The Fund was formed in 2009 to preserve and develop cultural, spiritual, historical and natural heritage of Russia, to maintain and retain our cult and historical sites and grave sites reminding us of accidents and catastrophes as well as to help people who suffered from accidents and catastrophes and to support their families. The Fund was named in consonance with a member of the Academy, D. S. Likhachev’s thoughts on memory helping us to overcome time and death, and being the basis of conscience, morals and culture and his saying that ‘To keep, to cherish memory is our moral obligation to ourselves and our descendants. Memory is our treasure’.

The Our Memory Charity Fund was founded by a famous Russian archeologist, Doctor of History, head of the Department at Institute of History of the Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences, professor A. N. Kirpichnikov, well-known for his excavations at the ancient capital of Russia Staraya Ladoga, and his friends and associates, – an entrepreneur, associate professor at St. Petersburg State University of Communication Routes, Candidate of Technical Sciences S. N. Poltorak and a director at Jalkala History and Ethnography Conservation Area N. M. Simankov.

First the founders were encouraged to create the Fund because they wanted to support the project of construction of St. Leonidas Chapel in Jalkala. The memorial chapel in the name of a saint Orthodox martyr of the 4^th century Leonidas of Egypt is being built now at Jalkala conservation area (former V. I. Lenin’s Museum), in Ilyichevo Villate, Vyborg Region, Leningradskaya Oblast, in remembrance of all who died in wars and accidents on the Karelian Isthmus. It was the first program started by the Fund and it brought together the desire to honor memory of the five youngmen, former classmates and graduates from the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics at St. Petersburg State University (Leonid, Igor, Denis, Roman and Alexander) and the wish to commemorate all fallen in wars and accidents on the Karelian Isthmus throughout thousands of years of its bloody history. From the very beginning this project has been called ‘the tolerance memorial’ by the printed press. The same aspiration for commonality and tolerance in preservation of our history and cultural legacy lies at the roots of Our Memory Fund’s charity activity.