Aruküla is a village in Harju County, the center of Raasiku Parish. Aruküla has 2,129 inhabitants (as of January 1, 2018). According to the 2011 census, there were 1,965 inhabitants in Aruküla, of whom 1,871 (95.2%) were Estonians.
Boulder Aruküla
Aruküla giant boulder or Hellama stone (also
Hellema stone / boulder) is a protected natural stone in the small
town of Aruküla, Raasiku parish, Harju County, and one of the
largest boulders in Estonia. The boulders have a circumference of
35.2 meters and a height of 6.2 meters, a volume of 360 m3.
Hellem farm
Aruküla Manor (Harju-Jaani)
Arroküll Manor was
founded in the 17th century as the Raasiku Manor. In 1726 it was
converted into a separate manor. In 1766, Karl Gustav von Baranov
became the owner of the estate. The Baranovs owned the estate until
the transfer in 1919. The last owner of the estate was Peter von
Baranov.
The surviving manor house was completed in the 1820s
as a one-story long building in the classicist style. Inside the
tiled roof building, low triangle facades were added on the
projecting side beams. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries,
the exterior of the building was changed by adding a wooden second
floor to the center of the building.
From the heart of the
estate, two lanes shaped roads lead to the Lagedi-Pening road, which
were at right angles to each other. Today both roads exist, but more
traffic has been taken to the southwest of the paved road.
In
1921, a local school began operating in the building. Aruküla School
was located on the estate until 1978, when a new school house was
built in the city center. In 1992, Aruküla Free Waldorf School moved
to a building belonging to the Raasiku parish. Various cultural
events are held in the manor hall. The manor's barn and stables are
also preserved.
To the north of the manor, a small town
Aruküla arose along the road connecting the railway station with the
manor. Today the village has grown along the roadside to manor
houses.
For the first time Aruküla is mentioned in written sources in
1291 (Arenkulle). It is also known that the Aruküla estate, founded
in 1560, split from Raasik in the middle of the 17th century.
The Great Northern War and the Plague of 1710 left only 19 of
the 212 Swedish population in Aruküla, although by 1716 the
population of Aruküla had doubled, the population had to be imported
to fill the empty farms. So, in 1730, 10 Russian families from the
country arrived in Arukyula, including the ancestors of the artist
Andrei Yegorov, who later brought glory to Arukyula. A peasant from
Uusimaa County in Finland also came to Aruküla. According to a 1744
plow inspection, 4 families and 3 single men from Hiiumaa were taken
to Aruküla. Of these, Broma Jaan served as a copper office.
In 1766 the Aruküla estate was transferred to the Baranov family.
The last landowner to own the estate was Peter von Baranow, the last
landowner to take office before Arukula's glory began in the early
20th century. The last landowner Aruküla was also described as very
friendly and helpful, who helped the peasants of the Igavere village
in difficult times with the help of custody and money.
In
1862, 20 children began to be taught reading, writing, rehearsal,
singing and religious education on Kulli Street, near the village of
Aruküla. This is considered the birth of the Aruküla school.
In 1870, the St. Petersburg-Paldiski railway was completed, where
Baranovka was also called at the request of the landowner Arukül
Baranov. The modern garden city of Aruküla originated in the early
20th century in a pine forest near the train station, which was also
planted in the mid-19th century by the elder Baranoffs. The von
Baranov family lived in Aruküla until 1919.
After the War of
Independence, in 1919, the Aruküla estate with the land and fields
surrounding it was awarded by Kaarel Eenpalu (until 1935 by Karl
August Ainbund) for the bravery shown in the war, later becoming the
first Minister of the Interior (1921-1926)) , Head of State (1932),
and since 1938 also Prime Minister of the Republic of Estonia. The
Aruküla manor was used by Eenpalu for the use of the Aruküla school
in 1921 and began construction of the Hellema farm next to the
manor, which was completed in 1925. Together with his wife Linda,
Eenpalud helped the residents of Aruküla improve the well-being of
the small town.
The first announcements from 1926 are plans
to build a garden city in the Aruküla pine forest, which remained
when the estate was distributed to local peasants. Unsuitable pine
forests were divided into garden plots of several hectares. Most of
the plots were provided by the state in exchange for land taken from
the owners of the Saku summer resort. In 1927, more active young
farmers, landowners and residents of Aruküla, with the help of
Kaarel Eenpalu, established the Aruküla department of the Upper
Estonia Youth Association (UENÜ), which began organizing cultural
and sports life in the Aruküla settlement. In 1929, the new
landowners in the newly created Garden City were unable to plan for
the Aruküla Garden City Association, which brought together former
members of the Saku Summer Resort Service Society who received land
for their land in Aruküla. Erroneous statutory documents of the
Company were returned for refusal to register.
In January
1932, Aruküla landowners Karl Joakit, Vilhem Truve and Johannes
Lustberg were able to register the Aruküla Service Society. The
society began to support the well-being of the Aruküla pine forest
by requiring forest owners to clear the forest every year, hiring a
forester and herders, and organizing roadside repairs. For example,
the Order planted ornamental trees on large roads and painted over
stones along the roadside. With the support of Prime Minister Kaarel
Eenpalu, a well-preserved linden alley was built along Jauk Avenue
in Aruküla. In 1933, under the leadership of the Arukül branch of
UENÜ, a large campaign was launched to build the Aruküla community
center. Initially, however, the highly welcomed proposal was
postponed due to design and land ownership errors. The public
building, however, was built in 1939 when he was given a plot of
land for construction and was supported by Kaarel Eenpalu with half
the money. Linda Eenpalu also helped gather the small town owner by
leading the founding of the Aruküla-Pening Housewives Society, which
began offering home courses.
In the 1950s, the plots of the pine city of Aruküla were divided
into small residential plots, which were gradually built into
houses. Two collective farms were established around Aruküla:
October Victory and Soviet Farmer.
The 1950s were also marked
by a new rise in the cultural life of Aruküla. Very soon, a large
stage was opened in a pine forest at the Arukül festival site, which
at that time received the status of a pop stage in the Harju region.
This was followed by regular district song festivals. Community
activities in Arukül were still blown up by wings in 1959 when the
Arukül Horticultural Society was founded and became an active
advocate of gardening and home culture. In addition to its main
goals, it has also played an important role in preserving the
cultural heritage of Arukül and promoting better lifestyles for the
people. The community also began organizing volunteers to help clean
up the village. On the initiative of the Society in the 1960s,
Aruküla also received a dispensary, a kindergarten, a bus line and a
black pavement on Tallinn Road.
In 1968 the small farms
around Aruküla were merged and the Aruküla collective farm was
established, and in 1974 a new central building was built in
Aruküla. In 1976, the Tasuja collective farm was merged with it,
after which the Aruküla collective farm acquired the then Raasiku
village council, the boundaries of the current Raasiku municipality
(with the exception of Raasiku). The new collective farm center,
built in the center of Aruküla, also became the new cultural center
of Aruküla. The Sõprus collective farm and the diversity center
began their work on the collective farm in 1970. In the 1920s,
dozens of residential buildings were built on former agricultural
land around the collective farm's central building for the benefit
of its members. A new building for the Aruküla school was also built
there, which remained narrow in the estate.
In 1987, when the
activities of the horticultural beekeeping society had already
ceased, the Society for the Preservation of the Arukül Heritage in
the Spirit of National Revival was created, which promoted the goals
of the previous societies. The organization of the celebration of
the 700th anniversary of Aruküla in 1991 became the main work of the
Society.
In March 1992, Aruküla became the center of the
newly created Rural Municipality of Raasiku. The most important
carrier of the transition period was Toivo Veenre, the last deputy
chairman of the Aruküla collective farm, the founder and first mayor
of the Raasiku rural district.
The non-governmental
organization Aruküla Culture Society, established in 1998, has taken
over the activities of the Aruküla community.
Until the
Tallinn-Tapa railway was built in two directions, Aruküla served as
a railway station with two bypass lines. Today the railway station
building was demolished.