Right

Ground

On February 4 ( February 16 ), 1854, the Russian government decided to erect a military fortification . In the spring of 1854, the construction of the Zailiysky fortification, later called the Faithful Fortification , began. Major Mikhail Dmitrievich Peremyshlsky, the head of the Zaili military detachment, together with lieutenant engineer Aleksandrovsky supervised the construction; by the fall of that year, all work was completed. In the log wooden houses and barracks, 470 soldiers and officers of the Zaili detachment were located ^[1] .

Settlement

From the middle of 1855, Russian immigrants began to arrive in the fortification. With their arrival, Faithful began to develop rapidly. In 1865, in the vicinity of Verny, the first seedlings of Aport were brought by a migrant from the Voronezh province Georgy Filippovich Redko (his children and neighbors called Grandfather Egor). Systematic species selection, including crossbreeding with the local wild-growing apple tree of Sievers, made this variety famous in imperial times ^{[2] [3]} .

Near the fortification appeared Big and Small villages, Tatar settlement . In 1856, the Treasury Garden (now the Central Park of Culture and Leisure ) was founded, and in 1857 the first water mill was built in the area of ​​the Tatar settlement. The first brewery, which went into operation in 1858, marked the beginning of the local manufacturing industry. In 1859, the geodesist Golubev sent from St. Petersburg marked Vernoye with a dot, and this place first appeared on world maps. By May 1859, there were already five thousand inhabitants in the fortification. In 1860, the first post office and hospital were opened.

1863 g

Capital status

On April 11 ( April 23 ), 1867, the city of Verny became the center of the Semirechensk region as part of the Turkestan governor-general . Major General Gerasim Kolpakovsky was appointed military governor, punishment chieftain of the Semirechensky Cossacks and commander of the troops located in the region. On July 13 ( July 25 ), 1867, the Semirechensk Cossack Army was established. At the same time, the emblem of the Semirechensk region was approved: a shield entwined with a garland of apple branches with fruits, divided into three fields. Upper - the image of the fortress, lower: on the left is a cross, on the right is a crescent. Having become the center of the Semirechensk region, Verny began to develop industry and crafts. There were distilleries and breweries, a factory for the production of coarse-woolen cloth. The largest enterprises of the city were the tobacco factories of Gavrilov (1875) and Kadkina (1900). Female and male schools, parish and craft schools, and later male and female gymnasiums were opened in the city. On January 1 ( January 13 ), 1879, the Semirechensk Regional Statistics Committee was opened, and on April 5 ( April 17 ), the first one-day census of the population of the city of Verny and the adjacent Big and Small Almaty villages was made.

Verna earthquake

On May 28 ( June 9 ), 1887, a major earthquake occurred in Verny, in which 332 people died. In the city of Verny, the Big Almaty and Malo Almaty villages, 161 people were killed (118 of them children). In the soldiers’ barracks, 14 soldiers died (of which 10 prisoners in the military guardhouse). In the mountains, 154 people died under the landslides (of which 87 were Kyrgyz).

1798 brick houses were destroyed. The buildings of the Greater and Lesser villages, built of wood, were less affected. Subsequently, a seismic and meteorological station was organized in the city under the guidance of the architect A.P. Zenkov, and a system for accounting for seismicity in the construction of buildings was developed. After the earthquake, mainly wood was used to build the city. Large buildings of the city were built from it - the House of the regiment of the military assembly, the Cathedral , the House of the public assembly and others. Some buildings of that period have survived and are now historical, architectural monuments and are protected by the state.

In memory of the victims of the earthquake, the Znamenskaya Chapel was built in the center of Gostinodvorskaya Square. Architect Pavel Vasilyevich Gourde , artist Nikolai Gavrilovich Khludov . The construction cost the city 5269 rubles. 50 kopecks., Of which 5112 rubles. 57 kopecks donations received. Large amounts were contributed by merchants Yevtikhiy Fomin, Nikita Pugasov, Mikhail Alikin and others. Every year, on May 28, a procession to the chapel took place. In 1927, during the reconstruction of the bazaar, the chapel was demolished.

Kemin earthquake

On December 22 ( January 3, 1911 ), 1910, the Kemin earthquake struck Verny. 776 houses were destroyed, of which 94 houses were the Cossacks of the Bolshe-Almaty village. 35 people were killed, including 9 Cossacks; 168 injured, 18 of them seriously. Based on the number of destroyed houses, the City Duma identified 3,500-4,000 people as victims and in need of help. To provide for the poor affected by the earthquake in Verny, seven free canteens were set up using military kitchens. Four canteens were for the Christian population in different parts of the city most affected by the disaster. One for Muslims and Christians. The other two are only for Muslims, at the Namangan mosque for Sarts , Dungans , Kashgars , and at Taranchinsky for taranches. Among the poorest people, free distribution of warm clothes, shoes and fuel was organized - 2 logs and 5 pieces of dung for the family. For the speedy repair of houses, the issuance by check of private warehouses of building materials, bricks, slabs, boards, nails, etc., was organized. The chief manager of land management and agriculture allowed the free issuance of forests of 2 trees per house ^[4] .

On the eve of the revolution

On the eve of 1913, more than 41 thousand people lived in the city, there were 59 industrial enterprises ^[5] .

Soviet period

In 1918, Soviet power was established in the city. March 3, 1921 by the decision of the CEC of the Turkestan ASSR , in the framework of the policy of indigenization , the city was given a new name - Alma-Ata ^[6] . In 1927, the city became the capital of the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic ^[7] .

Theaters

Theater art began to develop in the city of Verny a few years after the founding of military fortification. On November 21, 1872, the first urban production was presented - a play by A. N. Ostrovsky “Do not get in your sled,” which was staged by the Society of Dramatic Art Lovers. The plays in Verny went to the Public , Military or Commercial meetings ^[8] .

Theatrical art was part of charity, and often the performances were staged to raise funds for lyceum students and gymnasium students of the city. On July 30, 1913, a charity evening was held at the Military Assembly in favor of insufficient applicants to the gymnasium. The program included: Potapenko’s comedy “Bouquet”, a joke in one action “Inheritance helped”, a concert department.

The first opera in the city was staged on February 23, 1913 at the Commercial Assembly to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the reign of the Romanov dynasty. It was Glinka's opera Life for the Tsar in abbreviation. It was delivered by a three-class city ​​school named after General Kolpakovsky .

The pre-revolutionary period also included the emergence in Verny of theatrical art among Muslims. On October 5, 1913, the first Muslim musical and dramatic evening hosted by local Muslims in favor of a Muslim reading library was held at the premises of the Commercial Assembly. One-act comedy in the Tatar language “Berenche Theater” (“The First Theater”) by A. Kamalov was shown ^[8] .

Cinemas

The first film screening in the city took place in 1900, when physicist K.O. Krause arrived in the city. It demonstrated glass transparencies , hand-painted, using a slide projector. The film show took place on January 25 in the Pushkin Garden . At the same time, an attraction was created in the city - an electric panorama, in which shots of eating a buffalo by a python were shown, as well as piquant scenes on which entry was forbidden for young men under 16 years of age and ladies ^[9] .

In January 1911, the building of the first private cinema “Twentieth Century” was opened at the intersection of Pushkinskaya and Gogolevskaya Streets, owned by businessman A. R. Seifullin. It was the first building built after the severe earthquake of 1910. Permanent film demonstrations began in the fall of that year. To demonstrate films, the cinema was equipped with the first in the history of the city power station produced by the English company Petter, with 14 horsepower. The interior of the cinema was made by the artist N. G. Prusinovsky, and the Symphony jukebox was installed in the foyer to play melodies. The cinema building burned down in February 1918 ^[9] .

Museums

A significant contribution to the study of the history of culture and ethnography of southern Kazakhs in the late XIX - early XX centuries was made by Turkestan scholars and local historians who united around scientific societies and cultural and educational institutions of Tashkent . In 1874, from the private collections of travelers who visited Semirechye with a scientific and local history purpose and with the help of local intelligentsia, the museum in the city of Verny was first created, which was later transformed into the village museum of the Semirechensky Cossack army . This date is the day of the formation of the first museum in Semirechye ^[10] .

The first director and chief curator of the funds of the Semirechensky Museum was the local historian V.E. Nedzvetsky. His ascetic activity made it possible to significantly replenish the museum’s funds, systematize the collected collections, and publish a number of works of scientific importance in our time.

Heading the Semirechensk Regional Museum, Nedzvetsky made a significant contribution to its formation and development. Some of the exhibits from the Wildlife section, which are still on display at the Central Museum of Kazakhstan , were made at the time by Nedzvetsky. At the request of scientists P.P. Semenov-Tian-Shansky , G.L. Suvorov, N.V. Nasonov and others, he collected for them collections of the Zhetysu fauna in duplicate. Leaving one at a local museum, and the second sent to scientists, receiving in return a description of these collections. Thus, these museum collections were the result of collective work: an assiduous collector of Nedzvetsky and Russian scientists-researchers of Semirechye ^[11] .

The collection of the Semirechensk Regional Museum was so interesting that thefts often occurred, committed both by local residents and foreign citizens. So, the curator of the museum wrote ^[12] :

• Seven Rivers
• Vernensky County

• Kazakhstan. National Encyclopedia . - Almaty: “Mәdeni Mұra” - “The Cultural Heritage of Kazakhstan”, 2004. - T. 1. - 560 p. - ISBN 9965-9389-7-0 .