a city in Dnepropetrovsk Oblast, Ukrainian SSR, on the upper course of the Ingulets River at the confluence of the Saksagan’. Railroad junction (lines to Znamenka, Piatikhatki, Zaporozh’e, and Dnepropetrovsk). Population, 600,000 (1972; 192,000 in 1939; 401,000 in 1959). The city is divided into five raions.

The city of Krivoi Rog originated from a post office founded Apr. 27, 1775, at a natural landmark called Krivoi Rog. It became a military settlement in the 1820’s and a city in 1860. The beginning of its industrial development came with the mining of iron ore (in the 1880’s) and the construction of a railroad linking the Krivoi Rog basin with the Donbas. Most of the mines in Krivoi Rog belonged to foreign capitalists (mainly French), some of whom united to form the Prodarud syndicate in 1907.

The first Social Democratic groups in Krivoi Rog appeared in early 1903. Soviet power was established in the city on Jan. 9 (22), 1918, and permanently secured in 1920. From Aug. 14, 1941, through Feb. 22, 1944, Krivoi Rog was occupied by fascist German troops, who caused great damage. The city was rebuilt in the postwar years and is now a major industrial and cultural center of the Ukraine.

Krivoi Rog is the center of the Krivoi Rog Iron Ore Basin; it has large mines, with the most modern equipment, such as the Gigant-Glubokaia Mine, the V. I. Lenin Mine, and the Gvardeiskaia Mine. There is a highly developed metallurgical industry (the V. I. Lenin Krivoi Rog Metallurgical Works and the Severnyi, Tsentral’nyi, luzhnyi, Novokrivorozhskii, and Ingulets ore-dressing combines), machine-building and metalworking industry (the Kommunist Mining Equipment Plant), power engineering, and by-product coke industry.

A building-materials industry has grown up, with cement plants, brickyards, and large-panel housing-construction plants. There are enterprises of light industry (a footwear factory), food processing, and the wood-products industry. In 1970 the city had more than 5 million sq m of living space (compared to 833,000 sq m in 1940).

Krivoi Rog mining and pedagogical institutes, an evening department of the Dnepropetrovsk Metallurgical Institute, a branch of the Donetsk Institute of Soviet Trade, 15 technicums (including technicums of mining automation, mining electromechanics, metallurgy, the by-product coke industry, and mining engineering and a secondary specialized polytechnic), an aviation school for special civil aviation services, a medical school, and a school of music. The T. G. Shevchenko Russian Theater of Music and Drama, a circus, and a museum of history and local lore are located in the city. Noteworthy structures of the postwar period include the T. G. Shevchenko Russian Theater of Music and Drama (1949–50; architect V. A. Zuev), the Metallurgists’ Palace of Culture (1952–54; architect K. S. Bartashevich), the building of the Mining Institute (1960-64), the circus (1968–69; architects G. V. Naprienko and S. M. Gel’fer), the Rodina Mine (1972; architect E. G. Pestriakova, engineers V. A. Bondarenko and others), and the Giprorudmash Institute (1972; architect D. A. Livshits). The city was awarded the Order of Lenin in 1971.