The earliest known mention of Kalush is the accounting of a village of that name in a chronicle dated May 27, 1437.[5] At that time, together with allRed Ruthenia, the village belonged to theKingdom of Poland and was known under its Polish name, Kałusz. Until the mid-16th century, Kałusz was part ofHalicz Land,Ruthenian Voivodeship. It was known for producing malt, its brewery, and salt mining. In 1469, KingKazimierz Jagiellonczyk founded a Roman Catholic parish church there.
In 1549 Kalush was incorporated as a city by CrownHetmanMikołaj Sieniawski on the authority of the Polish Crown (Magdeburg rights). Already then Kalush became also known as a city of chemical industry specializing in producingnitrate. The contemporary city coat of arms is derived from theLeliwa coat of arms of the Sieniawski family and is dedicated to the victory in theBattle of Vienna, while the upper portion of the shield contains three white salt furnaces. In 1595 Kalush, which had 55 houses, was ransacked byCrimean Tatars. Here, two important battles took place. In 1672, forces of HetmanJan Sobieski clashed with Tatars ofSelim I Giray, and three years later,Andrzej Potocki fought here with Turks. In 1772, following thePartitions of Poland, the town was seized by theHabsburg Empire, where it remained until 1918.
In 1912–13 prior toWorld War I near the city of Kalush anoil rig was built. However, instead of oil, the rig ended up extracting anatural gas. For a long time the gas was not utilized, but later was used for heating a potassium quarry and boilers inBoryslav andDrohobych.
In theSecond Polish Republic, Kalush/Kalusz was the seat of a county inStanislawow Voivodeship. Its population was 15,000, almost equal proportions ofPoles,Ukrainians andJews.[6] Following the 1939Invasion of Poland, the town was annexed by theSoviet Union. Occupied by theThird Reich from 2 July 1941 until 30 July 1944,[7] it returned to the Soviet Union in 1944. DuringWorld War II the residents of the city witnessed many ethnocides. In 1940, the Soviets forced inhabitants of Kalush to leave the town and forcefully moved them toSiberia, many of whom were people of various nationalities: Poles, Ukrainians, and others. Then, in late 1941 and 1942, the majority of Kalush's Jewish inhabitants were murdered by the Germans. Since the 16th century, aJewish community had flourished in the city and at times constituted a majority of its population;[8] however, in 1941, while underNazi control, that community was virtually eliminated. PolishHome Army (AK) was active in the town and its area. The town itself was captured by the AK in mid-July 1944, during theOperation Tempest. In 1945, Polish residents of Kalush were expelled to theRecovered Territories.
On March 20, 1972, the city of Kalush became a city of regional importance.
Recently several renovations have taken place of several local temples such as the Temple of All Saints of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Kyiv Patriarchate), the Catholic Saint Valentine Church, and the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church of Saint Nicholas. Kalush residents presented a bust of Taras Shevchenko to Simferopol and erected the first monument to Kobzar on Crimean soil on August 21, 1997.[9] A monument to Shevchenko was also presented to the city of Novohrodivka, Donetsk region, in honor of the 10th anniversary of Ukraine's independence.[10]
Until 18 July 2020, Kalush was incorporated as acity of oblast significance and served as the administrative center of Kalush Raion though it did not belong to the raion. In July 2020, as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast to six, the city of Kalush was merged into Kalush Raion.[11][12]
Note: Percentage indicates correlation to the total number of seats in the city council which is 50. The results of the election were taken from kalush.net where they were published on 4 November 2010.[15][16] Election was half and half, one (25 seats) by the "majority rule", another (25 seats) – by "party-list". There were 15 non-affiliated members, all of whom associated themselves with the Ukrainian Party[17] (2006).
The city still contains an oldrathaus which was declared as the National Landmark of Architecture #591. The previous Rathaus was destroyed during theKhmelnytsky Uprising. The new Rathaus served as a town hall and a directory of agriculture since the 20th century. The conditions of the landmark in 2010 were terrible and the Rathaus required some major renovations. A fire broke out ruins of the Rathaus in 2013.[18]
In the city, there is a mount Vysochanka named after a colonel of the Lysyanka Regiment during theCossack Hetmanate and a leader of the local uprising in 1648Semen Vysochan.
^"The Jewish Community of Kalush".Beit Hatfutsot Open Databases Project. The Museum of the Jewish People at Beit Hatfutsot. Archived fromthe original on 2018-08-08. Retrieved2018-08-08.
^"Нові райони: карти + склад" (in Ukrainian). Міністерство розвитку громад та територій України. 17 July 2020.Archived from the original on 25 February 2022. Retrieved10 June 2021.
