Shakhtyorsk (; , ''Tōro'') is a

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

Uglegorsky District Uglegorsky District () is an administrative district (raion) of Sakhalin Oblast, Russia; one of the seventeen in the oblast.Law #25-ZO Municipally, it is incorporated as Uglegorsky Municipal District.Law #524 It is located in the western central ...

Sakhalin Oblast Sakhalin Oblast ( rus, Сахали́нская о́бласть, r=Sakhalinskaya oblastʹ, p=səxɐˈlʲinskəjə ˈobləsʲtʲ) is a federal subject of Russia (an oblast) comprising the island of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands in the Russian ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, located on the western coast of the

Sakhalin Island Sakhalin ( rus, Сахали́н, p=səxɐˈlʲin) is an island in Northeast Asia. Its north coast lies off the southeastern coast of Khabarovsk Krai in Russia, while its southern tip lies north of the Japanese island of Hokkaido. An islan ...

, northwest of

Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk (, , ) is a city and the administrative center of Sakhalin Oblast, Russia. It is located on Sakhalin Island in the Russian Far East, north of Japan. Gas and oil extraction as well as processing are amongst the main industries on ...

, the

administrative center An administrative centre is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town, or the place where the central administration of a commune, is located. In countries with French as the administrative language, such as Belgiu ...

of the

oblast An oblast ( or ) is a type of administrative division in Bulgaria and several post-Soviet states, including Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. Historically, it was used in the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. The term ''oblast'' is often translated i ...

. Population:

Etymology

The name of the town derives from the

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

word "" ("miner"), referring to the

black coal Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''Psy ...

production in the surrounding area.

History

It was founded after 1905 as ''Tōro'', in the region then known as the

Karafuto Prefecture , was established by the Empire of Japan in 1907 to govern the southern part of Sakhalin. This territory became part of the Empire of Japan in 1905 after the Russo-Japanese War, when the portion of Sakhalin south of 50°N was ceded by the R ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. After the Soviet Union gained control over the southern part of the Sakhalin Island in August 1945, it became part of

. It was granted town status and given its present name in 1947.

Administrative and municipal status

Within the framework of administrative divisions, it is, together with four rural localities, incorporated within

as the

town of district significance Town of district significance is an administrative division of a district in a federal subject of Russia. It is equal in status to a selsoviet or an urban-type settlement of district significance, but is organized around a town (as opposed to a ...

of Shakhtyorsk.Law #25-ZO As a municipal division, the town of district significance of Shakhtyorsk is incorporated within Uglegorsky Municipal District as Shakhtyorskoye Urban Settlement.Law #524

Economy

The town's economy relies mainly on black coal mining, which supports a power station.

Notable people

* Yuri Aleksandrovich Yakimov (born 28 February 1953, Shakhtyorsk) is a Russian rower who competed for the Soviet Union in the 1976 Summer Olympics. Нe won the silver medal in the quadruple sculls event.

References

Notes

Sources

* * {{Authority control Cities and towns in Sakhalin Oblast