Popov Central Museum of Communications in Saint Petersburg
Description
The A.S. Popov Central Museum of Communications was founded in 1872 and is one of the oldest museums of science and technology in the world. It is located in the historic centre of Saint Petersburg, Russia, near Saint Isaac's Square.
History
The museum was opened on 11 September 1872 as the Telegraph Museum. The head of the Telegraph Department of Russia Carl Luders proclaimed the foundation of this museum:
“ …For the purpose of familiarisation of all the telegraph workers and other interested persons with all innovations and improvements in the field of telegraphy, it is proposed to organise a permanent museum in Saint Petersburg, based on objects presented at the Moscow Polytechnic Exhibition… ”In 1884, the post office branch was added and the museum was transformed into the Postal and Telegraph Museum.
Thus the creation of the museum collections was set up. In 1945, the museum was named after the Russian scientist and inventor Alexander Stepanovich Popov, who first in the world used radio signals to transmit a message over distance that started an epoch of radio communication.
By the late 1970s, the museum housed more than 4 million stamps, stamped envelopes, and postcards.
Nowadays, the museum is a leading institution in its field in the Russian Federation. As such, it provides consulting supervision for other telecommunications museums.
Collections
The museum archives and collections include over 8 million items including:
- documents and items related to the history of post, telegraph and telephone, radio and broadcasting, space communication, and modern means of telecommunications,
- 15,000 apparatuses and technical pieces,
- 50,000 archival documents,
- vast collections of stamps and postal stationery, including 8 million items of the Russian National Collection of Philately,
- 50,000 books and periodicals of the specialised research library.
Address
The museum is situated at the address: 7 Pochtamtskaya Street, Saint Petersburg, 190000, Russia.
-
View of the museum
at Pochtamtskaya Street -
Main museum entrance
-
1960 USSR stamp celebrating Radio Day and showing the museum building
-
1972 USSR stamp commemorating the 100th anniversary of the museum
Street view
Reviews
For example, today one of them said that they are now out of the hall me and my baby (!). The reason? My child plays with an interactive exhibit. That is, the exhibit is, it is interactive, but can you touch some one way and others are not. In the instructions it doesn't say this, prohibit no labels. It is not spoil the exhibit or not (it is iron). But bellow is Holy. No, you please take a tamper-proof exhibits, if you want to be, as the European level of the Museum. Try only someone in Finnish "Eureka" is to say that the child now withdraw from the hall for the handling of exhibit, haha. If a person doesn't have a hammer and acids, all he can do with his hands, should be allowed, otherwise you have no interactive Museum, and one vision.
About the exhibition: resembles a warehouse. I brought two children, one 3, the second 9. No one understood anything about the relationship. Just saw a lot of old obscure things that slipped without a shadow of a curiosity, and were all interactive. But what did they know? The big question. Eldest said: I liked it a little bit, but all the old stuff is not interesting.
Many of the exhibits have lost the clarity, the instruction to them is difficult even for an adult. If you make at least one room for children, which simply and clearly explains everything that is found in the exposition of them, it will be easier.
Very informative
