In 1990 the local "Sovest" (Conscience) society was preparing to erect such a boulder in Arkhangelsk for the same commemorative purpose. Hearing of this proposal, Moscow Memorial requested Sovest to select a similar boulder and arranged for its transport to Moscow where it was erected on Lubyanka Square. For the next nine months the Solovki Stone faced the statue of Felix Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Cheka, which stood in the centre of the square. After the attempted August 1991 coup the Dzerzhinsky statue, first erected in 1958, was toppled and removed.