On October 8, a postcard with a commemorative stamp dedicated to the 175th Birth Anniversary of Alexander Sibiryakov, an entrepreneur and an explorer of Siberia, was put into postal circulation in the Geographical Projects of Russia series

Alexander Sibiryakov (1849-1933) was a Russian entrepreneur and an explorer of Siberia.

He was born on September 26 (October 8), 1849 in Irkutsk. In 1885-1895, he was a councilor of the Irkutsk City Duma; he prepared plans for the development of Siberia via “improving transport service, the construction of roads and canals in it, its maritime relations with neighboring countries”. In 1890, the director general of the Ural mining plants issued a certificate to Sibiryakov for prospecting and developing of gold fields and ore deposits in the Tobolsk Province.

Alexander Sibiryakov was one of the organizers of the polar expedition on the Vega steamship of the Swedish navigator Professor Adolf Erik Nordenshöld, who for the first time in 1878-1880 sailed by the Northern Sea Route along the shores of Siberia in the Arctic Ocean and went through the Bering Strait to the Pacific Ocean. The interest in Siberian waterways was dictated by the practical needs of Siberian entrepreneurs and Siberian residents. In the 1880s, A. Sibiryakov explored the mouths of the rivers of Pechora, Yenisei, Ob, and Amur, the coasts of the Kara and Okhotsk Seas, and overland routes between the rivers of Western and Eastern Siberia. He built a road from the Pechora to the Ob, which later became known as the Sibiryakov tract. It was used for transporting Siberian cargoes to the Pechora Region, Mezensky Uyezd, to the Murmansk coast, to Northern Norway and Denmark. An important stage in the realization of the plan was the work on improvement of navigation conditions on the Angara River.

A. Sibiryakov outlined the course and results of his numerous travels in a number of articles and books. About 30 articles published by him in 1881-1914 are devoted to the problems of communication routes in Siberia and its connection with other countries.

A. Sibiryakov's charitable activities pursued mainly the goal of development of education and culture in Siberia. He also did a lot for Irkutsk proper: generous donations to the city's educational institutions, financing of the construction of the Church to the name of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God, and building of the main church in the Ascension Monastery. In 1893, he was awarded the title of Honorary Citizen of Irkutsk.

The main illustration provides a portrait of A. Sibiryakov against the background of a map of the Sibiryakov tract, as well as the RGS logo; the commemorative stamp features images that symbolically represent geographic projects.

In addition to the issue of the postcard with a commemorative stamp, JSC Marka produced special cancels for Moscow, Irkutsk and Tomsk.


Design Artists: S. Kapranov and I. Ulyanovsky.
Quantity: 5 thousand postcards.

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