Prayer Plant

Molebsky Iron-Making Plant is a plant located in the village of Molebka of the Krasnoufimsky district of the Perm province , now in the Kishert district of the Perm Territory .

It was founded by Alexander Grigorievich Demidov on the Molebka River, which flows into the Sylva River, a tributary of the Chusovaya River, 70 kilometers southeast of Kungur, 168 miles from Perm. The construction site, discovered back in the 1770s, was examined by non-commissioned master E. Kuznetsov. A. G. Demidov in 1775 and 1779 appealed to the Berg College with a request for permission to construct a blast furnace and a hammer factory, but was refused. In the 80s, he renewed the application and received permission to build a plant. On October 7, 1787, the first smelting of cast iron took place. In the 1790s, the plant had 1 blast furnace, 8 critical horns and 4 critical hammers. Serfs transferred from other Demidov enterprises were engaged in factory and auxiliary works. The history of the Molёbka plant, as it was called until its closure at the end of the XIX century, is inextricably linked with the Demidov dynasty. They created a powerful industrial empire in the Urals, consisting of dozens of factories, which included: Revdinsky (iron and blast furnace, founded in 1731), Rozhdestvensky (now the village of Nozhovka on Kama, iron and steel, founded in 1730), Staroutkinsky blast furnace, Shaitan molotovy , Bisersky hammer, Suksunsky ironworks (founded in 1729), Bymovsky (founded in 1736), Ashapsky (founded in 1745), Shakvinsky smelter (founded in 1740), Tisovsky sawmill (1730), Tula desolation plant and part of the mountain mines High and others. After the death of Grigory Demidov, which followed in November 1761, this group of factories was divided into three parts, according to the number of sons of the deceased. The eldest son, Alexander G. Demidov (future creator of the Moleb plant), received the Suksunsky, Bymovsky, Ashapsky, Shakvinsky and idle Tisovsky factories. Soon Alexander bought from his brother Pavel Utkinsky and Kambarsky factories for 75 thousand rubles. Of the three brothers, Alexander was the most enterprising.

Prayer factory. 1870 year.

The “General Gazette", compiled by the Berg College in 1797, registered behind it seven plants instead of four inherited. And all the plants were considered working. The plants of the new owner became known as the “Suksunsky District” of the actual state adviser A. G. Demidov.

In the district there was only one plant in Staraya Utka, which smelted cast iron, the rest of the factories did not have a domain and only smelted iron from Staroutkino cast iron. Due to the range of transportation of pig iron from Utka to Suksun and Tees (130 versts) horse-drawn vehicles in the winter and summer rafting to the Kambara ironworks did not work at full capacity, they often stood idle. As a result, the cost of metal increased. In this situation, there was an urgent need for the construction of a new blast furnace plant, which would have its own ore, forests, and would be located in close proximity to ironworks.

A place that meets all these requirements was found 35 miles from the Suksunsky and Tisovsky factories. There was a river for the factory pond, a flood river and an ore base. Around stood virgin forests.

The first intention to build a new blast furnace at A. G. Demidov appeared in 1775, when the main Suksunsky office informed him of the right tributary of the river found on the Molebka River. Sylva, "a place free and capable of building a blast furnace and a hammer factory."

The report of the Main Board of the Siberian, Kazan and Orenburg Factories to the State Berg Collegium of August 23, 1779 No. 3517 states: “This August, to the local Main Plant of the Board of the Office of the Perm Mining Administration, the denunciation announced that the Suksun Berg was sent on February 19 this year. the collegium of adviser Alexander Demidov, the factory office, registering with such information from her to that authorities in 1775 in the month of June about the Molebnaya river found by the ministers sent by her ministers in the Kungursky district when it flows into the river On the right side, near the mouth of this free and capable of building a blast and hammer production site, which, according to the testimony of the authorities purposely sent in the same year, untershacht master Yegor Kuznetsov and was able to withdraw empty forests with a limit of sixty years ... "

However, official permission for the construction of the plant was received only a few years later. The long correspondence between the Berg College and Demidov ended in 1782. It is this year that is considered to be the date of the founding of the Moleb ironworks.

Construction began with the construction of the dam. The Molebka (Molebnaya) River was blocked perpendicular to the axis of its floodplain with an earthen dam 10.5 meters high, more than two hundred meters long, with a width of 55 meters on the bottom and 30 meters on the top. According to local historian Sergey Belyaevsky, a groovy row of bars of 176 × 18 centimeters was made inside the dam along its entire length. The pressure of the water created by the dam was 7.7 meters. The pond's mirror was 58 hectares in area. The spring culvert of the dam was located in the riverbed. Its width is 12 meters, and its total length is almost forty-two meters. The flutters (constipation) had a height of two fathoms and 2.5 arshins (fathom - 2-1.33 m, arshin - 71.1 cm), a width of five fathoms and two arshins. For the works of the ironworks, a second cut (drainage) was made, where the water was enclosed in wooden pipes (lari), connected to the working water wheels. The design of the drainage gates is pile-threaded, stable masonry on limestone mortar, and the base was a larch log made of larch logs of more than 35 centimeters in diameter. The source of the river is 5 kilometers north of Cordon station. Its length is about 30 kilometers, and the area of ​​the drain is 29 square kilometers. The main course of the river is from north to south. The width of the valley of the Molebke River ranges from 250 to 350 meters, the height of the primary banks above the length is about 50 meters. The bedrock of the river valley is sandstone, covered with a layer of clay on top. The floodplain rocks are clay and loam mixed with crushed stone. The width of the river bed is about 20 meters. The height of the edge of the banks above the low water (the lowest water) is on average 3 meters, the water depth in the low water is 0.5 meters, the maximum spring flood horizon is 2.7 meters.

In the early 1880s, it had three dams: the main and 2 auxiliary. At the main dam there were 2 blast furnaces located in stone buildings. In blast-furnace factory No. 1 there were dilapidated blast furnaces and single-blow cylindrical furs; In blast furnace No. 2, there was a working blast furnace with cold blasting. At the lower auxiliary dam, there was a nail with 4 horns and 2 nailing hammers, a coal-burning and annealing furnace, as well as storage rooms. At the upper auxiliary dam were the remains of a pudding factory. The mining department planned to resume ironmaking through the construction of a pudding and welding factory, but this idea remained unrealized. The plant reached its main capacity by 1810 and already in 1811 the first outfit for the production of ammunition for the Russian army was received. But the plant could not cope with this order and by 1812 owed to the treasury 116 pounds of shells. The debt was replenished during the execution of the next order in 1812. The Moleb factory was supposed to hand over 7706 pounds of 17 pounds of shells in 1812. The government order looked like this:

  "PRODUCE:
   24-pound cores 457 pcs.  totaling 297 pounds 2 pounds.
   18 pound cores 400 pcs.  total weight 200 pounds.
   12 pound cores 2288 pcs.  a total weight of 743 pounds 24 pounds.
   6 pounds 3600 cores  total weight of 630 pounds.
   3 pound cores 8118 pcs.  a total weight of 710 pounds 13 pounds.
   5-pound bombs 520 pcs.  total weight 2500 pounds.
   2-pound bombs 1143 pcs.  total weight of 2286 pounds.
   Card file No. 1 57146 pcs.  total weight 130 pounds 8 pounds.
   Card file number 7 9536 pcs.  totaling 109 pounds 10 pounds. "

For two years of shells production, the artisans of the plant gained good casting experience, which allowed them to carry out orders of subsequent years ahead of schedule.

The casting of shells was discontinued in 1816, and the plant again switched to the production of peaceful products.

By 1840, due to improper exploration of resources and the merciless exploitation of forest dachas, where charcoal was prepared for blast furnaces, many of the district's plants began to reduce production. The same problem arose at the Molebka plant. Located on the river Molebnaya .