The Museum of Intelligence Officer Nikolai Kuznetsov displays a homemade rectangular wall mirror crafted in the Russian folk style. The mirror is set in an intricately carved wooden frame. Over time, the glass has darkened, and its reflective surface has lost much of its original luster.

The artisan who made it used a technique typical of antique mirrors: the glass plate is backed with an amalgam — a reflective alloy based on mercury. Like many household objects of the past, such mirrors were handmade and richly decorated, which made them genuine works of applied art. It was only in the 20th century that mirrors ceased to be luxury items and became affordable, everyday fixtures in domestic interiors.

The history of this exhibit is closely tied to the life of Nikolai Ivanovich Kuznetsov. In the summer of 1924, Ivan Pavlovich Kuznetsov — father of the future legendary spy — decided to give his son a proper education and enrolled him in school. The nearest seven-year secondary school was located 22 versts (about 23 km) from their native village of Zyryanka, in the town of Talitsa. Although the family’s modest means allowed them to pay for rented lodgings, it was through the help of friends that they secured an arrangement with Alexandra Vasilyevna Prokhorova, in whose home the young Nika settled upon entering the sixth grade. It was the Prokhorov family who later donated this very mirror to the museum in 1983.

Alexandra Prokhorova fondly recalled the time Nika lived with them:

Even after leaving for the front, Nikolai Kuznetsov never forgot the Prokhorovs. On September 6, 1941, he wrote to Alexandra Vasilyevna from Moscow, thanking her for her kindness and care during his school years.

Interestingly, it was during his first days in the Prokhorov household that Nika’s habit of talking in his sleep first became apparent — a trait that stayed with him even during his preparation for the covert operation in occupied Rovno, where he would assume the identity of a German officer named Paul Siebert.