THE BENCH OF FRIENDSHIP
On June 27, 1809, John Quincy Adams was appointed as the first ever U.S. Minister to Russia. His official function developed into a friendship with Tsar Alexander I and launched two hundred years of diplomatic relations between the two countries that has withstood the tests of time and history.
On June 30, 2009, two hundred years later almost to the day, Tim Sandusky, the Consul General of the U.S. Consulate in Yekaterinburg visited a blacksmith forge outside Pervouralsk to celebrate a special exchange of citizen diplomacy between Russians and Americans. Although the Consulate was not directly involved in this exchange, the blacksmiths invited the Consul General to a feast prior to the departure of a delegation from Pervouralsk to Alton, New Hampshire. The blacksmiths showed the Consul General how they work metal to produce intricate designs and allowed Tim to hammer some blows to forge a square nail. The purpose of the visit was to recognize and encourage these kinds of citizen diplomacy projects that forge links between the people of different countries.
Two years before, in August 2007, work had begun on building a “Bench of Friendship” as a gift from Russian citizens to Americans to commemorate the bicentennial of American diplomacy. The blacksmiths, under the direction of Alexei Kobikov, master blacksmith and owner of the Kovgrad Forge in Pervouralsk, an hour’s drive west of Yekaterinburg, designed and crafted a beautiful Bench. Working after the forge had closed, from five until midnight, night after night, the blacksmiths and their friends, apprentices and neighbors labored with care to craft a symbol of their friendship with Americans. On February 25, 2008, after 10,000 hammer blows, several placed by a local policeman, the Bench of Friendship was ready to be conveyed to the United States.
While trying to determine the best way to ship the Bench, the blacksmiths took it to the Pervouralsk town square where many locals enjoyed sitting on it. The Bench has an emblem on the top that states “From People to People” in both English and Russian. In the center of the emblem movable figures of a bear and a blacksmith, a classic Russian image, take turns pounding an anvil to symbolize that friendship includes working together.
The Bench was finally shipped to Boston where it was placed under a walnut tree in the garden of the John Quincy Adams Museum. In July the Bench will be brought to Alton, New Hampshire, where a delegation from Pervouralsk will join local townspeople to inaugurate the Bench’s final resting place. The image on the Bench’s emblem will be sent by the State of New Hampshire as an ornament to decorate the White House Christmas Tree in 2009.
The idea for the Bench came from the co-founders of a unique NGO called Access to Ideas. Jeannie Ferber from New Hampshire and Nikolai Arzhannikov from Pervouralsk have collaborated to bring English and Russian books to schools and libraries in remote Russian villages Nikolai helped the artists locate and purchase the highest quality materials for the bench and found the way to ship the Bench to the United States. More details about the Bench can be found at: www.accesstoideas.org/Benchmarks.html