The city of Salekhard (until 1935 – Obdorsk) is the capital of the world’s largest gas producing region – the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. The only city on the planet located at the latitude of the Arctic Circle.
The history of Obdorsk – Salekhard goes into the history of the development of the north of Western Siberia, the creation of statehood among the aboriginal population, the industrial development of the Arctic. Obdorsk has been an outpost of the Russian state for centuries on its northern route to the Pacific Ocean.
After the annexation of Siberia to Russia on the site of the Ostyak town, near the confluence of the Polui River with the Obu, the Russian Cossacks of Berezovsky voivode Nikita Trakhaniotov in 1595 laid Obdor fort. Obdorsk has undergone many transformations, always remaining the center of the region and an independent administrative unit. It included the rates of Ostyak and Samoyed elders, representatives of the tsarist administration.
Ostrog in 1635 was renamed the Obdorsk outpost. In 1799 the fortress was abolished. The outpost was transformed into the center of the Obdorsky volost of the Berezovsky district of the Tobolsk province - the village of Obdorsk.
In 1897 Obdorsk had 30 houses, 150 shops, 500 permanent residents, engaged mainly in hunting, fishing and trade. Every year from December 15 to January 25, the Obdor Fair was held, the turnover of which exceeded 100 thousand rubles. It attracted thousands of sellers and buyers. Merchants brought here flour and bread, metal products and jewelry, cloth, wine and tobacco, and took furs, walrus fangs, fish and bird feathers.
After the formation of the Yamalo-Nenets National District, Obdorsk became its capital and in 1933 received a new name - Salekhard (from the Nenets "Sale-Harn" - a village on the cape). In 1938, the district center acquired the status of a city.
Today Salekhard is a modern center of cultural and business life. It harmoniously combines the founders’ past with the present and future.
