years ago, the entire issue of Ogonyok was dedicated to the opening of the Volga-Don Canal. “The channel is dug! — the magazine reported to readers. — From the Volga to the Don there was a highway of five seas. The first ships are already sailing along the “steppe seas”, buoys are swinging on the water, and the towers of two lighthouses proudly rise on the dam. “Hello, Tsimlyansk Sea!” - say everyone who enters this man-made reservoir, symbolizing the fulfillment of the age-old dream of our people..."

People first tried to connect the Volga and Don back in the 16th century, when Turkish Sultan Selim II sent 22 thousand soldiers to build the canal. However, a month later the Turks returned, declaring that “even the entire Turkish people cannot do anything here in 100 years.” Then Peter the Great took up the canal, but after the start of the Northern War, all plans for connecting the rivers were forgotten. Trade was carried out according to a simple scheme: Baku oil, Caspian fish, timber, and bread were transported along the Volga to Tsaritsyn. Then the cargo was transferred to the railway, delivered to the city of Kalach and from there lowered by water to the Sea of Azov - for export. After unloading, the barges were dismantled for firewood. “On the upper Don the forest was cut down, the river became shallow,” wrote canal construction engineer Ilya Skachkov. “Less costs, more profits—that was the motto of the predatory merchants!”

The government returned to plans to create a canal only after the Great Patriotic War, although the project itself was approved in Lenin’s GOELRO plan. Construction lasted only 4.5 years, which is a unique period in hydraulic construction (for example, the same Panama Canal with the same amount of work took 34 years to build). The reasons for the record are explained simply: the canal was dug by “enemies of the people” - political prisoners. But the press did not write about this.

dates – Ogonyok No. 23 (4999) from 06/10/2007