Joseph Stalin Museum, Biographical museum in Gori, Georgia.
The Joseph Stalin Museum is a biographical museum in Gori, Georgia, dedicated to the life of the Soviet leader. A small wooden hut stands under a large columned pavilion, beside a multi-story exhibition building and a green railway carriage on a track.
The museum opened in 1937 in the wooden house where Stalin's father rented a room and kept a workshop. The main palazzo was begun in 1951 as a museum of the history of socialism. Closed in 1989 amid rising ethnic tensions, it reopened after Georgia's independence.
The museum keeps its Soviet-era character: six halls run in roughly chronological order, mixing office furniture, personal effects and gifts with photographs, paintings and newspaper articles. Two paintings show the young Soso Jughashvili with the poet Ilia Chavchavadze in the Iveria editorial office and with comrades at the Gori fortress in 1892.
Guided tours last about an hour and cover all three parts of the complex. The railway carriage stands outside and remains accessible in cooler weather.
The green Pullman carriage is armour-plated and weighs 83 tons; it was recovered from the railway yards at Rostov-on-Don in 1985. The exhibition ends with one of twelve copies of Stalin's death mask, taken shortly after his death.
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