The Raznochintsy Petersburg Memorial Museum tells the story of downmarket Petersburg.
In pre-revolutionary Russia, the raznochintsy were people whose social status did not strictly conform to the notions of “hereditary nobleman” or “eminent merchant.” Minor clerks, retired soldiers, servants of various stripes, laborers and, of course, students and other intellectual workers lived in neighborhoods remote from Nevsky Prospect.
The museum traces its roots back to 1924.
Cossack Lane has been home to a memorial address since 1924. Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (Lenin) lived here from February 12, 1894 to April 25, 1895, and after his death, residents of the neighboring buildings established “Ilyich’s Corner” on the street.
In 1938, Ilyich’s Corner was turned into the V.I. Ulyanov Apartment Museum, part of the Leningrad branch of the Central Museum of Lenin. In 1992, the mayor of St. Petersburg ordered that the museum be preserved as as a historical landmark. It was granted the status of a state museum under the jurisdiction of the Lenin District (later, the Admiralty District) of St. Petersburg and became known as the Museum of the History of the Revolutionary Democratic Movement of the 1880s and 1890s.
In September 2003, by order of St. Petersburg city hall, the museum was transferred to the jurisdiction of the St. Petersburg Culture Committee. In 2006, in connection with the opening of a new permanent exposition, Around the Semyonovsky Regimental Parade Ground, the museum was given its current name — the Raznochintsy Petersburg Memorial Museum
Source: Raznochintsy Petersburg Memorial Museum. Translated by the Russian Reader, who remembers the museum fondly, especially Lenin’s apartment.
The Russian Reader 