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THE DESTRUCTION OF THE ORIGINAL
CATHEDRAL
VIDEO
THE PROJECT OF THE PALACE OF
SOVIETS
THE SWIMMING POOL
"MOSCOW"
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The site of the Cathedral is a very important one for
urban developers. After the revolution this, along with ideological principles, became the
reason for the decision to destroy the Cathedral. The plan entailed constructing a
grandiose Palace of Soviets on the site of the Cathedral. This palace was meant to be the
largest building in the world - a monument to victorious socialism and Lenin - the leader
of the world proletariat. A new Moscow, with no vestiges of the "cursed past and its'
monuments" was to arise around this Palace. A massive wave of propaganda preceded the
actual destruction. The newspapers wrote, "the Cathedral is grotesque and totally
inartistic", that "the Cathedral is a poisonous mushroom on Moscow's face"
and that it was "a source of slothfulness" and so forth.
The first explosions rocked the Cathedral at noon on December 5, 1931, as per the decision
of Stalin's politburo. The memorial to military glory and the most important church in
Russia was brutally vandalized and destroyed.
During those horrible days it seemed as if the Lamp of Faith, that had burned in the
cathedral through the efforts and prayers of the cream of the nation was extinguished
forever.
Russia sank ever deeper into the destructive gloom of atheism…
…An enormous cavity gaped on the site of the Cathedral for many years. During the
so-called Khruschev thaw, the city built an enormous swimming pool instead of the
Cathedral. The pool replaced the Cathedral and became a monument to forgotten and
obliterated national history and glory, which had no place in the plans of the
"builders of communism".
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Complete playbill of all St. Petersburg,Russia theatres, shows, concerts, etc. !
World-known music festival "The Stars of the White Nights".