The Ulyanovsk Museum of Local History houses a portrait of Ivan Goncharov’s mother — Avdotya Goncharova. The painting is currently located in the museum hall that recreates the interiors of a lady’s room of the first half of the 19th century.

Avdotya Goncharova, née Shakhtorina, was born in 1785 to an unwealthy family of Simbirsk merchants. When she was 19 years old, she got married to a merchant of the third guild Alexander Goncharov and became a widow at 35, left with four children — Nikolay, Ivan, Alexandra, and Anna. Avdotya Goncharova took over her husband’s merchant business, now running both the shops and the house. She was a good businesswoman and managed to provide a good education for her sons. Avdotya did not raise the children all by herself: she was joined by their godfather and a former naval officer Nikolay Tregubov. Later, Ivan Goncharov reminisced,

Despite his propound adoration of his mother, Ivan Goncharov would later recall her being a strict parent. He described Avdotya as follows,