Khabarovsk
Just like in all Soviet Russia in Khabarovsk right after the Soviet power was set up fight against illiteracy began which eventually led to blossom of education and science. New schools, technical colleges, universities and scientific research institutes were opened. 1925 – the Far Eastern chemical-bacteriological institute (now Khabarovsk SRI of epidemiology and microbiology) was opened. 1930 – Khabarovsk State Medical Institute and the Far-Eastern Communist University were opened. 1938 – Teachers’ training college.
Social life was not at all behind. New newspapers were released. In June of 1925 one of the oldest newspapers which is now released under the same title – “The Star of Pacific Ocean” began to get published. In 1934 – literary artistic almanac “On the Borderline” which was later given another title – “The Far East.” In May of 1925 the Far Eastern branch of “Soviet Cinema” began to work, in Khabarovsk cinemas opened for the masses. In 1926 a theater of musical comedy was opened. In 1935 the first stadium “Dynamo” was opened.
Residents of the city constantly responded to all the key events that happened within the country and outside. 1924 – V.I. Lenin’s death. Only one year later – on November 7 of 1925 a monument to Lenin was ceremonially opened on the main square of the city – the Square of Freedom. Khabarovsk also suffered from constant border conflicts first with the Chinese and then with the Japanese. In October of 1929 a meeting and a funeral of five soldiers of the Red Army who died in clashes with Chinese troops near the Sungari River took place.
So, after almost 20 years of intensive development Khabarovsk remained to be the largest industrial and transport center of the Far East. It is at that very time that the city formed its “face.” Now one just couldn’t imagine the Far East without Khabarovsk.
The years of the Great Patriotic War are terrible years. At the same time those were the times of great exploits and heroic deeds. And not only in a trench but also in front of a press or a blast furnace. Khabarovsk was not a front city in the literal sense. There were no street combats here, no explosions of buildings or bombardments. But on the border of the Far East there was gathered a big Japanese army ready to attack at any time. And then hardships of our country in this war would have been doubled.
That’s right, there was no fighting in the city but that does not mean the war didn’t affect our city at all. In the very first days of the war more than 25 thousand people signed up as volunteers and went to the front-line to fight. And their places in factories were taken by women, teenagers and the elderly.