Museum Construction in Ural Region (1923–1934): Based on the Materials of the State Archive of Sverdlovsk Region

Abstract

This article considers the development of the network of museums in Ural Region in 1923–1934. The author examines the features of the Ural museums, such as formation, organization, management, typology, educational activities, interaction with the Soviet authorities, the relationship of museums and the Ural local history movement, as well as the influence of state policy. Museums emerged in the Urals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During the post-revolutionary period, i.e. in 1917–1923, in many ways due to the purposeful state policy, new institutions appeared in the museum network. The reorganization of the administrative and territorial division in the Urals influenced the interaction between the local authorities and the museums subordinate to them. The introduction of a new economic policy in 1921 positively influenced the activity of the museums. Local history organizations and societies actively conducted scientific and educational work on their basis. With the creation of the super-region, Ural Region, in 1924, the museum activity on its territory was directed at implementing the decisions of the RSFSR People’s Commissariat for Education. Based on data sent to the museum subdivision of the Ural Public Education Department, the author reconstructs the museum system of the region as of 1926. The results of the analysis make it possible to speak about the inefficiency of the accounting and control of museums by the Ural Public Education Department. In addition to the complex management of museums, the museum industry also faced other problems. Throughout the 1920s, the material and normative consolidation of the museum network took place. By the early 1930s, the rejection of the new economic policy was followed by the ideological rethinking of the museum’s functions. The museum and local history movement shifted its focus from education and excursion activity to propaganda and political-educational tasks. The author draws a conclusion about the contradictions in the development of museums in the Soviet Urals between the 1920s and the early 1930s characterized by the complexity of management, weakness of material resources, low financing of the creation of the new Soviet museum. The paper refers to documents of the State Archive of Sverdlovsk Region.