Kunda is a city in Viru-Nigula parish, Estonia, located on the
coast of the Gulf of Finland. There is a pulp and paper mill, a
cement plant and a port.
Near Kunda, evidence has been found
of some of the oldest prehistoric communities in Estonia, hunting
and fishing communities dating from about 6500 BC. e. This
settlement gave its name to the Kunda culture.
Previously,
the name Kunda was used to refer to the Kunda estate, 2.5 km south
of the city, which was first mentioned in 1443 as a stone vassal
castle. The estate was named after the Kundistov family. An early
classicist manor house, built in the 1770s, has been destroyed since
World War II.
Until the middle of the 19th century, Kunda
remained a small village. In 1870, construction began on one of the
largest cement plant in Russia, founded by John Carl Girard de
Soucanton. In 1893 - the first industrial power plant in Estonia.
All this served as the beginning of the development of the village
and in 1938 it received the status of a city.
On May 1, 1938,
Kunda received official rights to the area.
Rutja airfield is
located 13 km west of Kunda and was used by Soviet troops during the
occupation of Estonia; it has since been abandoned.
The
municipal status of the city of Kunda was confirmed on December 12,
1991.
Kunda Gymnasium is the only general education school in Kunda
offering basic and secondary education. Kunda Gymnasium is a
municipal school run by the city government of Kunda. School
address: st. Kasemäe 22, Kunda. Kunda Gymnasium was founded on
September 1, 2001 by merging the 1st Kunda Secondary School with the
Estonian language of instruction and the Kunda Secondary School with
the Russian language of instruction. From 2001 to 2014, Kunda
Gymnasium was a bilingual school, where teaching was carried out in
both Estonian and Russian. Classes with the Russian language of
instruction were closed in 2014, but Russian-speaking students will
be allowed to study at the first level (1-3 grades) in the language
immersion study group. As of 2014, the school had 347 students and
35 teachers.
Kunda City Library is a library in Kunda,
Lääne-Viru County. The library has been operating since 1917.
Kunda Cement Plant (also Kunda Cement Plant) is a former cement
plant in Kunda, Lääne-Virumaa. The cement factory was founded by the
landowner of Kunda, John Girard de Soucanton, in 1870 on the Kunda
River. The original plant consisted of 17 so-called bottle kilns and
a clinker mill. A barrel mill and sawmill were built between 1885
and 1886. In 1893, to the west of the plant, another plant was built
with a 45-meter drainage channel and four ovens. In 1912 the port of
Kunda was formed. In the same year, a third plant was built with two
modern rotary kilns. In Soviet times, the plant was called Krasnaya
Kunda. Between 1960 and 1965, the factory was significantly expanded
and reconstructed. There was a labor settlement near the factory.
Kunda Cement Museum (also known as Kunda Museum) is a museum
founded in 1967 in Kunda, Lääne-Viru County. The museum is located
in the administrative building of the former Kunda Cement Factory,
which was built in 1898 and entered in the Estonian Register of
Cultural Monuments. The address of the Cement Museum is 11 Jaama
Street. The museum has been located in this building since 1967, in
2004 it was transferred to the Virumaa Museum Foundation and named
after the Kunda Cement Museum. In 2010, it returned from the
foundation to the city of Kundu.
The sandy Kunda beach is
located just 2 km from the center of the city of the same name. Here
you will find changing cabins, an outdoor toilet and a large
barbecue area. Children can have fun in the various playgrounds and
there is also a village swing.
Visitors to the Kunda Sports
Complex can take advantage of its gyms, sauna and swimming pool. The
pool center has a full-size pool, children's pool, jacuzzi and
various saunas.
The Lammasmägi Hill, located near the Kunda
Manor, is one of the oldest inhabited settlements in Estonia. Its
archaeological value was first discovered in 1872, and since then
more than 25,000 tools have been unearthed in the area. These
findings lead archaeologists to believe that people have lived in
the area since the Stone Age. Since similar instruments were later
discovered elsewhere, this Mesolithic culture was named after the
original and most widespread site, the Kunda culture.