Rybinsk

For the aerospace propulsion manufacturer formerly known as Rybinsk Motors, see NPO Saturn.

Rybinsk (English) Рыбинск (Russian)
-  City[citation needed]  -
View of the historic center from the Volga
Location of Yaroslavl Oblast in Russia
Rybinsk
Coordinates: 58°03′N 38°50′E
	Coat of arms
Administrative status
Country	Russia
Federal subject	Yaroslavl Oblast
Municipal status
Urban okrug	Rybinsk Urban Okrug[citation needed]
Mayor[citation needed]	Yury Lastochkin[citation needed]
Representative body	City Duma[citation needed]
Statistics
Area	101 km2 (39 sq mi)[citation needed]
Population (2010 Census, preliminary)	200,771 inhabitants
- Rank in 2010	93rd
Population (2002 Census)	222,653 inhabitants
- Rank in 2002	82nd
Density	1,988 /km2 (5,150 /sq mi)
Time zone	MSD (UTC+04:00)
Founded	1071[citation needed]
Previous names	Ust-Sheksna (until 1504),[citation needed] Rybnaya Sloboda (until 1777),[citation needed] Rybinsk (until 1946),[citation needed] Shcherbakov (until 1957),[citation needed] Andropov (until 1989)[citation needed]
Postal code(s)	152900—152939[citation needed]
Dialing code(s)	+7 4855[citation needed]
Official website

Rybinsk (Russian: Ры́бинск) is the second largest city of Yaroslavl Oblast, Russia, which lies at the confluence of the Volga and Sheksna Rivers. Population: 200,771 (2010 Census preliminary results); 222,653 (2002 Census); 251,442 (1989 Census). It is served by Rybinsk Staroselye airport.

Early history

Downtown and cathedral in the 19th century

Rybinsk is one of the oldest Slavic settlements on the Volga River. The place was first noticed by chroniclers in 1071 as Ust-Sheksna, i.e. "the mouth of the Sheksna". For the next four centuries, the settlement was referred to alternatively as Ust-Sheksna or Rybansk. Since 1504, it was mentioned in documents as Rybnaya Sloboda (literally: "the fishing village"). The name is explained by the fact that the settlement supplied the Muscovite court with choice sturgeons and sterlets.

General view of Rybinsk in the 1820s

In the 17th century, when the sloboda was capitalizing on the trade of the Muscovy Company with Western Europe, it was rich enough to build several stone churches, of which only one survives to the present. More old architecture may be found in the neighborhood, including the very last of Muscovite three-tented churches (in the Alexandrov Hermitage) and the Ushakov family shrine (on the Epiphany Island).

Golden age

A 19th-century photo of a monastery near Rybinsk, now submerged under the waters of the Rybinsk Reservoir

In the 18th century, the sloboda continued to thrive on the Volga trade. Catherine the Great granted Rybnaya Sloboda municipal rights and renamed it into the town of Rybinsk. It was a place where the cargo was reloaded from large Volga vessels to smaller boats capable of navigating in the shallow Mariinsk Canal system, which connects the Russian hinterland with the Baltic Sea. With the population of 7,000, the town of Rybinsk daily accommodated up to 170,000 sailors and up to 2,000 river vessels. Consequently, the local river port became known as the "capital of barge-haulers".

The town's most conspicuous landmark, the Neoclassical Savior-Transfiguration Cathedral, was constructed on the Volga riverside from 1838 until 1851. It was built to a design that the Dean of the Imperial Academy of Arts, Avraam Melnikov, had prepared for Saint Isaac's Cathedral in St Petersburg. After Melnikov lost the contest for the best project of St Isaac's Cathedral to Auguste de Montferrand, he sold his grandiose design to the municipal authorities of Rybinsk.

Grain bourse in Rybinsk. For a more recent picture, see here.

As a trade capital of the Upper Volga, Rybinsk formerly attracted scores of foreigners, who built a Lutheran church and an imposing Roman Catholic cathedral, said to be the tallest on the Volga. There is also the Nobel Family Museum, documenting the operations of that illustrious Swedish family in Imperial Russia. Early film moguls Nicholas Schenck and Joseph Schenck were born in the town, and there is a grand 18th-century mansion of the Mikhalkov family, whose living members include Sergey Mikhalkov, Nikita Mikhalkov, and Andron Konchalovsky.

20th century

In the Soviet years, Rybinsk continued its impressive record of renamings, for it changed its name four times: to Shcherbakov (after Aleksandr Shcherbakov) in 1946, back to Rybinsk in 1957, to Andropov (after Yuri Andropov) in 1984, and back to Rybinsk in 1989.

The most important industries of modern Rybinsk are aircraft engine manufacturing and a hydroelectric power station. As the experts warn, the giant Rybinsk dam, which holds the Rybinsk Reservoir (formerly touted as the largest man-made body of water on Earth) places the town in the imminent danger of the dam breaking and the reservoir flooding the city.

Notable residents

• Aleksey Ovchinin, cosmonaut

External links

• Official website of Rybinsk
• http://www.rybinsk.info/
• http://ryb.ru/
• http://www.rybinsk.ru/photoalbum/arch.htm
• Rybinsk Museum-Preserve of History, Architecture and Art, founded in 1910, is one of the greatest museums of the Upper Volga