Polevskoy

Polevskoy takes its name from the Polevaya River. In 1702 Sergey Babin and Kuzma Suleyev discovered copper ore nearby at Gumeshki, drawing the attention of the state to the site. A Bashkir detachment attacked and burned the mine in 1718. Peter I ordered a copper works and fortification to be built by the Polevaya in 1722; construction began the following year, and the plant produced its first copper in 1724.

An ironworks was begun on the nearby Severushka in 1735, giving rise to a second factory settlement. In 1758 both works passed from the state to the Solikamsk merchant Aleksey Turchaninov. Together with the Sysert works, they formed the basis of a mining and industrial district. The copper mine and the two plants made the river valleys a center of metal production in the southern Ural foothills.