The Kirov Plant, Kirov factory or Leningrad Kirov plant (LKZ) is a major Russian mechanical engineering and agricultural machinery manufacturing plant in St. Petersburg, Russia. It was established in 1789, then moved to its present site in 1801 as a foundry for cannonballs. The Kirov Plant is sometimes confused with another Leningrad heavy weapons manufacturer, Factory No. 185 (S.M. Kirov). Recently the main production of the company is Kirovets heavy tractors.
In 1917 the factory was an important center of the Red Guards formations.
History
Putilov works
In 1868 Nikolay Putilov (1820–1880) purchased the bankrupt plant. At the Putilov works, the Putilov Company (a joint-stock holding company from 1873) initially produced rolling stock for railways. The establishment boomed during the Russian industrialization of the 1890s, with the workforce quadrupling in a decade, reaching 12,400 in 1900. The factory traditionally produced goods for the Russian government, with railway products accounting for more than half of its total output. Starting in 1900 it also produced