Fur production

The majority of the population of our country represents a Siberian in winter dressed in a fur coat and a fur hat. Currently, not everyone wears furs, but they (furs as "soft gold") are traditionally associated with our region. The Cossacks and Streltsy who came to Siberia through Ermak were not only warriors, but also hunters. Russian people were attracted to the east by the fabulous riches of Siberia’s forests and its fur-bearing animals. The main one among the animals that were harvested for fur was the sable. It is no coincidence that he is depicted on the ancient coats of arms of the cities of the Urals and Siberia — Tobolsk, Verkhoturye, Yeniseisk, Irkutsk. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, the center of fur trade appeared — the "golden-boiling" Mangazeya. A man came there beggarly, and left fabulously rich (Sagittarius and Cossack received an annual salary of 6 rubles, and the skin of a black-brown fox cost 12 rubles, and the skin of a sable was twice as expensive). It is known that, when on official business in Moscow and other cities, the Cossacks sported fur coats, each of which cost an entire village!

At the end of the seventeenth century, a state monopoly on the extraction of sable was established. Then, for many years, Russian industrialists were either prohibited or allowed to hunt fur-bearing animals (fur extraction was the responsibility of the indigenous population, and yasak was paid from it to the treasury).

The indigenous people used furs to decorate their clothes. Furs were sold to merchants, they were brought to the Obdorskaya fair. Marten or sable is a very expensive fur, so Russian peasants (and Tatars) wore sheepskin coats and sheepskin hats with ears. In many villages, sheepskin processing and fur coat sewing were established. According to legend, Saint Simeon of Verkhotursky sewed fur coats. Sheepskin and fur production was one of the most widespread. For example, in 1888 there were 61 sheepskin and fur workshops in the Tobolsk province, they employed 345 workers. The workshops generated more than 124 thousand rubles of income per year.

After the revolution, a state monopoly was established for the purchase of furs. In the foreign trade of the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s, furs occupied one of the leading places. Already in the pre-war period, cellular animal husbandry was initiated as a source of fur raw materials. Fur factories were built and reconstructed in many cities of the country. So, in 1934, the Tyumen group of leather and fur factories was named the sheepskin and fur factory. In the villages, artisans continued to sew fur coats. In the post-war years, the processing of various skins of mink, blue fox, silver-black fox, rabbit, as well as astrakhan fur and sheepskin increased in fur factories. And now fur production is one of the promising areas for Siberia.

The Furrier

In the old days in Russia, masters of fur and leather processing were called furrier (skoryzhnik). Furry business appeared in ancient times, when people adapted the skins of animals killed in hunting for clothing. For a long time, this craft was associated with the dressing of hides and the manufacture of skins. In Russia, raw hides were processed (kneaded), so the masters were called "kozhemyak" or "rawhide". According to one version, the word "furrier" itself comes from the word "skora" - skin or raw skin.

In the peasant economy, furriers were engaged in the manufacture of skins with wool, which included tanning of skins, lining of furs, manufacture of sheepskin coats, etc. The material for furry production was primarily the skins of domestic animals, for example, sheepskin. Often the furrier worked with ready-made raw materials. He selected suitable skins for a particular product, kneaded and colored them. He often sewed himself.

Nowadays, special devices and chemicals are used to make skins. However, some furriers prefer to work the old-fashioned way.

Tyumen sheepskin and fur factory

In 1917, the fur artel "Kvadrat" was established in Tyumen. August 9, 1919 "Kvadrat" became a state-owned enterprise. In 1921, 97 workers were already working at the factory. There was no mechanization, all the work on processing, dressing sheepskins and tailoring was done manually. The production areas consisted of wooden log buildings, which housed kvass, cleaning, drying and other workshops, cutting and sewing workshops. In 1922, the association of tanneries "Kozhmekhzavod" was established, which included "Kvadrat".

The year 1924 can be considered the year of the birth of sheepskin and fur production, and therefore the birth of the factory. This year, a new sheepskin and fur factory was built on the basis of the warehouses of the former Sobennikov tannery, and then a sheepskin and fur factory. New production methods began to appear at the factory: finishing of mezdra on machine tools, manual unlocking is transferred to drums, etc. In 1935, the company was named after Sergei Mironovich Kirov

During the Great Patriotic War, the sheepskin and fur coat factory was among the best advanced enterprises in the city, whose products were entirely supplied to the active army. A part of the plant’s territory is an evacuated tannery named after Seregin in Kuntsevo, Moscow region (in 1946 they merged). In the second half of 1942, the plant began to produce fur vests, fur stockings, mittens, hat butts and even household soap from waste and low-value raw materials. The factory staff contributed 36 thousand rubles to the combat aircraft of the Tyumen squadron. By the end of the war, production volumes had increased. The factory produced military buckles, sheepskin coats, civilian buckles, fur mittens and about a dozen consumer goods. Since the late 1940s, the plant began to produce sheepskin with a film coating, sew civilian jackets, from the second half of the 1950s — sheepskins for a seal and an otter, in the 1960s — sheepskins for marten fur, sewing of sports jackets made of fur sheepskin and half-coats covered with cotton fabric with water-repellent impregnation began. During these years, at the All-Union Art Councils, seven of the factory’s products received an assessment of world standards and seven others received the highest assessment of the country’s standards. In 1984, the factory celebrated its 60th anniversary. In the year of its sixtieth anniversary, the factory had its own housing stock, where workers and employees lived. The employees had a kindergarten, a medical center, a factory club with a library at their disposal.

In the 1990s, the factory was able to survive, technical re-equipment was carried out, and in-demand products were produced. However, in 2008, after experiencing difficult economic trials, the factory closed.