County City Museum

The history of the museum begins in 1921, when amateur local historian, naturalist Alexander Konstantinovich Bulich took the initiative to establish a museum in Chistopol. The museum collections are based on his personal collections. The most interesting were materials on archaeology, paleontology, biology and botany. Some items from these collections, less susceptible to destruction by time, can still be seen in the museum today: Bulgar mail, found by the shepherd Minihan in 1921 near the village of St. Mokshino; amazing beauty spheroconus - a vessel for incense, which came to the museum from the collection of the landowner of Chistopol district Schulz; a collection of eggs and nests of birds inhabiting the territory of Chistopol district, and a rich collection of remains of ancient animals: mammoths, bison, rhinos and unicorns.

A vivid illustration of the history of the region is the rich ethnographic collection of the museum, combining household items, clothes, jewelry, tools, crafts of the peoples of the Middle Volga region: Russians, Tatars, Chuvash. The pearl of the collection of objects of urban life are two wooden bicycles made by a peasant of the village of Chistopol Vizelki by Melnikov Nikolai Ivanovich. The most interesting is the bicycle, made in 1902 in the form of a large wheel, inside which there are pedals and a saddle. The second bicycle (1909) is equipped with a special belt drive. In the axis of the rear wheel, a return clutch is inserted, which drove the bicycle in motion.