Chkalovsky District is a territory in the northwest of Nizhny Novgorod Region centered on the town of Chkalovsk, the only one in the Region that lies on the right, elevated bank of the Gorky Sea [1]. The name of the district and its center comes from the pilot Valery Chkalov, who was born here in the selo of Vasilyovo: the settlement and the district were renamed in August 1937, after his flight over the North Pole [1][2]. As a municipal entity the district ceased to exist under the regional law of May 8, 2015: the town and eight rural settlements were merged into the urban okrug of the town of Chkalovsk [9]; since January 1, 2025, the okrug has held the status of a municipal okrug [8].
Land, Borders, and Roads
The okrug covers 861.5 sq. km (86,152 hectares), of which 22,996 hectares, or 26%, is agricultural land. The population is about 20,000. The territory comprises the town of Chkalovsk and eight selsovets (rural councils) — Solomatovsky, Belovsko-Novinsky, Kotelnitsky, Purekhovsky, Kuznetsovsky, Vershilovsky, Katunki, and Chistoye; in all, 227 settlements: one town, ten selos (larger villages), four settlements, and 212 villages [1].
In the west the territory borders Ivanovo Region, and in the south and southeast it borders the Volodarsky and Balakhninsky okrugs, while the border with the Gorodets and Sokolsky okrugs runs along the water: they are separated by the broad reach of the Volga [1].
The land here is flat, with scattered hills and ridges, the sandy lowlands of the northern Volga–Oka interfluve; elevations range from 90 to 140 meters above sea level. The proximity of the reservoir noticeably softens the weather: winters are less frosty and very snowy, summers are cooler than in the south of the Region, precipitation is 550–600 mm per year, and the average annual temperature is +2.9 °C. Three rivers flow through the okrug — the Sanakhta, the Trotsa, and the Yug; the banks of the Yug are occupied by recreation centers, boarding houses, and children's camps belonging to Nizhny Novgorod enterprises [1].
From Chkalovsk to Nizhny Novgorod it is 97.4 km by highway. The nearest railway station is Zavolzhye, 40 km away, from which it is 59 km by rail to the regional center. On the other hand, the town stands on the busy Astrakhan–Nizhny Novgorod–Saint Petersburg waterway, along which dozens of tourist cruise routes pass during each navigation season [1].
Vasilyova Sloboda
The town's former name, Vasilyova Sloboda, comes from Prince Vasily Yuryevich, son of Yuri Dolgoruky, whose reign dates to the 12th century [1]. The sloboda on the right bank served as a reserve defensive point for Gorodets: after winning Maly Kitezh back from the Cheremis and renaming it Gorodets-Radilov, Yuri Dolgoruky installed his son there as voivode, and the son built a fortress opposite, on the high bank [7][13]. The settlement is first named in documents in the early 15th century [7].
In the 16th and 17th centuries Vasilyova Sloboda was the hereditary estate of the Shuisky princes; the last owner from that line was Tsar Vasily Shuisky. From 1610 to 1764 the sloboda was listed as monastery property, and after the secularization of church lands it passed into the category of economic villages [1][7].
In the 19th century Vasilyova Sloboda was a large market village renowned for its pottery: it had 25 pottery workshops turning out more than 25 million items, and the ware of the Vasilyova potters was prized all along the Volga. At the same time the sloboda was one of the main suppliers of barge haulers: peasants from villages and hamlets of the neighboring governorates gathered here to be hired [1][7].
State Workshops and the Birth of the Shipyard
In the second half of the 19th century steamship traffic on the Volga was growing while the river itself was growing shallow, and a dredging fleet became necessary. In 1883 the Kazan District of Communications approved a document on the start of construction of state workshops in Vasilyova Sloboda; they marked the beginning of industrialization in this area and, ultimately, the building of the town [1][2].
At first it was a semi-artisanal establishment: two lathes, a drilling machine and a planing machine, driven by a two-horsepower steam engine. By 1890–1900 new shops had risen in the backwater, along with a stone smithy and a boiler house, and a slipway appeared for hauling vessels onto the shore. The main business was repairing vessels of the technical fleet, but already in 1886–1892 the first Russian suction dredger, the Volga (later renamed Volzhsky-12), was built and launched in the Vasilyovo backwater. Wooden shipbuilding was also extensive — boats, barges, guardships; the most elegant floating landing stages for Nizhny Novgorod and Kazan were launched here as well [2].
The growth of the enterprise reshaped the settlement itself: in the early 1920s housing and cultural and community buildings began going up around the plant, and from 1927 the selo of Vasilyovo officially became a workers' settlement. In 1923 the workshops were reclassified as a ship repair plant, in January 1924 the plant was named after Ulyanov (Lenin), and in 1935 the Vasilyovo plant launched the country's first dredger with an internal combustion engine [2].
The Aviator's Name
Valery Pavlovich Chkalov was born in Vasilyovo on February 2, 1904. The test pilot took more than seventy aircraft types into the air, and together with Georgy Baydukov and Alexander Belyakov he flew the "ANT-25" nonstop from Moscow to Udd Island (1936) and from Moscow over the North Pole to Vancouver in the USA (1937) [1][5].
After that flight, residents of the settlement and the district asked that their land be named after their fellow countryman. In August 1937, by a resolution of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, the workers' settlement of Vasilyovo in Gorky Region was renamed Chkalovsk, and the Vasilyovo District became the Chkalovsky District [1][2]. Chkalovsk received town status considerably later, on December 23, 1955 [3][4]; the widespread claim that "in 1937 Vasilyova Sloboda became the town of Chkalovsk" conflates two separate events.
Three natives of the settlement — Akim Gerasimovich Grachyov, Vladimir Vasilyevich Klochkov, and Alexander Pavlovich Koryakov — were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union [1].
House of Culture, Museum, and Monument
Commemoration of Chkalov began immediately after his death: by a resolution of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, adopted in late December 1938, it was decided to build a complex at the pilot's birthplace consisting of a house-museum, a House of Culture, and a monument. In January 1939 the Gorky Regional Executive Committee took over a site on the high bank of the Volga next to the house where Chkalov spent his childhood, and from three draft designs the work of the Gorky architect Alexander Alexandrovich Yakovlev (the elder) was chosen [3].
The complex was meant to open by December 15, 1939, the anniversary of the pilot's death, but the project was redone twice to fit a spending limit handed down from above, the settlement had neither sewerage nor a working water supply, the capacity of the plant's only power station was insufficient, and workers recruited from the surrounding selos left to bring in the harvest. The House of Culture opened only on September 1, 1940, with the celebration timed to the third anniversary of the renaming of Vasilyova Sloboda as Chkalovsk [3].
The three-story main facade with 34 windows faces the water, crowned by a three-tiered belvedere tower with a spire and a stainless-steel star; an internal spiral staircase leads to the observation deck. The high-relief portrait of Chkalov on the facade was made by the sculptor A. V. Kikin. Seen from above, the building's symmetrical plan — with side club wings and a sports block behind the tower — resembles the outline of an airplane [3][6]. From 1942 to 1944, Evacuation Hospital No. 2883 was housed in the House of Culture [3].
The Memorial Museum opened to visitors on July 7, 1940. The house in which the pilot was born was built in 1896 by his father; the building is recognized as a cultural heritage site of federal significance. Nearby is a hangar pavilion, where the central place is given to the ANT-25 designed by A. N. Tupolev, surrounded by I-16 and I-17 (TsKB-15) fighters, a MiG-15bis jet, Chkalov's personal U-2 (Po-2) — a gift from the government for the first nonstop flight — and a Packard automobile [5][14].
The first stage of repairs to the house-museum took place in 2024, when Chkalovsk marked the 120th anniversary of the pilot's birth, and after comprehensive repair and restoration work the museum welcomed visitors again in July 2026 — for the 90th anniversary of the Moscow–Udd Island flight. The house-museum and the hangar pavilion have operated on their usual schedule since July 23, 2026 [5][14].
The monument planned for 1939 was never erected: there was not enough money, and the matter was limited to a memorial plaque at the entrance to the House of Culture. The best-known sculptural image of Chkalov from that time, by I. A. Mendelevich, was installed not here but by the Georgievskaya Tower in Nizhny Novgorod [4]. The idea was revisited in 1974, with the work entrusted to the Gorky sculptor and People's Artist of the RSFSR Gusev Pavel Ivanovich. In April 1978, a two-meter model was set up on the square in the zone of new city construction, and the eight-meter monument was unveiled on August 16, 1981: a four-meter bronze figure on a four-meter pedestal of black granite blocks, cast at the M. G. Manizer Monumentskulptura plant in Leningrad, with the architectural and planning side handled by O. P. Gavrilov and Yu. I. Konovalov [4].
Another aviation monument is a MiG-21PFM fighter on a pedestal next to the House of Culture; it was unveiled in 1984, for Chkalov's 80th anniversary [13].
will be excellently visible from the river side…, toward which it faces with its main facade, as well as from the city side
The House of Culture was built in 1940 under a resolution of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR of December 23, 1938, in memory of the great aviator of our time, Valery Pavlovich Chkalov
The Gorky Sea and the Relocation of the Town
The GOELRO plan envisioned ten hydroelectric power plants, and one of them was to be built near Gorky. Construction began in 1948, and the site was chosen near Gorodets; next to it a new town, Zavolzhye, rose [13]. The flooding swallowed the riverside strip: old Chkalovsk, with its thick-walled merchant mansions, its landing stage, its warehouses and storehouses along the banks of the Volga and the Sanakhta River, fell within the flood zone [1]. According to local residents, the tops of the drowned trees are still visible today [13].
The upper part of the old town, known as "the hill" (gora), survived and, from being an outskirt, became the northeastern part of the new Chkalovsk; it incorporated villages that had stood beyond Vasilyova Sloboda and merged with it in the early twentieth century. The new town was laid out around the old one, encircling it [1].
The shipyard was saved by its own workers. The old factory grounds were going under water, the treasury had no money for a new plant, and the decision to liquidate the enterprise had already been made — but the plant's workers defended it and, from 1951 to 1956, moved the plant by their own efforts. They dismantled 27 old buildings while putting up new ones, moved over 35,000 tons of equipment and materials, and for all five years production never stopped, and the plan was met on schedule [2].
The neighboring village of Katunki on the reservoir shore is called "the second Kitezh": most of what was once a huge village went under water. On the high ground survive the Cathedral of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos, whose walls are painted from floor to ceiling with nineteenth-century oil paintings of biblical subjects in the spirit of Italian Baroque, the work of masters of the Stupino school, and the Gruzinsky-Turchaninov estate with its park, which Gorky and Chaliapin used to visit. Rumor adds that it was here that Chaliapin first sang "Ey, ukhnem!" ("Song of the Volga Boatmen") — there is no documentary evidence for this legend [7].
The flooded part of Vasilyovo can today be seen only as an installation — it stands in the second hall of the Museum of Speeds [6].
Speed on the Water
From 1925 the Ulyanov (Lenin) Ship Repair Plant switched to year-round operation and took on state orders: in 1925–1930 Vasilyovo built dam trusses for the Moscow-Oka water system, and in 1926–1930 high-speed service boats and six tugboats for the Caspian merchant fleet [2].
In July 1941, construction of new vessels was halted, ship repair was cut to the bare minimum, vessels began to be converted for the military fleet at the shipyard's basin, and the plant set up production of components for "Katyusha" rockets in record time; the plant switched to an eleven-hour working day [2].
From 1958, vessels were assembled using the section-and-block method; between 1959 and 1965, the plant mastered eleven types of new products — oil barges, grab dredgers, channel-straightening units, self-propelled hopper barges, and DES-500 diesel-electric bucket dredgers. From the 1950s, the Chkalovsk plant supplied the entire cascade of Volga and Kama hydroelectric complexes, as well as the Volga-Don and White Sea–Baltic canals, with lock gates and shutters, Galle chains, and plate-link chains — including for the nearby Gorodets Locks [2].
Between 1976 and 1981, the plant put into series production the DES-550 dredger, the DE250 suction dredge, the SSh-170 and SSh-300 self-propelled spoil-carrying barges, high-pressure compressors, lock components, electric winches, buoys, anchors, and "Derrick" cranes. By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of August 1, 1983, for the centennial of its founding, the plant was awarded the Order of the Badge of Honor. In October 1993, a conference of the work force reorganized the plant into the joint-stock company "Chkalovsk Shipyard" [2].
In August 2018, the shipyard came to a standstill with no orders; from August 2019, after a change of principal shareholder, it began restoring its capacity: it mastered the construction of hatch cover lids and side coamings for vessels of the RSD-59 project, and resumed the forging of replacement spare parts for multi-bucket dredgers. The ship-lifting facility — a transverse slipway — can handle vessels up to 135 meters long, up to 26 meters wide, and with a docking weight of up to 2,500 tons [2].
Not far from Chkalovsk, on the Trotsa River, stand the design bureau's testing facility and an airfield where Rostislav Yevgenyevich Alekseyev — chief designer of the Central Design Bureau for Hydrofoil Craft, creator of hydrofoil vessels and ekranoplans — often worked. That is why the Museum of Speeds, opened in 2010 and occupying the entire second floor of the House of Culture, is devoted to the development of speed on water — from barge hauling to ekranoplans [6][7].
Speed has remained part of the business, too: Chkalovsk's "Arctic Trade and Transport Company" takes passengers for rides on an ekranoplan and a hydrofoil boat [1].
Guipure, Little Bells, and Linen
In the late 19th century, Vasilyova Sloboda developed its own style of openwork embroidery — the Nizhny Novgorod, also known as Chkalovsk, guipure. Its basis is a coarse mesh made by drawing out threads from the linen; the embroidery is distinguished by a geometric pattern not found in other regions. The craft proved profitable: nearly all the women of the sloboda took up orders, and even small children were put to "vydyorg" (thread-drawing) [7][10].
In the 1920s the craftswomen began to unite: in 1924 the Katunki labor artel for stitching and embroidering linens appeared, and in 1927 a similar one appeared in Vasilyovo, specializing in curtains, tablecloths, and bedspreads. After the war, diamond-shaped patterns gave way to floral ornaments. In 1960 the artels were merged into the state Chkalovsk Stitch-Embroidery Factory; its successor, the Chkalovsk enterprise "Gipyur," was recognized by a resolution of the Region's government as a particularly valuable object of cultural heritage of Nizhny Novgorod Region [10]. The enterprise has an exhibition hall and a showroom-shop [1][7], and the guipure pattern has been transferred onto an old water tower in the center of the town, turning it into an art object [13].
The area's second local craft is copper casting in Purekh: harness bells and small sleigh bells, which were sold at the local yarmarka and which made it to the Nizhny Novgorod All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition of 1896 [10][12]. At the Purekh Museum they advise ringing a bell to make a wish come true: the Purekh bells are said to ring longer than any others — up to forty seconds [7].
Among the district's present-day enterprises, the "Vasilyova Sloboda" factory is also well known, which for more than thirty years has been producing flax products — oils, porridges, flour, and seeds — as is the Chkalovsk sparkling wine plant [7][13].
Purekh — the Pozharsky Family Domain
Prince Dmitry Mikhailovich Pozharsky received the lands of Belgorodye in Balakhna Uyezd together with the rank of boyar in 1613 — for the "Moscow purification," that is, for the liberation of the capital by the militia of 1611–1612. In 1622–1625 he founded the Spaso-Makaryev Monastery for the disabled warriors of the militia on the Petryaevo wasteland next to the village of Krapivino. Nearby, bobyli (landless peasants) settled in a small sloboda; they sewed clothing for the monks, made boots, and produced horse harness. By the middle of the 18th century the sloboda around the monastery had grown into the independent settlement of Makariy-Purekh, and later simply Purekh [11][12].
The Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Savior, dating from the 17th–19th centuries, is a cultural heritage site of federal significance. By Pozharsky's will, the banner of the people's militia was kept here until the early 19th century; by imperial decree it was transferred to the Armory Chamber in Moscow, and a copy remained in the church. In Soviet times the cathedral housed a production facility for nylon stockings; the church is now being restored [11][12].
In the mid-nineteenth century, Purekh was home to 547 people — farmers, merchants, and craftsmen; from 1858 a school with 40 to 50 pupils operated there. Every Sunday was market day in the village, and on January 19 the Makaryev Yarmarka was held, offering shaved-wood wares — spoons, spindles, spinning combs, children's toys — along with cast copper harness fittings, bells, and sleigh bells; merchants came from other governorates as well [11]. In 1998 a monument to Pozharsky was unveiled on the central square [11].
The main treasure of present-day Purekh is the carved house facades in the tradition of remote Volga Region carving: on Lugovaya Street the houses seem to compete over whose wooden lacework is more intricate, with roosters, ginger cats, and suns on the window frames. The most famous of them, with the deer, was decorated from the 1970s by the cabinetmaker Nikolay Kaloshin, who worked at the local furniture factory [7][12].
In 2026 Purekh, home to more than 1,500 people, joined the expanded "Golden Ring of Russia." By then, specialists from the Agency for the Preservation and Development of Historic Environment Sites and graduates of its "Restoration School" had returned 101 window frames to the village: 55 were created from authentic models, 16 were restored, and another 30 were prepared for the former school building, built in 1902 [12].
Sights
The historical and cultural heritage of the district comprises 33 monuments of history, art, urban planning, architecture, archaeology, and culture, four of them of federal significance [1].
The core of Chkalovsk's museum quarter is the Chkalov House Museum, the hangar pavilion, and the House of Culture opposite. In 2024, more than seventy properties along the shoreline from the museum to the pier, on Vorovskogo, Khalturina, Karla Marksa, Chkalova, Chernyshevskogo, Mayakovskogo, and Pushkina streets and in Klubny Lane, were spruced up: facades were painted, roofs repaired, and about a kilometer of wooden fences installed [13]. The embankment, with its viewing platform, binoculars, and airplane-shaped art objects, has become the main place for strolling [7].
The list of museums has grown noticeably since the days of the old encyclopedia, and the earlier addresses have changed floors: in 2007 the exhibition of the folk museum "Vasilyova Sloboda" occupied the second floor of the House of Culture, and the A. M. Kamanin Art Gallery the first [3]; today the entire second floor is given over to the Museum of Speeds, which begins its story with Vasilyova Slobodka and the Rukavishnikov family, while the Kamanin exhibition hall has moved up to the third floor [6].
- V. P. Chkalov Memorial Museum — the house where the pilot was born, and a hangar with airplanes [5]
- "Vasilyova Sloboda" People's Museum — an exhibition on the history of the sloboda at the House of Culture [3][6]
- A. M. Kamanin Art Gallery, also known as the Kamanin Exhibition Hall: a collection of works by local artists, over 6,000 items in storage, mostly from the Soviet period [3][6]
- exhibition hall and showroom-shop "Nizhny Novgorod Guipure" at the folk art crafts enterprise [1][7]
| Museum | Location | Known for |
|---|---|---|
| Memorial Museum of V. P. Chkalov | Chkalovsk, Chkalova St., 5 | the house built in 1896 where the pilot was born, and a hangar pavilion with the ANT-25, I-16, I-17, MiG-15bis, U-2 aircraft and a Packard automobile [5][7] |
| Museum of Speed | Chkalovsk, Chkalova St., 4 | the entire second floor of the House of Culture: from barge hauling to ekranoplans, a hall dedicated to Rostislav Alekseev, an installation depicting the flooded part of Vasilyovo; opened in 2010 [6][7] |
| A. M. Kamanin Exhibition Hall | Chkalovsk, Chkalova St., 4 | the third floor of the House of Culture, featuring works by Aleksandr and Sergey Kamanin, Nikolay Markin, Mikhail Kamanin, and Nikolay Mochalin [6] |
| "Virazh" Museum and Tourism Center | Chkalovsk, Khalturina St., 2 | the 1880 house of the merchant Rukavishnikov, which survived the flooding; games, tours, a flight simulator [7] |
| Polar Aviation Museum | Chkalovsk, Komsomolskaya St., 10 | opened on May 17, 2025 in the "Legenda" hotel complex; twenty fates — from Vodopyanov and Levanevsky to Schmidt and Papanin [7][15] |
| D. M. Pozharsky Purekh Local History Museum | Selo Purekh, Lenina St., 66 | the 1612 militia, costume reconstruction, a collection of small bells [6][7] |
Chkalovsk is the pearl of Nizhny Novgorod Region, where picturesque landscapes, a rich cultural heritage, and a warm atmosphere of hospitality are harmoniously interwoven
Population
The 2002 census recorded 25,500 residents in Chkalovsky District, the 2010 census 22,000, and the 2020 census, conducted in the fall of 2021, 19,700. Over two decades the district lost almost a quarter of its population, with the rural part declining faster than the urban part [16][17][19].
As of January 1, 2024, the okrug had 19,063 residents, of whom 11,267 lived in Chkalovsk and 7,796 in selos and villages [18].
| Date | Total, people | Of which the town of Chkalovsk |
|---|---|---|
| census of October 9, 2002 | 25,509 [19] | 13,856 [19] |
| census of October 14, 2010 | 21,963 [16] | 12,368 [16] |
| census of October 1, 2021 | 19,678 [17] | 11,535 [17] |
| estimate as of January 1, 2024 | 19,063 [18] | 11,267 [18] |
From District to Okrug
By Nizhny Novgorod Region Law No. 59-Z of May 8, 2015, the urban settlement of the town of Chkalovsk and eight rural settlements — the Belovsko-Novinsky, Vershilovsky, Kotelnitsky, Kuznetsovsky, Purekhovsky, and Solomatovsky village councils, the Katunki village council, and the Chistoye village council — were merged into the newly formed municipal entity, the urban okrug of the town of Chkalovsk. Thus the Chkalovsky Municipal District ceased to exist [9].
By Law No. 152-Z of November 13, 2024, the okrug was granted the status of a municipal okrug: the boundaries and territorial composition remained the same, the town of Chkalovsk was designated the administrative center, and the law did not change the status of the settlements within the okrug or the rural social support measures. It took effect on January 1, 2025 [8]. The territory's current full name is the municipal okrug of the town of Chkalovsk, Nizhny Novgorod Region [1].
The name "Chkalovsky District" has remained attached to the area in everyday usage and in history: that is what it was called from August 1937 until 2015 [1][2].
Sources
- chkalovsk.nobl.ru — Administration of the Municipal Okrug of the City of Chkalovsk — "About the Okrug" section (archive)
- chsverf.ru — JSC "Chkalovsk Shipyard" — official company history — Our History (archive)
- opentextnn.ru — "Open Text," Nizhny Novgorod Branch of the Russian Society of Historians and Archivists — research based on documents of the Central Archive of the Nizhny Novgorod Region (archive)
- opentextnn.ru — "Open Text" — cultural heritage site passport, compiled by the Ethnos Research and Production Center in 2007 — Passport materials on the Monument to V. P. Chkalov in the city of Chkalovsk, Nizhny Novgorod Region (archive)
- vchkalov.ru — V. P. Chkalov Memorial Museum — official website
- русскиекрылья.рф — V. P. Chkalov Memorial Complex ("Russian Wings") — official website of the Chkalovsk museums — Museum of Speeds (archive)
- nn-tourist.ru — Nizhny Novgorod Region Tourist Portal — guide to Chkalovsk and the okrug (archive)
- publication.pravo.gov.ru — Official Internet Portal of Legal Information — text of the regional law (archive)
- base.garant.ru — Garant — text and details of the 2015 regional law
- livingheritage.ru — "Living Heritage" — map of local cultural brands of Russia — Nizhny Novgorod Guipure (archive)
- d-pozharsky.ru — D. M. Pozharsky Interregional Public Patriotic Foundation "Otechestvo" — Purekh — the patrimony of the Pozharsky princes (archive)
- nn.aif.ru — "Argumenty i Fakty — Nizhny Novgorod," August 26, 2026 — Carved Wonders of Purekh: How the Appearance of a Historic Selo Is Being Recreated (archive)
- Vremya N — Chkalovsk: History and the Present (archive)
- nobl.ru — Official website of the Government of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, July 25, 2026 — V. P. Chkalov Memorial Museum in Chkalovsk Reopens After Major Renovation
- nobl.ru — Official website of the Government of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, May 17, 2025 — New 50-Room "Legenda" Hotel Complex with a Polar Aviation Museum Opens in Chkalovsk (archive)
- rosstat.gov.ru — Rosstat — results of the 2010 All-Russian Population Census, volume 1, table 5 (archive)
- 52.rosstat.gov.ru — Nizhegorodstat — results of the 2020 All-Russian Population Census, table 4 (archive)
- rosstat.gov.ru — Rosstat — population of the Russian Federation by municipality as of January 1, 2024 (archive)
- web.archive.org — Results of the 2002 All-Russian Population Census, volume 1, table 4 (copy of the official census website in the web archive) (archive)