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    Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic (Karelia)

    Encyclopedia Arctica 10: Soviet North, Geography and General




    Unpaginated      |      Vol_X-0144                                                                                                                  

    Form for receipt of article "Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic (Karelia)"



    001      |      Vol_X-0145                                                                                                                  

            4600

            KARELO-FINNISH SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC (Karelia) lies in the north–

    western corner of the European portion of the U.S.S.R., on the Soviet–

    Finnish frontier. It is bounded by Murmansk Oblast (the Kola Peninsula)

    in the north, by the White Sea and Arkhangelsk Oblast on the east, and

    by Lakes Ladoga and Onega and Leningrad and Vologda Oblasts on the south.

    Its northern boundary lies one degree of latitude north of the Arctic

    Circle. It is 68,618 sq. mi. in area. The K.-F. SSR is a land of granite,

    lakes (17%) and forest (70%). Its surface is deeply marked by the traces

    of the receding ice-cap. There are long, narrow ridges, polished crags

    (called, locally, ram's brows) and glacial deposits of clay and sand.

    The largest lakes are Ladoga (biggest in Europe), Onega, Top, Seg and

    Vyg. The climate is damp, its northern cold moderated by proximity to

    the sea. Natural resources other than timber and water-power include

    pegmatite, mica, marble, granite, diabase and titanium-magnetite iron

    ore.

            [ ?] On June 1, 1941, the population numbered 606,333, of

    which 207,788 was urban. This represented a 50% increase over the

    census population of January, 1939, of 469,145, including 150,000

    urban. However, there had been an accession of territory from Finland

    in the interim. 1946 election registration indicated a drop in popula–

    tion to 400,000, due to the war, for the K-F SSR was under enemy oc–

    cupation and many people were evacuated. Educational facilities planned 130,000 evacuees had returned by

    for 1950 indicate a projected rise in population to 550,000, evident- the beginning of 1947.

    ly through the return of evacuees and immigration from other areas of

    the USSR. Under the 1939 census, Russians constituted 63% of the popula–

    tion, Karelians 23%. Evidently, the promotion of this formerly Autonomous

    SSR to the rank of full-fledged constituent Republic was an indication

    to the people of Finland, after the first Russo-Finnish was of 1939-40,

    that the USSR had no intention of Russifying a traditionally Karelo–

    Finnish area. The Karelian language and culture are cultivated and

    promoted (See below, History and Culture.)

    002      |      Vol_X-0146                                                                                                                  
    The average density of population is [ ?] 8.8 per square kilometer mile . The south–

    ern portion is less thinly populat ion ed , having as many as [ ?]

    [ ?] 21 to 23 per square mile. but in the

    Far North it declines to two to five per square mile. Industrialization has

    brought a sharp increase in the urban population, which rose from approxi–

    mately 10% in 1913 to 21.4% in 1926, and to 31.4% in 1939 and 34.3% in 1941.

    In 1947 there were 13 towns and 14 urban settlements. The largest are

    Petrozavodsk, with 80,000 in 1941 , (it fell by half during the war), Kem

    (16,700), Kondopoga , founded under the Soviets, (14,000), Medvezhegorsk (13,400), Belomorsk (13,500),

    Sortavala (13,000) and Segezha (5,400). Medvezhegorsk, Kondopoga and Sort–

    avala were virtually wiped out during the war. [ Of the 1941?] At the beginning

    of 1941 there were 147,350 wage and salary earners, of whom 53,800 were

    engaged in industry, 7,300 in construction, 12,100 on the railroad and

    18,300 in the health and education services. The rest were chiefly lumber-

    jacks.

            The economy of Karelia was has been fundamentally changed in the Soviet period.

    In Tsarist times this was one of the most backward regions of the Empire.

    The number of industrial workers in 1913 was exactly one-tenth the figure

    for 1941, but output increased far more rapidly thanks to increased skill

    and mechanization. In 1920 the total power in all forms available to indus–

    try in Karelia was equal to 2,800 kilowatts of electricity. By 1939 this

    figure had multiplied 21 times to 59,000 kilowatts. Industrial investments

    by Moscow in the development of Karelia [?] - excluding those in transport, public services, etc. - totalled

    1,090,000,000 rubles in the deace 1928-37. Damage done by the Finnish and

    German occupying forces is estimated at twenty billion rubles. No single

    enterprise of any sort was built here in the three-and-a-half yeats of

    occupation. Over 200 enterprises were destroyed. The territory under occu–

    pation, comprising a little more than half the area of [ ?] Karelia, con–

    tained four-fifths of its industry and industrial workers. In 1944 the

    head of horses was down to 10.2% of pre-war, and of cattle there were

    only

    003      |      Vol_X-0147                                                                                                                  
    12% as many as before. Four-fifths of the tractors were gone. However,

    by 1945 almost all the destroyed enterprises were producing to some de–

    gree.

            Economy . [?] The felling, sawing and processing of lumber is the

    chief occupation , by far, engaging 70% of the industrial workers. Although

    Karelia possesses but 1.5% of the timber in the USSR, it provided 4.7%

    of the [ ?] output in 1937. In Tsarist times, the logs were shipped out

    of Karelia unprocessed, but the past decades have seen the widespread

    establishment of sawmills and paper-and-cellulose mills. Sub-Arctic con–

    ditions make agriculture a relatively minor occupation here. Fisheries

    are important.

            Industry . [ ?] There are 24,200,000 acres of timber, of which 60%

    is pine, 33% fir, 6% birch, asp and alder - 1%. [ ?] Pine is

    predominant in the north and northwest, constituting 75% there, while

    fir comprises 50% of the forests in the south and southeast. The threefold greater

    share of Karelia in Soviet lumbering than would be indicated by its pro–

    portion of the country's timber reserves is explained by its proximity

    to the world ports of Leningrad and Murmansk (lumber is a major Soviet

    export, particularly to Britain), its location astride the railroad be–

    tween these ports, the presence of numerous rivers suitable for rafting

    and of the recently-built White Sea-Baltic Canal. [ ?] The

    largest amount of timber ever felled in a single year constituted only

    13/16s of the quantity maturing annually, and only 1/75th of the reserves

    already mature or [ ?] nearing maturity. The bulk of the felling occurs

    along the railroad and canal. In the northwest, where railroads have been

    lacking until recently, and long rafting is necessary, lumbering is

    little developed. New sections have been opened by the building of the

    northern railroad link westward to Finland and another eastward to the Arkhangelsk

    line during the war, totalling together some 100 miles in Karelian terri–

    tory. A new 120-mile railroad being built in western Karelia in 1946-50

    will open timberlands along its route.

    004      |      Vol_X-0148                                                                                                                  
    Lumbering has been considerably modernized in the past decades, and in

    1940, 36% of the felled timber was hauled out by mechanized means. Canadian

    axes, spring saws and other devices were introduced, while the 1946-50

    plan provides for considerable introduction of power saws. There were 19 sawmills in 1941. Manufacturing

    and chemical plants built by the Soviets to use lumber as a raw material

    included paper-and-cellulose vertical enterprises at Kondopoga and Segezha

    and a large ski factory in Petrozavodsk. In 1947 six [ ?] paper-and-cellu–

    lose plants were [ ?] in operation , at [ ?] Kondopoga, Segezha, Pitkaranta,

    [ ?] Suojarvi and Harlu-Laskel. In 1940 they had provided 12% of the

    entire Soviet output of paper. Furniture manufacture is another leading

    industry, with large plants at Sortavala, Nadvoitskaia and Helliulskaia.

    In 1946 a plant manufacturing pre-fabricated housing [ ?] went into opera–

    tion and another was under construction. Also under construction were a

    hydrol [ ?] sis plant using the waste of the saw-milling and paper industries. 100

    The shipbuilding industry is another which [ ?] is founded on the lumber

    resources, as it makes small coastal, river and canal boats and barges.

    There are four shipyards and one a repair yard at Povenets, while in 1947 two more were

    being built to construct fishing vessels.

            Mining is the second most important industry. The systematic explora–

    tion of the mineral riches of this territory dates only from Soviet times.

    Although only 15% of Karelia had been completely prospected by 1943, very

    considerable resources were already known, and they were supplemented great–

    ly by the aeromagnetic survey of 1945. Thus far the minerals exploited are

    chiefly spar and quartz and their pegmatite, consisting of a mixture of

    both, [ ?] and also of mineral building materials.

    The resources of spar and quartz are estimated at 10,000,000 tons. Pegma–

    tite resources have been found along the coast of the White Sea as well

    as one important supply in western Karelia. The mining of quartz and feld–

    spar and of mica began in 1921, immediately after the close of the Civil

    War, along the shore of Chupin Bay of the White Sea. A pegmatite plant,the only

    005      |      Vol_X-0149                                                                                                                  
    one in the USSR, went into operation at Kondopoga in 1938, supplying the entire Soviet porcelain and ceramics industry, whereas a mica

    works [ ?] had been commissioned at Petrozavodsk in 1929. The other important branch

    of the mining industry is the quarrying of building stone, in which Kare–

    lia is exceptionally rich. There are vast quantities of granite, [ ?]

    quartzite, sandstone, marble, granite-gneiss, diabase rocks, etc. Talco–

    chorite, used in the paper and radio industries, is a particularly valu–

    able mineral product. Diabase is quarried in the region of Shelt Lake,

    and quartzie and granite at [ ?] Mt. Koshina. Marble quarrying began on

    the eve of World War II, as did the manufacture of acid-resistant products

    for the chemical and paper industries, while three large mechanized brick

    works went into operation.

            Karelia is also rich in metallic ores. As yet they are not worked,

    but they form the center of the plans for [ ?] expanding industry

    here in the future. They are many deposits of iron ore, of which the most

    important [ ?] are the [ ?] titano-magnetite resources at Mt. Pudozh.

    Similar ores are found near Lake Elt. Near Lake Tulom there is a large

    deposit of hematites. Lake ores have long been known, and were recovered

    at various times, in Lakes Siam, Vyg and Ushk. New deposits were discovered

    in 1945 and 1946 at [ ?] Gimolskoe and elsewhere. Non-ferrous and

    rare metals are also known: copper, tin, lead and zinc at Pitkaranta;

    tin and zinc in the [ ?] Priazh district, molybdenum near Ukhta, and

    copper north and east of Lake Onega. Gold was mined as long ago as the

    latter half of the 18th century at Voiits. Pyrites and pirrotin, [ ?]

    from which sulphuric acid may be processed, have also been found. On the

    other hand, Karelia is relatively poor in mineral fuels, but there are

    three billion tons of air-dried peat. Near the village of Shunga, on the

    west shore of Lake Onega near the railroad is a deposit of shungite, a

    primitive coal of relatively poor quality. The lack of mineral fuel is

    compensated for by [ ?] large water power resources, estimated at

    1,300,000 kilowatts, with a minimum annual output, once it has been de–

    veloped, of twelve billion

    006      |      Vol_X-0150                                                                                                                  
    kilowatt hours. The most important rivers in this respect are the Vyg, Kem

    and Keret. Prior to the Revolution only 700 kilowatts of electric power producing

    capacity had been installed, but this had risen to about 40,000 in 1940,

    with the building of the Kondopoga hydroelectric plant, the Solomenskaia

    steam-powered plant (6,000 kilowatts) and others. Available power is being

    trebled by the installation of 81,000 kilowatts of new capacity in 1946-50.

            The largest manufacturing plant in Karelia is the Onega Metal and Mach–

    inery Works in Petrozavodsk, one of the most ancient in the USSR, founded

    by Peter the Great (Petrozavodsk means Peter's Factory) in 1702, but essenti–

    ally rebuilt in the past two decades. In 1947 reconstruction was taking place

    at the Viartsilia Metal Works, equal in size to that at Petrozavodsk.

            The

    industries listed [ ?] hitherto are administered by Moscow, as being of im–

    portance to the national economy of the USSR as a whole. However, Karelia

    operates a sizeable industry of its own to meet local needs. This includes

    a furniture factory; two metal manufacturing enterprises making containers

    of various types as well as children's furniture; a calico mill; and enter–

    prises manufacturing making small water turbines, railway tie-cutters, wood–

    working lathes, blacksmith's hammers, etc. The 4th 5-Year Plan, 1946-50,

    provides for investments of 1,600,000,000 rubles in Karelia, or 60% more

    than in the first two five-year plans combined. This is to result in the

    reconstruction of all wrecked enterprises and in bringing overall produc–

    tion in 1950 up to 11% over the 1940 high. However, the lumber industry is

    not expected to regain its pre-war level by that date, as 11,000,000 cubic

    meters are to be felled, as against 13,000,000 in 1939. [ ?] 880,000

    cubic meters of sawn board are to be produced, indicating that a great part

    of the [ ?] felled lumber will be exported unprocessed or processed only

    slightly. Electric power production is to reach 320,000,000 kilowatt hours,

    or still only one fourth of that available through full development of

    water resources, aside from peat. However, this will already would made Karelia

    10th in power output among the Soviet Republics, although it is 16th in

    population.

    007      |      Vol_X-0151                                                                                                                  
    A major consumer of power will be the Leningrad-Murmansk railroad, which

    is being completely transferred to electrical operation during 1946-50.

    Paper output is to reach 142,000 tons in 1950m glass 275,000 square meters,

    and fish, 15,000 tons. The pulp and paper mills and a hydrolysis and a

    sulphite alcohol plant are to be restored and put into operation, bring

    about a level of output in the paper-and-cellulose industry two-and-a-half

    times as high as in 1940. Cardboard and plywood are to be made for the first

    time. The metalware and mica mines are to be restored to prewar capacity,

    and the mica factory rehabilitated. New industries under the jurisdiction

    of the Republic, independent of Moscow, are to include a clothing and foot–

    wear factory, a metalworking enterprise, a plant producing plastics, a

    glass works and a cement plant. The quartz and spar-processing enterprises and

    the pegmatite plant are being restored.

            Agriculture . As Karelia lies in the same latitudes as Alaska and the

    Canadian Northwest Territories, it is clearly not suited to large-scale

    agriculture as the world practices it today. Only 0.8% of its territory

    is presently tillable, under cultivation, some 381,500 acres in all. Although concentrated

    chiefly in the south, the farm lands are widely scattered among solid

    forest areas. In the south, there are ten to thirty acres under cultiva–

    tion per farm family, but in the north only 2.5 acres, on the average,

    so that income must come chiefly from other pursuits, chiefly lumbering

    or fishing. Prior to the Revolution farming here was extremely primitive,

    even by comparison to the backward state of Russian agriculture as a whole,

    and there was a 30% drop in sown acreage in Karelia from 1909 to 1917.

    The three-field system predominated. However, in the past two decades farm–

    ing has been modernized. At the beginning of 1941 32 Machine and Tractor 200

    Stations worked the surrounding collective farms with the aid of 610 trac–

    tors, 62 harvester combines, 300 power threshers and other equipment.

    [ ?] Farmers with 85% of the crop acreage had joined

    collective farms, and state-owned farms operated 12% of the acreage.

    281,500 acres were planted in 1940. [?] Grain yields have reached two-thirds The remaining 100,000 had been the

    of a ton per acre.

    008      |      Vol_X-0152                                                                                                                  
    Of the acreage planted, 53.2% went to grains, 10.7% to potatoes and 1.8%

    to vegetables. 9.3% of the total went to wheat; this is one of the areas

    where wheat had been pushed farthest north. Despite its progress, agri–

    culture is not presently able to meet the needs of the population, and

    reclamation of additional land through drainage of swamps and clearing

    of forests is a major problem before the Republic. Moreover, the occupa–

    tion destroyed reclamation and drainage systems serving 50,000 acres al–

    ready under cultivation. Evacuation of population and warfare brought ag–

    riculture, as industry, almost to a complete standstill, but in 1946 [ ?]

    195,000 acres were planted. By 1950 the figure is to reach 335,000, the

    highest level on record, but still only one-fourth as much per head of

    population (rural and urban) as in the USSR as a whole. Grain will com–

    prise almost half the plantings (156,000 acres) , and fodder almost as much (127,000) , in view of

    the wholesale slaughter of livestock by the occupation forces. Potatoes

    and vegetables are to get most of the remaining 15%, (52,000 acres) as against 10% before the war.

    Of horses, which are expected to total 22,500, there will still be little

    more than half as many as before the war. Other types of livestock are

    expected to number more than ever before, [ ?] as follows:

    cattle, 101,000; sheep and goats, 78,000; pigs, 37,000.

            Fishing is concentrated chiefly in the North. 80% of the catch

    comes from the White Sea, where herring and navaga abound. Pike-perch,

    pickerel, grayling and salmon breed in the rivers and lakes. The annual

    catch is capable of reaching 30,000 tons. Two canneries are under construc–

    tion.

            Transport . Karelia is bisected from north to south by the Kirov (Lenin–

    grad-Murmansk) Railroad, put into temporary operation in 1916 and completed

    under the Soviets. Lesser [ ?] lines built in recent years include the

    50-mile [ ?] Rugozero and 40-mile Kestenga spurs to the west, the 80-mile

    Petrozavodsk-Suojarvi line built to link with the Finnish network in the

    south and the vital Belomorsk-Obozero line, which substituted for the main 234

    line in carrying Allied supplies

    009      |      Vol_X-0153                                                                                                                  
    from Murmansk during the war years, when the Finns and Germans held a

    large section of it. The total rail network is 1,000 miles in length.

    It carried 10,300,000 tons of freight in 1940. 60 to 70% of the freight

    usually consists of lumber and stone building materials. The [ ?]

    co mpletion of the railroad was, of course, of vital importance in open–

    ing this hitherto semi-desert sub-Arctic land. Also of great value was

    the construction, in 1931-33, of the White Sea-Baltic Canal, 146 miles in

    length, which required the construction of 19 locks, 15 dams, 49 dikes,

    12 spillways and 33 artificisl canals to link existing lakes on its route.

    In 1940 it carried 2,270,000 tons of freight, including 1,780,000 of

    lumber and board. Wrecked by the invaders, it was placed back in operation

    in 1946. Other than as part of the canal, the lakes and rivers of Karelia

    are little used for transportation, particularly as rapids and falls are

    frequent in the latter. However, recent years have [ ?] seen the development

    of ports on the White Sea: Belomorsk, Kem, Keret and Chupa. Roads totalled

    8,729 miles in length as of January 1, 1941, of which 47.9% were surfaced

    or improved, but the northern and western regions are almost roadless.

    145,000 tons of freight were moved by road in 1940. As mentioned above,

    a 120-mile railroad is to be built in 1946-50.

            Education and Culture . Illiteracy has been reduced in Soviet times

    from 77% to 15%, as of 1941. In 1913 only 47% of the children of school

    age went to school at all, and attendance totalled 13,000. In the 1940-

    41 school year, 93,600 were in attendance, and the average schooling was

    three to four times as long. In 1914 there were only five junior high and

    two high schools, whereas in 1940-41 the figures had risen to 153 and 61

    respectively. There was now a high school in every county seat. In all,

    in 1941, there were 770 schools, 15 semi-professional high schools

    (normal schools for teachers, etc.) and two higher educational institutions.

    150 of the school buildings had been built since 1928. In 1940 there were

    also 402 community centers and 400 public libraries - roughly one of each

    per [ ?]

    010      |      Vol_X-0154                                                                                                                  
    1,500 population, while there was one school per 800 [ ?] population,

    young and old. The Finnish occupation forces destroyed the university,

    77 of the most modern schools and the like. By the end of 1946, 370

    schools, [ ?] 264 public libraries and 283 community centers

    were again functioning, as well as three normal schools, and one speci–

    alized high school each for forestry, agriculture, accounting, physical

    education teachers and the management of cooperatives. The university and

    a teachers college were again functioning. In 1946 a "base" of the Aca–

    demy of Sciences of the USSR was established in Karelia. Newspapers are

    issued in every county, and one for the republic as a whole. There is a

    publishing house in Petrozavodsk.

            The 1946-50 5-Year Plan provides, for the goal year, 652 schools

    in operation (73 urban and 579 rural), with an attendance of 95,000, or

    more than double the actual attendance in 1945. This also indicated a

    total population about the same as pre-war. 80 new school buildings are

    to be erected. By 1950 the number of persons with high school education

    is to be 100 per 1,000, by comparison to 14 per thousand before the Revo–

    lution. There are to be, in 1950, 25 county-wide community centers, 261

    village centers, 329 public libraries (excluding those of the trade unions),

    six theaters and 250 movie houses. Expenditure per education per head of

    population rose from 1.43 rubles in 1914 to 13,00 rubles in 1928 to

    200.00 rubles in 1945-46, adjusted for changing values. A Karelian alpha–

    bet was devised.

            Karelian literature takes its origins from the Karelo-Finnish folk

    epic, Kalevala , from which Longfellow took the meter for his Song of

    Hiawatha . Folk singers and story tellers carry on that tradition, and are

    continually creating new songs, laments, runes and tales. A distinctive

    musical form is the recitation and singing of the Kalevala by two men

    seated facing each other and holding hands, reflecting how rare and preci–

    ous was a meeting of friends in this little-populated land. The national

    instruments include a sort of

    011      |      Vol_X-0155                                                                                                                  
    shepherd's clarinet, the psaltery, the balalaika and the accordion. Dances

    and songs are improvised on the psaltery. A Karelian Opera and Ballet Com–

    pany was founded during the war - the first in its people's history. It and

    the four theater companies then existing gave some 2,000 performances be–

    fore Karelian troops. A Russian composer wrote an opera, Sampo , based on

    the Kalevala, and a Karelian, [ ?] Hjalmar Sinisalo, wrote a ballet on the

    same theme. Another, Kalle Rautio, wrote a symphonic poem on the feats of 300

    Toivo Antikainen, a modern Finnish folk hero who fought Baron Mannerheim's

    accession to power. Finnish literature is translated into Russian and vice versa.

            Musical and theatrical enterprises [ ?] founded during the past quarter century in–

    clude a philharmonic society, a musical comedy company, the Kantele Ensemble

    of Karelian Songs and Dances, the Theater of National Drama [ ?] and the Theater of Russian Drama.

    Other centers of cultural activity include the House of Folk Arts, and the

    unions of composers and artists. However, war brought the destruction of the

    buildings of the National Theater, the Philharmonic and the music school

    in Petrozavodsk, and the theater in Medvezhegorsk. The House of Folk Arts

    sends ensembles to tour the lumber camps. Nearly 50,000 young people belong 310

    to sports organizations.

           

    310 125 ﹍ 1550 620 310 ﹍ 38750 310 13 ﹍ 930 310 ﹍ 4030



    012      |      Vol_X-0156                                                                                                                  
    Karelo-Finn

            ld>

            History . The Karelian people maintained a communal tribal exist–

    ence until the 10th century, when there began class stratifica–

    tion and the emergence of feudal relationships. In the 11th

    [ ?] century the country was subjugated by [ ?] Novgorod , and came

    under the power of Moscow when [ ?] Novgorod was conquered

    in 1478. Karelia's tribute to its overlords was chiefly in

    furs. At the beginning of the 17th century Karelia was badly

    plundered during a Swadish invasion, which [ ?] resulted in

    the loss of western territories just recently [ ?] regained.

    However, the Russo-Swedish treaty of 1721, a century later,

    restored the [ ?]

    Karelian Isthmus to Russian control. The founding and growth

    of St. Petersburg strongly influenced the economy of Karelia.

    With the appearance development of industrial capitalism in Russia in

    the 19th century lumbering was developed in Karelia. But until

    the Revolution, Karelia remained, despite its proximity to

    the capital, a backward colonial borderland, its people op–

    pressed and extremely proverty-stricken. The country was [ ?]

    entirely roadless, and the people's staple food a bread made

    of rye mixed with pine bark and straw. There was no written

    language, and there were many restrictions on the use of the

    spoken Karelian tongue. No ¶ As elsewhere in the Empire, the use of this isolated land

    as a place of exile for revolutionaries resulted in the birth

    of political consciousness among its people. In 1905-1907 there

    were peasant disturbances, and meetings and demonstrations in

    Petrozavodsk ("Peter's Factory", where that great Tsar had es–

    tablished an iron works) and Pudozh. A branch of the Bolshevik

    Party was founded in Petrozavodsk in 1906. The suppression of

    the 1905 Revolution resulted in a worsening of the status of

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    013      |      Vol_X-0158                                                                                                                  
    Karelo-Finn

    the Karelians. From 1917 to 1922 Karelia was the seene of vir–

    tually uninterrupted [ ?] conflict, internal and foreign - in the latter

    case against invading troops of the great powers and those of

    Finland which sought to annex Karelia with the aid of its

    powerful allies. The Karelian nationality received recognition

    from the Soviet government with the formation, on March 4, 1920,

    of a short-lived form of autonomy called the Karelian [ ?] Labor

    Commune. On June 25, 1923, this became the Karelian ASSR. Fin–

    ally, on March 31, 1940, as described above, it was elevated

    to the status of an SSR. no ¶ Most of Karelia was occupied by the Finns from 1941 to 1944.

    The population of the capital, Petrozavodsk, fell by half from

    its former 80,000. Other modern towns, such as Kondopoga and

    Medvezhegorsk, were virtually wiped out. Corporal punishment

    was legalized, and sentences of whipping with the knout car–

    ried out in public. Karelia shares with Estonia the dubious

    distinction of having suffered a heavier per capita loss than

    any other occupied Soviet republic. Destruction in Karelia

    was largely responsible for the loss of 30 per cent of all Soviet

    lumbering and sawmill capacity, vital to reconstruction and

    export, a similar percentage of the paper-mills, and more

    than half the match manufacture.

            ld >

            Economic Life . Logging multiplied 8 times from 1913 to

    1939. Timber felling, sawmill operations, paper making, and

    ski and other wood-products manufacture accoun [ ?] t for half of

    the gross output of the national economy. Electric power

    capacity rose from 700 kilowatts in 1913 to 40,000 in 1940.

    Some 20 factories and mills were built in the decade before

    the war, bringing industry up to ten times the 1913 level.

           

    William Mandel



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    014      |      Vol_X-0160                                                                                                                  
    Karelo-Finn

            Lit.: Large Soviet Encyclopedia (Russ.), Supplementary Volume, USSR ,

    Moscow, 1947; Brief Soviet Encyclopedia (Russ., one volume), Moscow, 1943;

    Socialist Construction of the USSR (Russ., Statistical Handbook), Moscow,

    1939; Socialist Agriculture of the USSR (Russ.) 1939; Cultural Construc

    tion of the USSR , (Russ.), 1939; Soviet Calendar , 1945; Information Bulletin ,

    Embassy of the USSR, Wash., D. C., [ ?] Sept. 11, 1943, Jan. 15,

    1944, Dec. 9, 1944, Oct. 11, 1945; Moscow News , March 30, 1946; Bulletin

    on the Soviet Union , Feb. 5, 1942; [ ?]


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