the house was influenced by the Gagarin House, a fine example of the Muscovite Empire Style, which had been built in the 1820s by Joseph Bové
.
Another likely source was the Polovtsev House in Saint Petersburg
by Ivan Fomin
, completed in 1913.
Externally and internally, Vtorov House was a recreation of an early 1820s upper-class estate, with palladian windows and a perfectly symmetrical floorplan. Work on the house began in April 1913, and by the summer the exterior was nearly completed. Work on the interior continued during the winter of 1913-1914. The house was completed and the Vtorovs moved in shortly before the beginning of World War I in August 1914.
In the turbulent months following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, Nikolay Vtorov died mysteriously and his family fled Russia. Spaso House was expropriated by the new Soviet government. Spaso House served as a reception house for the All-Russia Central Executive Committee, then as a residence for Soviet diplomats, including Georgi Chicherin, the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs from 1918 to 1930, and Lev Karakhan
, who was Chicherin's deputy.
, negotiated a three-year lease for the property for $75,000. Bullitt did not ask for a longer lease, because he had a plan to build a new residence, similar to Thomas Jefferson's Monticello
, in the Sparrow Hills, but the Soviet government never granted the land for the new house, so Spaso House became the permanent Ambassador's residence.
Early in 1934, the Ambassador and the first American diplomatic staff moved into Spaso House, which, due to structural problems with the Mohovaya street buiiding, at first served as both the residence and Embassy chancery. The U.S. government constructed a new ballroom for Spaso House in 1935 to provide more space for entertaining large groups. On July 4, 1934, Bullitt hosted the first Fourth of July reception at Spaso House, and also led a team of U.S. diplomats in a game of baseball against a team of Moscow-based American journalists.
Bullitt's parties at Spaso House became legendary. The Spaso House Christmas party of 1934, held in the Chandelier Room, featured three performing seals from the Moscow Zoo, who came into the room balancing a Christmas tree, a tray of glasses, and a bottle of champagne. When the performance ended, the seal's trainer, who had been drinking, passed out, and the seals galloped free throughout the house.
Although Stalin did not attend, the four hundred guests at the festival included Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov
, Defense Minister Kliment Voroshilov
, Communist Party luminaries Nikolai Bukharin
, Lazar Kaganovich
, and Karl Radek
, and Soviet Marshals Alexsandr Yegerov, Mikhail Tukhachevsky
, and Semyon Budyonny
, and the writer Mikhail Bulgakov
.
The festival lasted until the early hours of the morning. The bear became drunk on champagne given to him by Karl Radek, and in the early morning hours the zebra finches escaped from the aviary and perched below the ceilings around the house, but other than that the party was considered a great success.
Mikhail Bulgakov transformed the Spring Festival into The Spring Ball of the Full Moon, which became one of the most memorable episodes of his novel The Master and Margarita
.
In 1936 Bullitt was replaced by a new Ambassador, Joseph E. Davies
, who was married to Marjorie Post, heiress to the Post Foods fortune. Davies and his wife They made major repairs to Spaso at their own expense, rewiring the house and installing American bathtubs. They also used their private yacht to bring 2000 pints of frozen ice cream to Moscow, much of which spoiled when the power in the house went out.
Davies and his family were also subjected to intense surveillance from the Soviet Government. They learned that their domestic staff were spying on them, and discovered microphones hidden throughout the house.
Davies left Moscow in June 1938, but relations with Moscow remained tense; his successor, Laurence Steinhardt
, did little entertaining at Spaso House.
The German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 led to dramatic changes in the life of Spaso House. Spaso House was slightly damaged by German bombing in the autumn of 1941. In October 1941, most of the American diplomatic staff were evacuated to the city of Kuibyshev, 540 miles southeast of Moscow. A six-man team of American diplomats, led by Second Secretary Llewellyn Thompson
, kept the Embassy functioning, issuing transit visas and reporting to Washington on the military situation. The new U.S. Ambassador, Admiral William Standley, based in Kuibyshev, traveled regularly to Spaso House to meet with Soviet officials to discuss American military assistance.
In August 1943, as the Germans began to fall back from Moscow, Ambassador W. Averell Harriman replaced Standley, and the full American diplomatic staff returned to Moscow. supplemented by many military staff helping to bring American military aid to the USSR. Spaso House became an office building, a dormitory for staff, and a hotel for important visitors. Spaso House guests included Presidential advisor Harry Hopkins
, former Presidential candidate Wendell Willkie
, Secretaries of State Cordell Hull
and Edward Stettinius. In August 1945, General Dwight Eisenhower came to Spaso House to celebrate the Allied victory in Europe.
In August 1945, a delegation from the Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
presented a carved wooden plaque of the Great Seal of the United States
to U.S. Ambassador
Averell Harriman, as a "gesture of friendship" to the USSR's World War II
ally
. Unbeknown to anbody in the Embassy, it contained The Thing
, a covert listening device
(or "bug"), enabling the Soviet Union
to spy on the United States
. It hung in the ambassador's residential study undetected until it was exposed in 1952.
From March to April 1947, Spaso House was the site of a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers, including Secretary fo State George Marshall
, who met in Moscow to draft the final peace treaties with Germany and Austria.
After the death of Joseph Stalin in March 1953, the frozen American-Soviet relationship began little by little to thaw. Communist Party General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev
made surprise appearances at the 4th of July receptions at Spaso House in 1954 and 1955. Vice President Richard Nixon
stayed at Spaso House when he came to Moscow to open the first large-scale American National Exposition in Sokolniki Park, and dined with Khrushchev at a dinner at Spaso House hosted by Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson
. The Cold War was still not over - shortly before Nixon's visit, a microphone was discovered hidden in the chandelier near Ambassador Thompson's office. Nonetheless, five thousand Soviet citizens attended events at Spaso House in 1957, more than in the previous twenty-three years.
The building of the Berlin Wall and Cuban Missile Crisis
caused a new chill in Russian-American relations, but after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy
on November 22, 1963, both General Secretary Khrushchev and Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko
came to Spaso House to express their condolences to the new U.S. Ambassador, Foy D. Kohler
.
(SALT 1) and on an Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. The treaties were signed shortly afterwards at the Kremlin.
The visit of President Nixon was the first visit of a U.S. President to Moscow, and the second visit of a U.S. President to the USSR since Franklin Roosevelt went to Yalta in February 1945. While Nixon did not stay at Spaso House, staying at the Kremlin instead, he did host a dinner for Soviet leaders in the ballroom of Spaso House on May 26, 1972, after the announcement of the START and ABM agreements.
That evening the pianist Van Cliburn
also played a concert at Spaso House, the first of a long series of performances at Spaso by major American artists.
The early 1980s saw a series of turnovers in the Soviet leadership. Vice President George H.W. Bush came to Spaso house three times to attend the funerals of General Secretaries Leonid Brezhnev
, Yuri Andropov
and Konstantin Chernenko
.
In April, 1986, another American cultural envoy, pianist Vladimir Horowitz. stayed at Spaso House, along with his own Steinway piano, shipped by diplomatic pouch from New York, preparing for his historic April 20 concert at the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory
, marking his return to his homeland after an absence of 60 years. Other notable American musicians who performed at Spaso were Leonard Bernstein
, Mstislav Rostropovich
, Ray Charles
, and Chick Corea
. On May 31, 1988, the jazz pianist Dave Brubeck
performed in the Spaso House ballroom for President Ronald Reagan
and the new Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev
.
The 1991 Fourth of July Reception at Spaso House was not attended by President Gorbachev, but it was attended by Boris Yeltsin
, the President of the Russian Federation. A month later, an attempted coup against Gorbachev failed, the Soviet Union collapsed, and Yelstin became the leader of the new Russia. The 1992 Fourth of July Reception was not attended by Boris Yeltsin, but it was attended by Mikhail Gorbachev, who no longer had a job. The occupant of Spaso House, Ambassador Robert Strauss
, had a new title; he was the last Ambassador to the Soviet Union and the first Ambassador to the Russian Federation.
During the tenure of Ambassador John Beyrle
, Spaso House was the site of several symbolic events which symbolized the "reset" and improvement of Russian-American relations. These included a reception for Russian World War II veterans, which featured a real World War II Lend-Lease
jeep parked in the ballroom; a ceremony for the return of a medallion, owned by the family of Czar Nicholas II, which had been stolen from the Hermitage Museum, and recovered by American and Russian law enforcement; and a ceremony on July 20, 2010 honoring the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project
, the first joint Soviet-American space mission in July 1975, with the participation of astronauts Thomas Patten Stafford
and Vance Brand and cosmonauts Alexei Leonov and Valeri Kubasov
.
On October 29, 2010, Ambassador Beyrle celebrated the connections between American and Russian literature and culture by hosting an Enchanted Ball at Spaso House. The ball recalled the Spring Ball of 1935 held by Ambassador William Bullitt
, which inspired the ball in the novel Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
. Guests at the 2010 ball included theater director Oleg Tabakov
, writers Victor Erofeev and Vladimir Sorokin
, and sculptors Zurab Tsereteli
and Alexander Bourganov
.
(See video of ball below under external links).
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...
Revival building at No. 10 Spasopeskovskaya Square in Moscow. It was originally built in 1913 as the mansion of the textile industrialist Nikolay Vtorov
Nikolay Vtorov
Nikolay Alexandrovich Vtorov was a Russian businessman, notable as Russia's wealthiest man on the eve of World War I ....
. Since 1933 it has been the residence of the U.S. Ambassador to the USSR and (since 1991) to the Russian Federation.
Early History
Spaso House takes its name from Spasopeskovskaya Square, in the Arbat District. 'Spasopeskovskaya' meant "Saviour on the Sands," referring to the sandy soil of the neighborhood, which was first settled in the seventeenth century. Most of the original wooden houses on the square were burned by the fire of Moscow (1812)Fire of Moscow (1812)
The 1812 Fire of Moscow broke out on September 14, 1812 in Moscow on the day when Russian troops and most residents abandoned the city and Napoleon's vanguard troops entered the city following the Battle of Borodino...
. New stone houses were built soon afterwards, including two one-story mansions of plaster-covered stone with columned porticos, built by A. G. Shchepochkina, which stand today at number 6 and number 8 Spasopeskovskaya square, on either side of Spaso House.
In 1913 a large lot on the square was sold by Princess Lobanova-Rostovaya to the family of the Russian industrialist Nikolay Vtorov
Nikolay Vtorov
Nikolay Alexandrovich Vtorov was a Russian businessman, notable as Russia's wealthiest man on the eve of World War I ....
, who owned the largest textile manufacturing firm in Imperial Russia. Vtorov commissioned the architects Vladimir Adamovich and Vladimir Mayat, two prominent advocates of the neoclassical
Neoclassical architecture
Neoclassical architecture was an architectural style produced by the neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century, manifested both in its details as a reaction against the Rococo style of naturalistic ornament, and in its architectural formulas as an outgrowth of some classicizing...
style, to build the new mansion. As a student, Adamovich had worked with F.O. Shekhel, the master of Russian Art Nouveau in the early 1900s. They chose the "New Empire" style, which was popular with the Russian business class. The exterior of the house was influenced by the Gagarin House, a fine example of the Muscovite Empire Style, which had been built in the 1820s by Joseph Bové
Joseph Bové
Joseph Bové was a Russian neoclassical architect with Italian roots who supervised reconstruction of Moscow after the Fire of 1812.-Biography:...
.
Another likely source was the Polovtsev House in Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
by Ivan Fomin
Ivan Fomin
Ivan Aleksandrovich Fomin was a Russian architect and educator. He began his career in 1899 in Moscow, working in the Art Nouveau style. After relocating to Saint Petersburg in 1905, he became an established master of the Neoclassical Revival movement...
, completed in 1913.
Externally and internally, Vtorov House was a recreation of an early 1820s upper-class estate, with palladian windows and a perfectly symmetrical floorplan. Work on the house began in April 1913, and by the summer the exterior was nearly completed. Work on the interior continued during the winter of 1913-1914. The house was completed and the Vtorovs moved in shortly before the beginning of World War I in August 1914.
In the turbulent months following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, Nikolay Vtorov died mysteriously and his family fled Russia. Spaso House was expropriated by the new Soviet government. Spaso House served as a reception house for the All-Russia Central Executive Committee, then as a residence for Soviet diplomats, including Georgi Chicherin, the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs from 1918 to 1930, and Lev Karakhan
Lev Karakhan
Lev Mikhailovich Karakhan Armenian Կարախանյան Լեւոն Միքայելի, Russian Лев Михайлович Карахан was an ethnic Armenian-born Russian revolutionary and a Soviet diplomat...
, who was Chicherin's deputy.
The Residence of U.S. Ambassadors to the Soviet Union
After a long period of not recognizing the Soviet Union, the United States finally established diplomatic relations with Moscow in 1933. The first American Ambassador to the Soviet Union, William C. Bullitt, came to Moscow and selected a building on Mokhovaya street as the new U.S. Chancery and the Vtorov House as his temporary residence. The Vtorov House appealed to Bullitt because it had large space for entertaining and an American-style heating system, installed by the Soviet Government in 1928. The new third secretary of the Embassy, George KennanGeorge F. Kennan
George Frost Kennan was an American adviser, diplomat, political scientist and historian, best known as "the father of containment" and as a key figure in the emergence of the Cold War...
, negotiated a three-year lease for the property for $75,000. Bullitt did not ask for a longer lease, because he had a plan to build a new residence, similar to Thomas Jefferson's Monticello
Monticello
Monticello is a National Historic Landmark just outside Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was the estate of Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence, third President of the United States, and founder of the University of Virginia; it is...
, in the Sparrow Hills, but the Soviet government never granted the land for the new house, so Spaso House became the permanent Ambassador's residence.
Early in 1934, the Ambassador and the first American diplomatic staff moved into Spaso House, which, due to structural problems with the Mohovaya street buiiding, at first served as both the residence and Embassy chancery. The U.S. government constructed a new ballroom for Spaso House in 1935 to provide more space for entertaining large groups. On July 4, 1934, Bullitt hosted the first Fourth of July reception at Spaso House, and also led a team of U.S. diplomats in a game of baseball against a team of Moscow-based American journalists.
Bullitt's parties at Spaso House became legendary. The Spaso House Christmas party of 1934, held in the Chandelier Room, featured three performing seals from the Moscow Zoo, who came into the room balancing a Christmas tree, a tray of glasses, and a bottle of champagne. When the performance ended, the seal's trainer, who had been drinking, passed out, and the seals galloped free throughout the house.
The Spring Festival of 1935
Of all the social events held in Spaso House, the most famous was the Spring Festival hosted by Ambassador Bullitt on April 24, 1935. Bullitt instructed his staff to create an event that would surpass every other Embassy party in Moscow's history. The decorations included a forest of ten young birch trees in the chandelier room, a dining room table covered with Finnish tulips, a lawn made of chicory grown on wet felt; an aviary made from fishnet filled with pheasants, parakeets, and one hundred zebra finches, on loan from the Moscow Zoo; and a menagerie of several mountain goats, a dozen white roosters, and a baby bear.Although Stalin did not attend, the four hundred guests at the festival included Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov
Maxim Litvinov
Maxim Maximovich Litvinov was a Russian revolutionary and prominent Soviet diplomat.- Early life and first exile :...
, Defense Minister Kliment Voroshilov
Kliment Voroshilov
Kliment Yefremovich Voroshilov , popularly known as Klim Voroshilov was a Soviet military officer, politician, and statesman...
, Communist Party luminaries Nikolai Bukharin
Nikolai Bukharin
Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin , was a Russian Marxist, Bolshevik revolutionary, and Soviet politician. He was a member of the Politburo and Central Committee , chairman of the Communist International , and the editor in chief of Pravda , the journal Bolshevik , Izvestia , and the Great Soviet...
, Lazar Kaganovich
Lazar Kaganovich
Lazar Moiseyevich Kaganovich was a Soviet politician and administrator and one of the main associates of Joseph Stalin.-Early life:Kaganovich was born in 1893 to Jewish parents in the village of Kabany, Radomyshl uyezd, Kiev Governorate, Russian Empire...
, and Karl Radek
Karl Radek
Karl Bernhardovic Radek was a socialist active in the Polish and German movements before World War I and an international Communist leader after the Russian Revolution....
, and Soviet Marshals Alexsandr Yegerov, Mikhail Tukhachevsky
Mikhail Tukhachevsky
Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky was a Marshal of the Soviet Union, commander in chief of the Red Army , and one of the most prominent victims of Joseph Stalin's Great Purge.-Early life:...
, and Semyon Budyonny
Semyon Budyonny
Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny , sometimes transliterated as Budennyj, Budyonnyy, Budennii, Budenny, Budyoni, Budyenny, or Budenny, was a Soviet cavalryman, military commander, politician and a close ally of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin.-Early life:...
, and the writer Mikhail Bulgakov
Mikhail Bulgakov
Mikhaíl Afanásyevich Bulgákov was a Soviet Russian writer and playwright active in the first half of the 20th century. He is best known for his novel The Master and Margarita, which The Times of London has called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century.-Biography:Mikhail Bulgakov was born on...
.
The festival lasted until the early hours of the morning. The bear became drunk on champagne given to him by Karl Radek, and in the early morning hours the zebra finches escaped from the aviary and perched below the ceilings around the house, but other than that the party was considered a great success.
Mikhail Bulgakov transformed the Spring Festival into The Spring Ball of the Full Moon, which became one of the most memorable episodes of his novel The Master and Margarita
The Master and Margarita
The Master and Margarita is a novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, woven around the premise of a visit by the Devil to the fervently atheistic Soviet Union. Many critics consider the book to be one of the greatest novels of the 20th century, and one of the foremost Soviet satires, directed against a...
.
Spaso House in the Late 1930s and World War II
After July 1935, when the Soviet Government invited the American Communist Party to take part in the anti-western Communist International (Comintern), Soviet-American relations turned increasingly chilly, and Bullitt held no more memorable parties.In 1936 Bullitt was replaced by a new Ambassador, Joseph E. Davies
Joseph E. Davies
Joseph Edward Davies was appointed by President Wilson to be Commissioner of Corporations in 1912, and First Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission in 1915. He was the second Ambassador to represent the United States in the Soviet Union and U.S. Ambassador to Belgium and Luxembourg...
, who was married to Marjorie Post, heiress to the Post Foods fortune. Davies and his wife They made major repairs to Spaso at their own expense, rewiring the house and installing American bathtubs. They also used their private yacht to bring 2000 pints of frozen ice cream to Moscow, much of which spoiled when the power in the house went out.
Davies and his family were also subjected to intense surveillance from the Soviet Government. They learned that their domestic staff were spying on them, and discovered microphones hidden throughout the house.
Davies left Moscow in June 1938, but relations with Moscow remained tense; his successor, Laurence Steinhardt
Laurence Steinhardt
Laurence Adolph Steinhardt was a United States diplomat. He served as the U.S. Minister to Sweden and U.S. Ambassador to Peru, the USSR, Turkey, Czechoslovakia, and Canada....
, did little entertaining at Spaso House.
The German invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 led to dramatic changes in the life of Spaso House. Spaso House was slightly damaged by German bombing in the autumn of 1941. In October 1941, most of the American diplomatic staff were evacuated to the city of Kuibyshev, 540 miles southeast of Moscow. A six-man team of American diplomats, led by Second Secretary Llewellyn Thompson
Llewellyn Thompson
Llewellyn E. "Tommy" Thompson Jr. , was a United States diplomat. He served in Sri Lanka, Austria, and for a lengthy period in the Soviet Union where his tenure saw some of the most significant events of the Cold War....
, kept the Embassy functioning, issuing transit visas and reporting to Washington on the military situation. The new U.S. Ambassador, Admiral William Standley, based in Kuibyshev, traveled regularly to Spaso House to meet with Soviet officials to discuss American military assistance.
In August 1943, as the Germans began to fall back from Moscow, Ambassador W. Averell Harriman replaced Standley, and the full American diplomatic staff returned to Moscow. supplemented by many military staff helping to bring American military aid to the USSR. Spaso House became an office building, a dormitory for staff, and a hotel for important visitors. Spaso House guests included Presidential advisor Harry Hopkins
Harry Hopkins
Harry Lloyd Hopkins was one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's closest advisers. He was one of the architects of the New Deal, especially the relief programs of the Works Progress Administration , which he directed and built into the largest employer in the country...
, former Presidential candidate Wendell Willkie
Wendell Willkie
Wendell Lewis Willkie was a corporate lawyer in the United States and a dark horse who became the Republican Party nominee for the president in 1940. A member of the liberal wing of the GOP, he crusaded against those domestic policies of the New Deal that he thought were inefficient and...
, Secretaries of State Cordell Hull
Cordell Hull
Cordell Hull was an American politician from the U.S. state of Tennessee. He is best known as the longest-serving Secretary of State, holding the position for 11 years in the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt during much of World War II...
and Edward Stettinius. In August 1945, General Dwight Eisenhower came to Spaso House to celebrate the Allied victory in Europe.
In August 1945, a delegation from the Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer...
presented a carved wooden plaque of the Great Seal of the United States
Great Seal of the United States
The Great Seal of the United States is used to authenticate certain documents issued by the United States federal government. The phrase is used both for the physical seal itself , and more generally for the design impressed upon it...
to U.S. Ambassador
Ambassador
An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization....
Averell Harriman, as a "gesture of friendship" to the USSR's 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...
ally
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
. Unbeknown to anbody in the Embassy, it contained The Thing
Thing (listening device)
The Thing, also known as the Great Seal bug, was one of the first covert listening devices to use passive techniques to transmit an audio signal...
, a covert listening device
Covert listening device
A covert listening device, more commonly known as a bug or a wire, is usually a combination of a miniature radio transmitter with a microphone. The use of bugs, called bugging, is a common technique in surveillance, espionage and in police investigations.A bug does not have to be a device...
(or "bug"), enabling the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
to spy on the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. It hung in the ambassador's residential study undetected until it was exposed in 1952.
From March to April 1947, Spaso House was the site of a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers, including Secretary fo State George Marshall
George Marshall
George Catlett Marshall was an American military leader, Chief of Staff of the Army, Secretary of State, and the third Secretary of Defense...
, who met in Moscow to draft the final peace treaties with Germany and Austria.
Spaso House During the Cold War
Increased tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States, the division of Europe into eastern and western blocs, and the Korean War led to increased isolation for the residents of Spaso House. Ambassador George Kennan was always followed by plainclothes police when he left the house, and additional listening devices were found inside Spaso House in 1952, including the microphone hidden inside a wooden seal of the United States.After the death of Joseph Stalin in March 1953, the frozen American-Soviet relationship began little by little to thaw. Communist Party General Secretary 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...
made surprise appearances at the 4th of July receptions at Spaso House in 1954 and 1955. Vice President Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
stayed at Spaso House when he came to Moscow to open the first large-scale American National Exposition in Sokolniki Park, and dined with Khrushchev at a dinner at Spaso House hosted by Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson
Llewellyn Thompson
Llewellyn E. "Tommy" Thompson Jr. , was a United States diplomat. He served in Sri Lanka, Austria, and for a lengthy period in the Soviet Union where his tenure saw some of the most significant events of the Cold War....
. The Cold War was still not over - shortly before Nixon's visit, a microphone was discovered hidden in the chandelier near Ambassador Thompson's office. Nonetheless, five thousand Soviet citizens attended events at Spaso House in 1957, more than in the previous twenty-three years.
The building of the Berlin Wall and Cuban Missile Crisis
Cuban Missile Crisis
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation among the Soviet Union, Cuba and the United States in October 1962, during the Cold War...
caused a new chill in Russian-American relations, but after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
on November 22, 1963, both General Secretary Khrushchev and Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko
Andrei Gromyko
Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko was a Soviet statesman during the Cold War. He served as Minister of Foreign Affairs and as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet . Gromyko was responsible for many top decisions on Soviet foreign policy until he retired in 1987. In the West he was given the...
came to Spaso House to express their condolences to the new U.S. Ambassador, Foy D. Kohler
Foy D. Kohler
Foy David Kohler was an American diplomat and career Foreign Service Officer who was Ambassador to the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis.- Early life :...
.
Detente and the End of the Cold War
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Soviet-American relations began to improve again. On May 26, 1972, President Richard Nixon, Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev and Premier Alexei Kosygin used Spaso House as the venue to announce their agreement on the first round of Strategic Arms Limitation TalksStrategic Arms Limitation Talks
The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty refers to two rounds of bilateral talks and corresponding international treaties involving the United States and the Soviet Union—the Cold War superpowers—on the issue of armament control. There were two rounds of talks and agreements: SALT I and SALT...
(SALT 1) and on an Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. The treaties were signed shortly afterwards at the Kremlin.
The visit of President Nixon was the first visit of a U.S. President to Moscow, and the second visit of a U.S. President to the USSR since Franklin Roosevelt went to Yalta in February 1945. While Nixon did not stay at Spaso House, staying at the Kremlin instead, he did host a dinner for Soviet leaders in the ballroom of Spaso House on May 26, 1972, after the announcement of the START and ABM agreements.
That evening the pianist Van Cliburn
Van Cliburn
Harvey Lavan "Van" Cliburn Jr. is an American pianist who achieved worldwide recognition in 1958 at age 23, when he won the first quadrennial International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow, at the height of the Cold War....
also played a concert at Spaso House, the first of a long series of performances at Spaso by major American artists.
The early 1980s saw a series of turnovers in the Soviet leadership. Vice President George H.W. Bush came to Spaso house three times to attend the funerals of General Secretaries Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev – 10 November 1982) was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. His eighteen-year term as General Secretary was second only to that of Joseph Stalin in...
, Yuri Andropov
Yuri Andropov
Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov was a Soviet politician and the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 12 November 1982 until his death fifteen months later.-Early life:...
and Konstantin Chernenko
Konstantin Chernenko
Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko was a Soviet politician and the fifth General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He led the Soviet Union from 13 February 1984 until his death thirteen months later, on 10 March 1985...
.
In April, 1986, another American cultural envoy, pianist Vladimir Horowitz. stayed at Spaso House, along with his own Steinway piano, shipped by diplomatic pouch from New York, preparing for his historic April 20 concert at the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...
, marking his return to his homeland after an absence of 60 years. Other notable American musicians who performed at Spaso were Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
, Mstislav Rostropovich
Mstislav Rostropovich
Mstislav Leopoldovich Rostropovich, KBE , known to close friends as Slava, was a Soviet and Russian cellist and conductor. He was married to the soprano Galina Vishnevskaya. He is widely considered to have been the greatest cellist of the second half of the 20th century, and one of the greatest of...
, Ray Charles
Ray Charles
Ray Charles Robinson , known by his shortened stage name Ray Charles, was an American musician. He was a pioneer in the genre of soul music during the 1950s by fusing rhythm and blues, gospel, and blues styles into his early recordings with Atlantic Records...
, and Chick Corea
Chick Corea
Armando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
. On May 31, 1988, the jazz pianist Dave Brubeck
Dave Brubeck
David Warren "Dave" Brubeck is an American jazz pianist. He has written a number of jazz standards, including "In Your Own Sweet Way" and "The Duke". Brubeck's style ranges from refined to bombastic, reflecting his mother's attempts at classical training and his improvisational skills...
performed in the Spaso House ballroom for President Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
and the new Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...
.
The 1991 Fourth of July Reception at Spaso House was not attended by President Gorbachev, but it was attended by Boris Yeltsin
Boris Yeltsin
Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was the first President of the Russian Federation, serving from 1991 to 1999.Originally a supporter of Mikhail Gorbachev, Yeltsin emerged under the perestroika reforms as one of Gorbachev's most powerful political opponents. On 29 May 1990 he was elected the chairman of...
, the President of the Russian Federation. A month later, an attempted coup against Gorbachev failed, the Soviet Union collapsed, and Yelstin became the leader of the new Russia. The 1992 Fourth of July Reception was not attended by Boris Yeltsin, but it was attended by Mikhail Gorbachev, who no longer had a job. The occupant of Spaso House, Ambassador Robert Strauss
Robert Schwarz Strauss
Robert Schwarz Strauss is a figure in American politics and diplomacy. A Texas political figure, Strauss’s political service dates back to future president Lyndon Johnson’s first congressional campaign in 1937. By the 1950s, he was associated in Texas politics with the conservative faction of...
, had a new title; he was the last Ambassador to the Soviet Union and the first Ambassador to the Russian Federation.
Spaso House in the Post-Soviet Era
in the years following the breakup of the Soviet Union, President William J. Clinton visited Moscow four times, and each time was a guest of Spaso House. On March 24, 2002, President George W. Bush also came to Spaso House to commemorate the signing that day of the Moscow Treaty on Strategic Offensive Arms Reductions.During the tenure of Ambassador John Beyrle
John Beyrle
John R. Beyrle , a career Foreign Service Officer and specialist in Russian and Eastern European affairs, is currently Ambassador of the United States to the Russian Federation.- Biography :...
, Spaso House was the site of several symbolic events which symbolized the "reset" and improvement of Russian-American relations. These included a reception for Russian World War II veterans, which featured a real World War II Lend-Lease
Lend-Lease
Lend-Lease was the program under which the United States of America supplied the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, China, Free France, and other Allied nations with materiel between 1941 and 1945. It was signed into law on March 11, 1941, a year and a half after the outbreak of war in Europe in...
jeep parked in the ballroom; a ceremony for the return of a medallion, owned by the family of Czar Nicholas II, which had been stolen from the Hermitage Museum, and recovered by American and Russian law enforcement; and a ceremony on July 20, 2010 honoring the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project
-Backup crew:-Crew notes:Jack Swigert had originally been assigned as the command module pilot for the ASTP prime crew, but prior to the official announcement he was removed as punishment for his involvement in the Apollo 15 postage stamp scandal.-Soyuz crew:...
, the first joint Soviet-American space mission in July 1975, with the participation of astronauts Thomas Patten Stafford
Thomas Patten Stafford
Thomas Patten Stafford is a retired American Air Force lieutenant general and former NASA astronaut. He flew aboard two Gemini space flights; and in 1969 was the commander of Apollo 10, the second manned mission to orbit the Moon and the first to fly a lunar module there.In 1975, Stafford was...
and Vance Brand and cosmonauts Alexei Leonov and Valeri Kubasov
Valeri Kubasov
Valeri Nikolayevich Kubasov was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew on two missions in the Soyuz programme as a flight engineer: Soyuz 6 and Soyuz 19 , and commanded Soyuz 36 in the Intercosmos programme. On 21 July 1975, Soviet Soyuz module landed in Kazakhstan at-5:51pm and Valeriy Kubasov was the first...
.
On October 29, 2010, Ambassador Beyrle celebrated the connections between American and Russian literature and culture by hosting an Enchanted Ball at Spaso House. The ball recalled the Spring Ball of 1935 held by Ambassador William Bullitt
William Bullitt
William Christian Bullitt, Jr. was an American diplomat, journalist, and novelist. Although in his youth he was considered something of a radical, he later became an outspoken anticommunist.-Early years:...
, which inspired the ball in the novel Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Mikhail Bulgakov
Mikhaíl Afanásyevich Bulgákov was a Soviet Russian writer and playwright active in the first half of the 20th century. He is best known for his novel The Master and Margarita, which The Times of London has called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century.-Biography:Mikhail Bulgakov was born on...
. Guests at the 2010 ball included theater director Oleg Tabakov
Oleg Tabakov
Oleg Pavlovich Tabakov is a Soviet and Russian actor and the artistic director of the Moscow Art Theatre.-Theatre career:...
, writers Victor Erofeev and Vladimir Sorokin
Vladimir Sorokin
Vladimir Georgievich Sorokin is a contemporary postmodern Russian writer and dramatist, one of the most popular in modern Russian literature.-Biography:...
, and sculptors Zurab Tsereteli
Zurab Tsereteli
Zurab Konstantines dze Tsereteli is a Georgian-Russian painter, sculptor and architect who holds the office of President of the Russian Academy of Arts.- Life :...
and Alexander Bourganov
Alexander Bourganov
Alexander Bourganov is a Russian sculptor, a National Artist of Russia, and a member of the Russian Academy of Fine Arts. His recent works include a monument to Alexander Pushkin located at George Washington University in Washington DC ; a statue of John Quincy Adams, the first U.S...
.
(See video of ball below under external links).
U.S. Ambassadors who lived in Spaso House
| Ambassador | Date of arrival |
|---|---|
| William C. Bullitt | November 1933 |
| Joseph E. Davies Joseph E. Davies Joseph Edward Davies was appointed by President Wilson to be Commissioner of Corporations in 1912, and First Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission in 1915. He was the second Ambassador to represent the United States in the Soviet Union and U.S. Ambassador to Belgium and Luxembourg... |
November 1936 |
| Laurence A. Steinhardt | March 1939 |
| William H. Standley | February 1942 |
| W. Averell Harriman W. Averell Harriman William Averell Harriman was an American Democratic Party politician, businessman, and diplomat. He was the son of railroad baron E. H. Harriman. He served as Secretary of Commerce under President Harry S. Truman and later as the 48th Governor of New York... |
October 1943 |
| Walter Bedell Smith Walter Bedell Smith Walter Bedell "Beetle" Smith was a senior United States Army general who served as General Dwight D. Eisenhower's chief of staff at Allied Forces Headquarters during the Tunisia Campaign and the Allied invasion of Italy... |
March 1946 |
| Alan G. Kirk | May 1949 |
| George F. Kennan George F. Kennan George Frost Kennan was an American adviser, diplomat, political scientist and historian, best known as "the father of containment" and as a key figure in the emergence of the Cold War... |
March 1952 |
| Charles E. Bohlen Charles E. Bohlen Charles Eustis “Chip” Bohlen was a United States diplomat from 1929 to 1969 and Soviet expert, serving in Moscow before and during World War II, succeeding George F. Kennan as United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union , then ambassador to the Philippines , and to France... |
March 1953 |
| Llewellyn E. Thompson | June 1957 |
| Foy D. Kohler Foy D. Kohler Foy David Kohler was an American diplomat and career Foreign Service Officer who was Ambassador to the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis.- Early life :... |
August 1962 |
| Llewellyn E. Thompson | December 1967 |
| Jacob D. Beam Jacob D. Beam Jacob Dyneley Beam was an American diplomat.Beam was born in Princeton, New Jersey. His father was a German professor at Princeton University, and the younger Beam earned a bachelor's degree in 1929 from Princeton... |
April 1969 |
| Walter J. Stoessel, Jr. | February 1974 |
| Malcolm Toon Malcolm Toon Malcolm Toon was an American diplomat. He graduated from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy of Tufts University in 1938, and served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Toon was the ambassador to Czechoslovakia from 1969–1971, Yugoslavia from 1971–1975, Israel from 1975–1976, and the Soviet... |
January 1977 |
| Thomas J. Watson, Jr. Thomas J. Watson, Jr. Thomas John Watson, Jr. was an American businessman, political figure, and philanthropist. He was the 2nd president of IBM , the 11th national president of the Boy Scouts of America , and the 16th United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union... |
October 1979 |
| Arthur A. Hartman Arthur A. Hartman Arthur Adair Hartman is a retired American career diplomat who served as Ambassador to France under Jimmy Carter and Ambassador to the Soviet Union under Ronald Reagan.-Career:... |
October 1981 |
| Jack F. Matlock, Jr. Jack F. Matlock, Jr. Jack Foust Matlock, Jr. is a former American ambassador, career Foreign Service Officer, a teacher, an historian, and a linguist. He was a specialist in Soviet affairs during some of the most tumultuous years of the Cold War, and served as U.S... |
April 1987 |
| Robert S. Strauss | August 1991 |
| Thomas R. Pickering Thomas R. Pickering Thomas Reeve "Tom" Pickering , is a retired United States ambassador. Among his many diplomatic appointments, he served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 1989 to 1992.-Early life:... |
May 1993 |
| James F. Collins James Franklin Collins James Franklin Collins is a former United States Ambassador to Russia. A career Foreign Service Officer in the State Department, he is a Russian specialist.- Biography :... |
September 1997 |
| Alexander Vershbow Alexander Vershbow Alexander Russell "Sandy" Vershbow is an American Assistant Secretary of Defense and diplomat.Until October 2008, he was the United States Ambassador to South Korea; he was appointed to the position in October 2005. Before that post he had been the ambassador to the Russian Federation from 2001 to... |
July 2001 |
| William Joseph Burns William Joseph Burns William J. Burns , an American diplomat, is the current Deputy Secretary of State and the highest ranked Foreign Service Officer in the United States. He is only the second serving career diplomat in U.S. history to become Deputy Secretary... |
July 2005 |
| John Beyrle John Beyrle John R. Beyrle , a career Foreign Service Officer and specialist in Russian and Eastern European affairs, is currently Ambassador of the United States to the Russian Federation.- Biography :... |
July 2008 |