TRABZON ATATÜRK PAVILION

Gazi Mustafa Kemal paid his first visit to Trabzon in 1924, and then in 1930. As it happened in other cities, in Trabzon, too, one pavilion and a house were given as a gift in 1931. Atatürk liked the pavilion in which he stayed for only two days in his third visit in 1937 and he used the expression “Trabzon Atatürk Pavilion” for it. In this short span of time, they had important moments: In this pavilion, Atatürk announced in a document he sent to İsmet İnönü in 11 June 1937 that he donated his farms to the Treasury. He gave expression to the happiness he lived on that particular night with the delegates as follows: “These are the happiest moments of my life.” In the telegram that he sent to İsmet İnönü on the same night, Atatürk wanted İsmet İnönü to announce this happiness to the whole nation and wrote that “the sincere time he had with the delegates was the highest example of state, government and nation collaboration.”After Atatürk’s death, pavilion and the house were left to his legal heir, Makbule Boysan. On Makbule Boysan’s attempt to sell this pavilion in which important moments were experienced, in 21 March 1940, Trabzon Municipality decided to expropriate it in order to convert it into a museum with the purpose of keeping Atatürk’s memory alive. After the period of the court case for expropriation, the pavilion and the house, in 17 April 1943, were registered on the title deed in the name of Trabzon Municipality. Trabzon Municipality converted the pavilion into a museum with the process it started within the same month. Atatürk Pavilion whose garden was made smaller considerably in 1974 still serves as a museum today.