[1][2] On May 7, 1905, Samara native Pavla Alexeevna Smirnova opened a school of the 2nd category with four classes in the central part of Novonikolayevsk.

This building belonged to the merchant Fyodor Danilovich Mashtakov, and the City Public Administration rented it specifically for the school.

In 1908, it became a sixth-grade school, in 1909, the seventh grade was organized at the institution, after which Smirnova began planning the opening of the eighth pedagogical class.

On August 2, 1910, the trustee of the West Siberian Educational District decided to reorganize the institution into the Gymnasium of the Ministry of National Education, after which the financial and economic affairs of the school were decided by the Board of Trustees which at different times included Kalisfenia Platonovna Lapshina, Ekaterina Nikolayevna Vstavskaya, Elena Iosifovna Piton, Mikhail Pavlovich Vostokov, Alexei Grigorievich Besedin, Sergei Vladimirovich Gorokhov, Mitrofan Alexeevich Runin, Alexander Michailovich Lukanin, Nikolai Michailovich Tikhomirov, Andrei Dmitrievich Kryachkov.

It was written by a peasant woman from the village of Verkh-Irmenskoye, Novonikolayevsky Uyezd who asked to accept her daughter for a knowledge test for admission to the first grade.

[3] According to the recollections of the daughter of one of the pupils of the gymnasium, the rules of the educational institution were very strict: the wearing of jewelry was prohibited, the distinction between the rich, the middle class and the poor was forbidden, senior 7th grade students had the right to get married, and they could wear the only piece of jewelry, namely a wedding ring.

For example, Sofiya Mashtakova, the daughter of the merchant Ivan Danilovich Mashtakov, could be expelled from the gymnasium for attending a masquerade organized at the Officers' Assembly.

The Journal of Accounting for Information of 7th Grade Students 1912–1913, for example, documented individual permissions to attend Karinskaya's concert and such operas as The Queen of Spades, and The Demon.

In December 1912, such a document was received, for example, by Alexandra Dobrokhotova who was allowed to go to the village of Verkh-Irmen, Barnaul Uyezd, Tomsk Governorste, to visit her parents.

Similar tickets were received in 1912–1913 by Evlampiya Ryazantseva (to Bolotnoye), Nina Sizikova (to Barlak), Bronislava Karvatskaya (to Kainsk Station), Elizaveta Lunts (to Kochenyovo), Kobyakova Lyudmila (to Spirino).

[3] According to the order, which was received by all educational institutions of Novonikolayevsk in December 1915, studies were canceled during strong winds and frosts.

Pavla Smirnova, in her petition to the Board of Trustees, indicated that Anna's guardian, Ekaterina Gavrilova Sukovatova, is an elderly woman who suffers from rheumatism and earns money by washing clothes.

[3] The gymnasium was constantly experiencing financial difficulties, as evidenced by correspondence with various institutions, merchants, suppliers, owners of premises, etc.

[3] The Siberian Commercial and Industrial Partnership 129 rubles 7 copecks for needles, muslin, paper, coarse calico, etc.

So, the City chronicle section of the Narodnaya Letopis indicated the names of people who donated money to install a telephone in the gymnasium: N. A. Ippolitov – 1,50 rubles, K. N. Lapina – 1,60, M. P. Vostokov – 1, D. L. Nakhimson – 1, A. M. Lukanin – 3, N. P. Litvinov – 3.

[3] Yellow oval badges with the name of the institution (The First Novo-Nikolayevsk Gymnasium) were attached to the cap or to the left side of the dress.

[3] Both peasant girls from Kochenyovo, Kainsk, Ordynskoye, Bolotnoye etc., and the daughters of the richest people in Novonikolayevsk (Lukanin, Kogan, Mashtakov and others) studied at the gymnasium.

[3] The institution was graduated by two well-known physicians in the city: neuropathologist Esfir Shamovskaya and Honored Doctor of the RSFSR Anna Benevolenskaya.