A remarkable museum of mining and smelting business is located in the village Zhezdy, Karaganda region. It is only Museum in Kazakhstan and across Central Asia of the similar profile, only here visitors can get acquainted with the history of formation and development of mining and metallurgy from ancient times to the present days.

In addition to the museum the House-Museum of the Academician K.I. Satpayev is located 35 km away from the village Zhezdy in the village Karsaklay. Both museums represent a single historical and cultural complex, which introduces visitors to the stages of formation and development of the mining and metallurgical industry in Central Kazakhstan.

The museum of mining and smelting business has more than 25-year history, it has been organized by Regulation of the Council of Ministers of the Kazakh SSR 21.12.1988, by the decision of the Committee on Culture 30.02.1988. The house-museum of the academician K.I.Satpaev was opened in 1969 on the 70th anniversary of the academician.

Cultural and Historic Ensemble of the museum covers an area of more than 4 hectares, the exhibition halls of the museum premises occupy more than 800 square meters. An important part is the open air exhibition where the exhibits are placed on special sites of over 870 square meters.

In the course of 25 years, the museum staff managed to gather an impressive collection of equipment, items, documents, photos and many other things. To date, the museum has 14,667 artifacts, 12028 of which are the exhibits of the main fund, that is, they are shown to visitors at the museum.

The open air exhibition placed at special venues deserves a special attention, mining equipment from different times collected from all enterprises of Zhezkazgan region, Zhezkazgan mineral specimens, models of existing smelters of antiquity (II-I m. BC), and many other things are represented here.

The museum has three exhibition halls which display the history of mining business divided into whole epochs. So the first hall introduces the mining and smelting business of antiquity and the Middle Ages. The second room contains the exhibits telling about the mining industry in the province until 1917. There are such sections as: scientists' and travelers' investigation of the area; emergence of the first enterprises; British concessions; emergence of the working class, etc. The third panoramic hall includes such sections as the development of mining and metallurgical enterprises of the region; agriculture of the region; culture and social development; fauna and flora; the topic: "Space."

The collection of artifacts is amazing and it will impress any fan of history, the visitor will be able to get acquainted with stone tools of the Paleolithic and Neolithic, the history of mankind's application of metal beginning with copper and bronze arrowheads and ending with the fragments of the spacecraft of a complex alloy. The geography of origin of the exhibits the British Isles, the United States, Germany, Port Arthur and many other places is no less interesting.

In 1994, the museum was visited by the first President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev, he expressed his high opinion of the place and importance of this museum. Today, in addition to the core expositional activity, the museum serves as a training base of the university, specialized secondary schools, middle schools, scientific and educational classes with the use of a rich collection and scientific exhibits are held here.

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