Kirov Plant

Kirov Zavod

Native name	Кировский завод
Company type	Joint-stock company
Industry	Mechanical engineering Defense industry Agricultural machinery
Founded	February 28, 1801 (1801-02-28)
Founder	Under the decree of emperor Paul I
Headquarters	Saint Petersburg , Russia
Area served	Coast Gulf of Finland
Key people	General director George Semenenko
Products	Tractors, escalators, artillery etc
Revenue	$36.7 million (2016)
Operating income	$9.46 million (2016)
Net income	$6.57 million (2016)
Number of employees	5,900

Aerial view of the Kirov Plant in 2017

The Kirov Plant, Kirov factory or Leningrad Kirov plant (LKZ) (Russian: Кировский завод, romanized: Kirovskiy zavod) is a major Russian mechanical engineering and agricultural machinery manufacturing plant in St. Petersburg, Russia. It was established in 1789, then moved to its present site in 1801 as a foundry for cannonballs. The Kirov Plant is sometimes confused with another Leningrad heavy weapons manufacturer, Factory No. 185 (S.M. Kirov). Recently the main production of the company is Kirovets heavy tractors.

In 1917 the factory was an important center of the Red Guards formations.

History

Putilov works

In 1868 Nikolay Putilov (1820–1880) purchased the bankrupt plant. At the Putilov works, the Putilov Company (a joint-stock holding company from 1873) initially produced rolling stock for railways. The establishment boomed during the Russian industrialization of the 1890s, with the workforce quadrupling in a decade, reaching 12,400 in 1900. The factory traditionally produced goods for the Russian government, with railway products accounting for more than half of its total output. Starting in 1900 it also produced artillery, eventually becoming a major supplier of it to the Imperial Russian Army alongside the state arsenals. By 1917 it grew into a giant enterprise that was by far the largest in the city of St. Petersburg.

In December 1904, during the antecedent to the 1905 Russian Revolution, four workers at the plant, then called 'Putilov Ironworks', were fired because of their participation in strikes during Bloody Sunday. However, the plant manager asserted that they were fired for unrelated reasons. Virtually the entire workforce of the Putilov Ironworks went on strike when the plant manager refused to accede to their requests that the workers be rehired. Sympathy strikes in other parts of the city raised the number of strikers up to 150,000 workers in 382 factories. By 21 January [O.S. 8 January] 1905, the city had no electricity and no newspapers whatsoever and all public areas were declared closed.

Launch of Volkhov at the Putilov works in November 1913

Ships were built at the Putilov works in the early 20th century. The submarine tender Volkhov (later renamed Kommuna), built 1911–1915 at Putilov for the Imperial Russian Navy, remained in service of the Russian Navy in the 2010s.

In February 1917 strikes at the factory contributed to setting in motion the chain of events which led to the February Revolution.

Red Putilovite plant

After the October Revolution of November 1917 the establishment was renamed Red Putilovite plant (zavod Krasny Putilovets) and became famous for its manufacture of the first Soviet tractors, Fordzon-Putilovets, based on the Fordson tractor.

Kirov factory

In the wake of the December 1934 assassination of Sergey Kirov, the Leningrad Communist Party head, the plant was renamed Kirov Factory No. 100.

During World War II the plant manufactured the KV-1 tank.

In 1962 the factory produced the Kirovets K-700 tractor.

The Kirov Plant was de-listed from the Moscow Exchange in 2011.

Directors of Kirov Plant

• 1917-1919 - Vasilyev, Anton Efimovich, the first "red" director
• 1930-1936 - Ots, Karl Martovich
• 1938-1941 - Zaltsman, Isaac Moiseevich
• 1941-1943 - Dlugach, Moisey Abramovich
• 1945-1948 - Kizima, Alexander Leontyevich
• 1950-1954 - Smirnov, Nikolai Ivanovich
• 1954-1964 - Isaev, Ivan Sergeevich
• 1964-1972 - Lyubchenko, Alexander Alexandrovich
• 1972-1975 - Ulybin, Vasily Ivanovich
• 1975-1976 - Belt, Oleg Nikolaevich
• 1976-1984 - Muranov, Boris Alexandrovich
• 1984-1987 - Chernov, Stanislav Pavlovich
• 1987-2005 - Semenenko, Pyotr Georgievich
• 2005-2022 - Semenenko, Georgy Petrovich
• from 2022 - Serebryako, Sergey Alexandrovich

See also

• List of Soviet tank factories
• Trams of Putilov plant

References

• Peter Gatrell (1994), Government, Industry, and Rearmament in Russia, 1900-1914: The Last Argument of Tsarism, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-46619-9.
• Workers Unrest and the Bolshevik Response in 1919 written by Vladimir Brovkin in Slavic Review, Volume 49, Issue 3, (Autumn 1990) page 358-361

External links

• Official website
• Media related to Kirov Plant (factory, Saint Petersburg) at Wikimedia Commons
• St Petersburg Tractor Plant Subsidiary that builds tractors and agricultural machinery.
• Kirov Plant @ globalsecurity.org (plant's military production)