At the opinion crossroads: Kuibyshev in the days of the Great Patriotic War (1941–1943)

The article considers Kuibyshev city (Samara nowadays) in the wartime (1941–1943), the features of its life activity and development. The solving of the large-scale tasks raised in connection with the unprecedented evacuation of the government departments, diplomatic body, people’s commissariats, factories and population to the city deeply changed the city life. Kuibyshev was the regionally governed city, but it performed many specific functions typical for the soviet capital city of Moscow. The circumstance gave occasion to call the city of Kuibyshev unofficially «alternate capital». The research task is to analyze the various aspects of the Kuibyshev city life in the wartime: to show the different interpretations of its status perception by the historians in 1941–1943; to specify the data concerning the specified All-Union people’s commissariats being on evacuation in the city of Kuibyshev and its quantitative composition; to raise the question of the final date of the acceptance of the «special objects» No. 1 (Stalin’s bunker) and No. 2 (for General Staff of the Red Army) of the Building of Metrostroi (Soviet subway construction company); to qualify the questions about the zoning of the city in the wartime; to cite new data about Bezymyanka district of the prewar time using comparative-historical, analytical and retrospective methods. The article introduces a new document material of the central archives of the Russian Federation into scientific discourse. It is proved that Kuibyshev was neither «alternate» nor «military» capital. It tasted the peak of its «capital city status» during 2–3 months while solving many issues of the All-Union scale and performing capital functions. The conclusion that the acceptance of the city services in the analyzed period was the rating of the city of Kuibyshev to the cities of republican subordination on 21st August 1943 is drawn.