Kardla (German Kertel) is the only town on the island of Hiiumaa,
Estonia. It is the capital of Hiiu County and the center of the
Hiyumaa parish.
Kärdla is located on the northeastern coast
of Hiiumaa, on the Tarete Bay. To the southeast of the city is the
Kärdla meteorite crater, which is 455 million years old. Several
small rivers flow through the city. There are also artesian wells in
Kärdla.
Kardla was first mentioned in 1564 as a village
inhabited by Swedes. Its growth was greatly influenced by the cloth
factory founded in 1830. The port was built in 1849. Both the port
and the factory were destroyed during the Second World War.
Kärdla officially became a district in 1920 and a city in 1938. In
2013, the city was merged with Kõrgessaare Rural Municipality to
form Hiiumaa Rural Municipality, as a result of which Kärdla lost
its municipality status.
Hiiumaa Museum, Vabrikuväljak tn, ° +372 4632091, °
info@muuseum.hiiumaa.ee. October-April Mon-Sat 10-17: 00, May-August
daily 10-18: 00, September daily 10-17: 00. This is the main museum
of Hiiumaa. This is a building in Kärdla, Hiiumaa, built in the
1830s for the directors of the Hiiu-Kärdla cloth factory. Popularly
known as the Long House (the longest wooden house in Kärdla, over 60
m). In the center there is a permanent exhibition presenting, among
other things, the history of Kärdla and the Kalev factory. Various
short-term exhibitions are also organized throughout the year.
Winter: € 2.50 / 2 adults / discount, summer: € 4/2. 50 adults /
discount.
Kiwi Yuri
“Kivi Jüri” or “Kivijüri” is a
monument to the “Heroes of the 1941 defensive battles of Hiiumaa” in
Kärdla. The memorial was erected in 1966 at the intersection of
roads leaving Kärdla. The granite memorial was designed by sculptor
Endel Taniloo and architect Ülo Sirp. This is one of the largest
monumental sculptures in Estonia. The 2.6 x 2 x 1.7 m monument
weighs 36 tons, and the soldier's head rests on 10 tons. Total
height 4.3 m. Monument protected by heritage in 1997.
Kärdla
House (also Kärdla Fire House) is located in Hiiumaa, on the central
square of Kärdla at st. Hiiu 1.
The Kärdla House was built in
1930 and fire brigades have worked here throughout its history. It
was built with a tower, primarily because there it was easy to dry
the fire hoses in a hanging position. Also from the top of the tower
one could see if something was on fire. Today, the fort house houses
the Hiiu County Fire Association, a tourist information center and a
shop. The fire house is the last building with a high tower in
Estonia built for fire fighting.
The Kärdla Song Festival
Grounds is a song scene at 5 Uus Street in Kärdla, Hiiu District. In
addition to musical events, concerts and theater performances are
also held here. The song's scene was largely destroyed by the
November 2008 fire. Restored with donations in 2012.
Kärdla
Port is a port in Hiiu County, in Kärdla Municipality in Hiiumaa
Rural Municipality. The port of Kärdla was built in the middle of
the 19th century to transport the Kärdla Kalev factory. At the
beginning of the 20th century, the Kärdla-Tallinn route began before
the Second World War. The port was destroyed by bombing in 1944. The
port was rebuilt in 2012-2013. In 1996, she became a marina with the
help of the European Regional Development Fund. The first season of
the port was opened on May 24, 2014. The port is operated by the
Kärdla Harbor Foundation.
Kärdla Bus Station is a bus station
at 13 Sadama Street in Kärdla, Hiiu District.
The Long House
is a building in Kärdla, Hiiumaa, built in the 1830s for the
directors of the Hiiu-Kärdla factory. Since 1998, the building has
been the research center of the Hiiumaa Museum. In the center there
is a permanent exhibition presenting, among other things, the
history of Kärdla and the Kalev factory.
Kärdla City Park is
a park located between New and Post streets in Kärdla town. The park
is under protection. The park area is 5.2 hectares.
St.
John's Church
Swedish farmers built the first chapel in Kärdla.
It was dedicated to Saint Olav. Their year of origin is not known.
The chapel stood on the edge of the old Swedish cemetery of Kärdla.
It was leveled together with the chapel in 1848 to make room for the
beach park.
in 1847, at the instigation of the then director
of the cloth factory, Robert von Ungern-Sternberg, the so-called
"German Chapel" was built of wood on the banks of the Nuutri River.
It is no longer preserved today.
Between 1861 and 1863 a
larger stone church was built. The simple three-nave church in the
neo-Gothic style was jointly financed by donations from the working
class and the German-Baltic nobility Hiiumaa. The Evangelical
Lutheran Church has 600 seats. It is dedicated to John the Baptist.
The altar painting "Christ on the Cross" comes from an unknown
German-Baltic painter. It was erected in 1889. The organ is a work
of the southern German company Walcker from the year 1904.
in
1929 the high wooden tower was added. The original bell was melted
down by the tsarist authorities in 1917 in the course of the First
World War. Today's bell is a gift from businessman Richard Devid. He
was born in Kärdla in 1893 and was, among other things, the owner of
the Tallinn luxury hotel and restaurant Kuld Lõvi ("Golden Lion").
Devid was deported to the interior of Russia with the Soviet
occupation of Estonia and sentenced to death by the Soviet
authorities in 1942.
Hiiumaa muuseum
The Hiiumaa muuseum,
founded in Kassari in 1967, provides information about the history
of the city and the island, which was transferred to Kärdla in 1998.
It is located in the "Long House" (Pikk maja), built in 1830 for the
director of the cloth factory, the longest wooden house in Kärdla
with over 60 m.
The museum maintains holdings in the fields
of natural history, ethnography, archeology, history, numismatics
and textile studies. The museum also has an extensive photo
collection.
Branches of the Hiiumaa muuseum are the Local
History Museum in the village of Kassari on the neighboring island
of the same name, the Mihkli talu museum farm in Malvaste and the
Museum dedicated to the life and work of the composer Rudolf Tobias
in Selja.
Airport
Four kilometers east of Kärdla, on the
territory of the village of Hiiessaare, the city's airport, the
Kärdla lennujaam, is located. It was built in 1963. The runway is
1520 m long. From there, there are daily flights to the Estonian
capital Tallinn and back.
Kärdla is located on the northeastern coast of the island of Hiiumaa,
directly on the Baltic Sea. The city is adjacent to the Tareste Bay
(Tareste laht). The small river Nuutri (Nuutri jõgi) and the streams
Kammioja and Liivaoja flow through Kärdla.
The name of the city
comes from Swedish. Kärrdal refers to a swampy and humid valley.
The city has 3,050 inhabitants (as of December 31, 2011). The population
is almost completely Estonian-speaking.
the village of Kärtillby was first mentioned in a document in 1564.
Its inhabitants were Swedes. They had probably already immigrated to the
island of Hiiumaa from the Swedish-speaking areas of Finland in the 14th
century.
In 1470, the Livonian master of the Order Johann Wolthus
von Herse granted the Hiiumaa Swedes extensive privileges, including
exemption from serfdom.
In the 18th century, the plague raged on
Hiiumaa. Numerous residents of Kärdla also fell victim to her. By 1810
there were almost no Swedish inhabitants of Kärdla anymore. The place
became a Beigut of Partsi (Pardas) under the name Kertelhof. At first he
led a village shadowy existence.
Kärdla owes its upswing to the founding of the cloth factory K. U. E.
Ungern-Sternberg on the Suuremõisa estate (German Großenhof) in 1829.
The founders were the German-Baltic noblemen Peter Ludwig Konstantin von
Ungern-Sternberg (1779-1836) and Heinrich Georg Eduard von
Ungern-Sternberg (1782-1861) with the financial support of the Tallinn
trading house Clayhills & Co.
As early as 1830, the factory and
its 210 workers were transferred from the estate to Kärdla. After a fire
in 1870, the factory was modernized and rebuilt. There were also
numerous residential buildings for the workers. The Dago-Kertel Cloth
Factory, so-called since 1874, was one of the oldest and largest cloth
factories in the whole of Estonia. She was known for her excellent
quality. In the 1880s, the company, which from 1918 was called
Hiiu-Kärdla Kalevivabriku Osaühisus, employed over 700 workers. The
joint-stock company was by far the largest employer in the town.
From 1860 to 1883, a large machine factory and other industrial
enterprises also operated in Kärdla. In 1849, the port of Kärdla was
launched. It was destroyed during the Second World War and has not yet
been rebuilt.
The textile factory was nationalized in December 1940 with the Soviet
occupation of the country. The historical factory buildings were mostly
destroyed by the Red Army in October 1941 during the course of the
German attack on the Soviet Union.
Some workers' residences and
the former director's office are still preserved. Since 1982, a monument
commemorates the factory. It was created by the Estonian sculptor Mati
Karmin (* 1959).
In 1920 Kärdla became a large village (alevik).
On May 1, 1938, Kärdla was granted city rights as part of the Estonian
municipal reform.
During the Second World War, Kärdla was
subjected to heavy air raids and was severely destroyed. Most of the
industrial enterprises, the port and numerous residential buildings fell
victim to the attacks.
In 2013, Kärdla and the rural municipality of Kõrgessaare merged to
form the rural municipality of Hiiu, which merged with the other three
rural municipalities on the island to form the rural municipality of
Hiiumaa in 2017.
Today, Kärdla is a green town with small wooden
houses and numerous gardens. The cityscape is characterized by the
proximity to the Baltic Sea, the natural watercourses and the two parks.
The 5.1 hectare Linnapark ("city Park") and the 4.2 hectare Rannapark
("beach park") are popular meeting places for the urban population.
The Ranna Park is located on the site of the former cemetery of the
Swedish-speaking population of Kärdla, which existed until 1838. Behind
it is the bathing beach of Kärdla. Near the beach, near the mouth of the
Nuutri River into the Baltic Sea, there is a large boulder.
Behind the Linna Park is the new cemetery Kärdlas. It was built in the
middle of the 19th century. The former fire station on the central
market square of Keskväljak now houses the tourist information office.
Kärdla is the only town on the island of Hiiumaa. It is the
administrative, economic and cultural center of the island. Kärdla is
home to Hiiumaa's only high school and the island's hospital. The
cultural center with its puppet Theater, founded in 1991, and the
Central Library of the island of Hiiumaa are well known.