Novocherkassk is a city in the Rostov region of Russia, located on the right elevated bank of the Aksai (the right arm of the Don), at the confluence of the Tulov River, 40 km northeast of Rostov-on-Don. Novocherkassk is a railway station and a junction of roads. Population of 182,000 inhabitants (2001). The city was founded in 1805. The main branches of urban industry: electric power engineering (Novocherkasskaya GRES); mechanical engineering (Novocherkassk Electric Locomotive Plant, Magnit (manufacture of permanent magnets); plants: mechanical engineering named after Nikolsky (manufacturing of mining equipment), petroleum engineering, machine tool); chemical (factories: electrode, synthetic products (from natural gas), chemical); production of building materials (plant of silicate brick); also there are enterprises of meat, milling, winemaking industry.
The city was founded by the ataman M. I. Platov as New Cherkassk, which should be the administrative center of the Earth (since 1870 the Region) of the Don army instead of Cherkassskaya (now Starocherkasskaya) stanitsa, flooded by spring spills of the Don. In the 19th century, Novocherkassk became the center of political life of the Don Cossacks. In the 1870s, after the construction of the railway line Millerovo Rostov-on-Don, the city was connected to the railway network of Russia. At the beginning of the 20th century in Novocherkassk were opened Ataman technical school, spiritual and teacher seminaries, Junker Cossack school, cadet corps, Don Polytechnic Institute (1907; the first higher educational institution on the Don). In the late 1920s, 14 universities and technical schools operated in the city. Novocherkassk is the birthplace of philosopher A. F. Losev, general A. I. Lebed, actress Valentina Telegina.
The city has a number of research and design institutions, including those specializing in electric locomotion and electrical engineering, as well as the North Caucasus Zonal Veterinary Institute. Not far from Novocherkassk is the All-Russian Research Institute of Viticulture and Winemaking. There is also a museum of the history of Don viticulture with a tasting hall. Among the educational institutions of the city are Novocherkassk Meliorative Academy, South Russian Technical University, Novocherkassk Military Institute of Communications. In Novocherkassk there is a drama theater named after Komissarzhevskaya (opened in 1825), a museum of the history of the Don Cossacks (kept military kleinodes, banners, weapons, as well as documents on the history of the Cossacks), house-museums: battle painter M.B. Grekov, artist I.I. Krylov.
Among the first architectural structures of the city are two triumphal arches built to meet troops returning from under Azov; the Ascension Cathedral (1805; the third largest church in Russia after St. Isaac’s Cathedral in St. Petersburg and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow).
In the center of the city of Novocherkassk there is a monument to the ataman M. I. Platov (near Novocherkassk there is a farm of Small Mishkin - the family estate of the ataman), as well as the Ataman Palace, where the city council and the museum of the history of the Don Cossacks are located.
