While many, and many of the nicest sets of this design were manufactured in Gulag workshops of Mordovia, the earliest specimens of this design that have emerged were made in the Beryozovsky Children's Penal Colony in the south of Krasnoyarsk Krai. Here is one from my collection.
From the Best Latvian chess pieces reproduction? thread, I detach here some hopefully interesting information, using more advanced editing features for the provided links:
- Pictures of a Mordovian set from the Moscow chess museum. The interesting fact is, a text (with the museum logo) is displayed alongside the chess set; unfortunately the picture doesn't enable reading it, but a brief summary is provided by the author of the post:
"This particular one was manufactured in 1953 in Factory No.5 of 'Dubravlag' (Yavas, Mordovian ASSR), a part of the GULAG system specialising in wood processing."
- Using 'Yavas' as a key word and googling the internet brings some interesting information about the region, the wood industry, and the history.
- I could find a nice map of the Dubravlag camp, here. It moved me to see, in a more concrete way, where this museum set had been manufactured.