Radio broadcasting on Shabolovka: Main Archive tells about the construction of the Shukhov Tower

One hundred years ago, on March 19, 1922, the Shukhov Tower on the ancient Moscow Shabolovka Street started radio broadcasting. The building was named after its author, engineer and architect Vladimir Shukhov. Main Archive tells the story behind the broadcast tower and other Shukhov’s projects.

During his studies at high school and at the Imperial Moscow Technical School, Vladimir Shukhov demonstrated outstanding design skills. In his lifetime, he managed to create unique projects in oil equipment and technology, was the technical director during the construction of the first Russian oil pipelines and an oil refinery with oil cracking units. Beyond that, the designer created projects for natural gas storage facilities, steam boilers, sea mines, and platforms for heavy artillery systems.

Vladimir Shukhov's most renowned structure was the 160-meter-high radio tower on Shabolovka Street. It consists of six mesh hyperboloidal steel tier sections.

In 1919, the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense agreed to establish permanent radio and telegraph communications between the RSFSR and Western European countries. They needed to build a powerful radio station. The Construction Office headed by engineer Vladimir Shukhov received the order to build it.

There was a then shortage of metal in the country. Structures of factories and bridges were used to build the tower on Vladimir Lenin's order. The facility was built without scaffolding: first, the lower section was assembled, then the subsequent sections were erected inside it and lifted using blocks and winches.

The openwork design of the tower, on the one hand, was strikingly light and graceful, while on the other hand, it was very solid and ensured minimum wind load.

After the Moscow radiotelegraph station had been completed and equipped, its first broadcast surpassed the radio stations of Paris, Berlin, and New York in power and range. It was a concert of Russian music with outstanding artists of the Bolshoi Theater Nadezhda Obukhova and Boris Yevlakhov participating.

In 1927, Vladimir Shukhov modified the design of the tower top. After another 12 years, the structure had a television antenna. The Moscow Television Center opened on Shabolovka to start regular studio television broadcasts.

During World War II, broadcasting was interrupted but was one of the first in Europe to be restored on May 7, 1945. Until the Ostankino TV tower appeared in 1967, the Shukhov Tower remained not only the main broadcasting center of the USSR but also the tallest structure in the country. It was named a cultural heritage site of regional significance.