the capital of the Karelian ASSR. Landing on Lake Onega; junction of railroad lines to Leningrad, Murmansk, and Sortavala; airport.
Petrozavodsk extends nearly 25 km along the Petrozavodsk Bay. Population, 203,000 (1974; 27,000 in 1926; 70,000 in 1939; 135,000 in 1959; 184,000 in 1970). The city was founded in 1703 as Petrovskaia Sloboda, in connection with the construction of a cannon foundry (one of the Olonets foundries). In 1777, Petrozavodsk became a district capital, and from 1784 to 1796 it was a province city and the administrative center of Olonets namestnichestvo (vicegerency). In 1801 the city became the administrative center of Olonets Province. In 1862 regular steamship communication with St. Petersburg was established. The Petrograd-Murmansk Railroad was built through Petrozavodsk in 1916.
By 1904 approximately 1,000 people were employed at the Aleksandrovskii Shell Factory (founded in 1773 as a cannon factory) in Petrozavodsk. In 1906 a Social Democratic group arose there, and in 1907 a committee of the RSDLP was formed.
Before the October Revolution of 1917, Petrozavodsk was a place of political exile. Soviet power was established there on Jan. 4(17), 1918, and in 1920 the city became the administrative center of the Karelian Workers’ Commune, which in 1923 was renamed the Karelian ASSR. During the Great Patriotic War of 1941-45, Petrozavodsk was occupied from Oct. 2, 1941, to June 28, 1944, by Finnish troops, who inflicted much damage. The city was liberated by the Svir’-Petrozavodsk Operation of 1944.
Petrozavodsk is a major industrial center of Karelia, accounting for more than one-fourth of the republic’s industrial output. The principal industrial sectors are machine building and metal-working. The largest enterprises are the Onega Tractor Plant (tractors for timber-hauling), a plant producing heavy paper-making machinery, a machine-tool plant, and a shipyard. Petrozavodsk also has a mica factory, a housing construction combine, and a sawmilling and furniture manufacture combine. Various light industries and the food-processing industry are well developed.
Petrozavodsk has been rebuilt after having suffered great destruction between 1941 and 1944. Situated on terraces leading to the lake shore, the city has a geometrically planned layout. Administrative buildings, large apartment buildings, and the university are located along the main thoroughfare, V. I. Lenin Prospect, which extends from the embankment to the railroad station. The most important buildings of the 1950’s and 1960’s include the Russian Dramatic Theater and the Music Theater of the Karelian ASSR (1953-55, architect S. G. Brodskii, sculptor S. T. Konenkov), the Public Library (1959, architect K. Ia. Gutin), the Finnish Dramatic Theater (renovated in 1965, architect S. G. Brodskii), and the Railroad Workers’ Club (1966, architect E. B. Adaleva). The neoclassical Kruglaia Square (now Lenin Square) ensemble has been preserved (1775, architect E. S. Nazarov; rebuilt from 1787 to 1789 and again in 1839).
Petrozavodsk has monuments to Peter I (bronze and granite, 1873, sculptor I. N. Shreder, architect I. A. Monighetti), Lenin (granite, 1933, sculptor M. G. Manizer, architect L. A. Il’in), S. M. Kirov (bronze and red granite, 1936, sculptor M. G. Manizer, architect L. A. Il’in), K. Marx and F. Engels (crimson quartzite and bronze; unveiled in 1960; sculptors E. I. Belostot-skii, E. M. Fridman, and P. F. Osipenko), and O. V. Kuusinen (granite, 1973, sculptor B. I. Diuzhev, architect A. A. Zavar-zin). Also in Petrozavodsk is the memorial complex Mass Grave and Tomb of the Unknown Soldier With the Perpetual Fire of Glory (granite, diabase, and crimson quartzite; unveiled in 1969, architects E. F. Andreev and E. V. Voskresenskii, sculptors E. A. Akulov and L. K. Davidian).
Petrozavodsk is the site of the Karelian branch of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, the University of Petrozavodsk, a branch of the Leningrad Conservatory, a pedagogical institute, and 13 secondary specialized educational institutions. Also in the city are the Karelian Museum of Local Lore and the Museum of Fine Arts of the Karelian ASSR. As of 1975, peformances were given at the Musical Theater of the Karelian ASSR, the Russian Dramatic Theater of the Karelian ASSR, the Finnish Dramatic Theater, the Puppet Theater, and the K. Rautio Music School.