Beloretsk is located between the Ural Mountains in Bashkortostan (Republic of Bashkiria). The city stands on Belaya River (the inflow of Kama), 245 km away from Ufa. The population of Beloretsk makes 67.9 thousand people as of 2010.

Today Beloretsk is a modern industrial town, the administrative center of Beloretsk District. The leading enterprise of the city is Beloretsk iron and steel works. Other Beloretsk factories produce tractor springs, nails, metal grids etc. There is a bread-baking complex, cheese-making plant, and concrete goods factory in the town.

The main sight of the town is Beloretsk iron and steel works with its Museum of labor and battle glory.

One of the symbols of the town is a Water Tower constructed in 1916. In those days it was the highest construction in the town. Another place popular with visitors in this small Ural town is the 500 meter-long pedestrian wooden bridge over Belaya River.

The town has a museum of local lore and an art gallery.

Beloretsk District

Beloretsk District harbours the main reserves of iron ores of Bashkiria Republic. Deposits of gold-placer, magnesite, fluorite, and chromites have been discovered there. Other minerals are represented with fields of sandstone, quartzite, dolomite, and limestone; there are deposits of cement marl, refractory clay, forming sand, ochre, and slates. Well-known are Assa mineral springs of chloride-sodium-calcium type. Rivers Yuryuzan, Inzer, Zilim originate here.

In the territory of Beloretsk District there are 12 especially protected nature sanctuaries – the mountains Bolshoi Yamantau and Iremel, the Kyzylyarovsky Cave, waterfall Atysh, Assa's mineral springs, etc.

History of Beloretsk

Dwellers of Beloretsk town connect the history of Beloretsk town with the foundation of the same name factory. According to some data merchants Myasnikov and Tverdyshev got the right to build an iron and steel plant on this land in 1759. Some data says about completion of the plant construction in 1762, while other sources mention the year 1776. Therefore the exact date of the foundation of the settlement in Beloretsk remains unknown. However according to documents iron casting was started at the factory in 1767.

Russian peasantry was considered the main population of the land adjoining the factory. By 1859 the plant lands already counted over 5 thousand inhabitants and workers. Construction of a school, an infirmary, a market, and railways was started there.

In 1923 Beloretsk plant got the official status of a town. During the Soviet epoch the plant was repeatedly reconstructed and expanded, with enormous work on mechanization and automation of the enterprise carried out.

On the basis of the steel plant and with accession of the Tirlyansky sheet-rolling plant and Tukansky mine, the Beloretsk works was founded in 1957.

Today the city actively develops cultural life on the basis of its rich history. The town dwellers become famous for the results of their work at various competitions, achievements in sports events and advances in a number of different spheres.

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