page_title: Tomsk
section_title: Culture
hierarchical_section_title: Tomsk / Culture
context_page_description: Tomsk is a city and the administrative center of Tomsk Oblast in Russia, located on the Tom River. The city's population was 524,669; 487,838; 501,963.
  Tomsk is considered one of the oldest towns in Siberia. It celebrated its 410th anniversary in 2014. The city is a notable educational and scientific center with six state universities, over 100,000 students, and the oldest university in Siberia.
context_section_description: Tomsk has many local cultural institutions including several drama theaters as well as a children's theater and a puppet theater. Major concert venues in the city include the Conservatory Concert hall and the Tomsk Palace of Sport. The city also boasts cultural centers dedicated to German, Polish and Tatar languages and culture.
  One of the city's prominent theaters was destroyed in an act of terrorism in 1905. The Korolevsky Theater (built in 1884–85) was being used by a group of communist revolutionaries when the theater was attacked and set on fire by members of the Black Hundred, a hard-line nationalist organization. Those who escaped the flames were gunned down by Black Hundred members waiting outside the theater. Estimates put the number of casualties between 200 and 1000.
  There are a number of museums in Tomsk devoted to various subjects, most notably art, local history and wood carving. There is also a Museum of Oppression, housed in a former KGB dungeon. Tomsk State University has a number of small museums with exhibits on archaeology, paleontology, zoology, as well as a herbarium and a botanical garden
  As in many other cities in the former Soviet Union, the revolutionary government destroyed a number of old churches in the city including two that had existed since the 17th century. However, Tomsk managed to save some of its churches by transforming them into machine shops, warehouses, archives, and even residential buildings. Since the end of the communist era some of the churches have been renovated and returned to their congregations.
  Tomsk is well known for its intricate "gingerbread" decoration of traditional wooden houses in the area. However, the number of old homes in this style is decreasing due to redevelopment or some of them catching fire, as the structures have little to no fire protection.
  Trud (Labor) Stadium, in central Tomsk is the base for matches with the FC Tom Tomsk, the city's professional football club. The team's 2004 promotion to the Russian Premier League gave local fans a chance to see some of the nation's best teams play at the city's own stadium.
  Tomsk has many local media outlets including the TV2 (Tomsk) television station, shut down by the authorities and turned into an internet TV medium, the radio stations Radio Siberia and Echo of Moscow in Tomsk along with several newspapers (Tomskaya Nedelya, Krasnoye Znamya and Vechernii Tomsk).
  In April 2006 Tomsk received international media attention as the venue of a major summit on economic cooperation, held in the city between Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
  Tomsk was the name given by children's author Elizabeth Beresford to one of her fictional characters The Wombles, all of whom are named after places.
caption: Tomsk Museum for Regional Studies and the Organ Hall of the Philharmonic
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