It is believed that Miletopolis—whose exact origins remain unclear, as it is not certain whether it was founded as a Miletus colony directly by the Milesians or by the people of Cyzicus or Athens—was the region’s first settlement. In the sources, Miletopolis is described as a settlement on the shore of a lake. According to estimates, over time, the lake waters receded to their current course, and as the Kirmasti Creek and Debboy, and Tepebağlık regions—splitting the area where the regulator is located today—toward the lake, it is highly likely that the city of Kirmasti was relocated from Melde Bayırı to the area now known as the Lalaşahin Neighborhood.
It is believed that the town of Kirmasti (Kirmastorya) was established in the Lalaşahin region between A.D. 301 and 331. It is also thought that its name derives from Kirmastorya, the female ruler of the town during the Byzantine period. At the same time, Mihaliç, Kirmastorya’s brother, was the ruler of the Mihaliç region, which is today known as Karacabey.
The region’s incorporation into the Ottoman Empire is described in various ways across different sources. On page 48 of the first volume of *Tacüttevarihin*, it is stated that Orhan Bey set out to overthrow the Karesi government, and that the fortresses of Kanolyas and Vanolyas were captured from enemy hands, leading to the entry into the province of Kirmasti; and that Kirmasti and Mihaliç came under Ottoman rule after their rulers declared their allegiance. On page 31 of Solakzade’s history, the event is described in a similar manner, with the date given as 737 (1336).
Lalaşahin Pasha did not participate in this battle and is believed to have been in Bursa with Orhan Bey’s younger son, Murat. There is no definitive source regarding the granting of the region to Lalaşahin Pasha. However, it is highly likely that it was granted to him as a timar based on a promise made by Orhan Bey prior to the war.
Until 1875, the district was known as the Sincan Subdistrict, which was part of Mihaliçe. On May 14, 1881, the Ottoman Government issued a decree declaring Kirmasti, the center of the Sincan subdistrict, to be a district. Hacı Salih Hayri Efendi was appointed as the first district governor. On August 1, 1881, the municipal administration was established.
Since it was administered as the Sincan Subdistrict under Mihaliçe until 1881, the exact population is unknown; however, tax records from 1831 show 5,425 taxpayers in Mihaliçe. Based on a conservative estimate, the population of Kirmasti is believed to have been 2,250. According to the 1875 tax payer census—conducted before the arrival of immigrants from Rumelia and the Caucasus—there were 3,367 tax-paying Muslims and 660 unemployed individuals. In the 1893 census, the district center had a population of 4,050, comprising 3,367 Muslims and 683 Greeks, Armenians, and Jews. There were 37,153 people in 139 villages. The district’s total population was 42,420.
According to the 1908 Yearbook, the population of this district—comprising 139 villages and covering an area of 2,000 km²—had grown to 56,116 people due to the influx of migrants from the 93 War. The migrants came from
established Caucasian villages such as Kadirçeşme, Karaorman, Soğucak, Güvem, Koşuboğazı, Karapınar, Kömürcükadı, Döllük, and Eskimezarlık; while immigrants from Rumelia also established new settlements such as the Hamidiye, Selimiye, Çırpan, and Vıraca neighborhoods, as well as Tırnova, Fındıcak, Kosova, Yenice, Demirdere, Kazanpınar, and Sarımustafalar.
In 1909, in Şemsettin Sami Bey’s work *Kamus’ul A’lam*, Kirmasti was described as having:
3 mosques, 5 prayer rooms, 1 madrasa, 1 Rüştiye school, 8 elementary schools, 2 churches, 2 public baths, 7 caravanserais, 183 shops, 4 tanneries, 2 dyehouses, 3 handlooms, 2 steam-powered, 1 horse-drawn, and 6 mills.
In 1910, an Armenian of British descent, who had relatives in the district, brought the first automobile to the district. The British man, who stayed as a guest for 3 months, drove the automobile—which the locals called the “devil’s car”—through the district’s streets, attracting great interest, especially from the children. In 1923, Fuat Bey, Benli Ahmet, and Demirci Hafız Mehmet also purchased automobiles.
The war years were also very difficult in our district. Many war fugitives, such as Çerkez Davut, formed gangs in our district, tormented the people, and extorted money from them at gunpoint. Lieutenant Colonel Osman Bey, commander of the 172nd Infantry Regiment stationed in Kirmasti and Mihaliç, played a major role in the establishment of the Kuvayi Milliye organization in our district. For 10 months, until the Greeks landed in Izmir in 1919, he was the stuff of nightmares for these gangs, particularly for Circassian Davut and his followers. Both before the 172nd Regiment withdrew to Bursa and after the Greeks settled in our district, bands imbued with the National Spirit were formed, and their members sacrificed their lives for the homeland. The most prominent of these were the guerrilla groups formed by Nazif Ağa’s Ahmet, Georgian Ahmet Efendi, Laz İsmail, Hacı Bekir, Karapınarlı Mehmet, and Cinci Mehmet. In addition, the National Forces Organization (Kuvayi Milliye Teşkilatı), chaired by Gürcü Mehmet Efendi and led by District Governor Saffet Bey, Branch Chairman Ömer Lütfü, and Captain Halil Bey, was established. Chief Hafiz Ahmet Efendi, Hafiz Mustafa Efendi, Benli Ahmet Ağa, Kurdish Mevlüt, Ahmet Hulusi Koçak, İsmail Uzel, and Kıyıcı Halit Efendi worked tirelessly within this organization.
The Greeks, who kept our district under occupation for 26 months until September 14, 1922, and who, in collaboration with traitorous gangs, committed every kind of oppression, murder, and looting, set fires in Karapınar, Kosova, Adaköy, Taşköprü, Eskimezarlık, Demirdere, and Paşalar as they fled. Dallımezarlık, Tepecik, and Çırpan were the areas that suffered the most damage. With the entry of Turkish soldiers under the command of Sabri Bey, commander of the 7th Company of the 33rd Cavalry Regiment, the district regained its freedom.
During the War of Independence, which lasted 3 years and 6 months, the names of 100 of our martyrs were received from various fronts. In addition to the hundreds of district residents martyred within the district borders by bands of bandits and Greek soldiers, the district lost more than 5,000 martyrs on numerous fronts during World War I.
In October 1922, Çolak Kemalettin Pasha arrived in our district with his regiment and took up quarters in Demireli and the surrounding villages. He established a Military Tribunal to try collaborators and traitors. Seventy-two people were sentenced to death. In a single day, in four separate groups, they were executed by firing squad at Ağabağı on Debboy Hill. Among the areas damaged by the Greeks as they fled after the war, Karacabey suffered the greatest damage. Some of the residents of Karacabey whose homes had been burned were brought to Kirmasti and settled into the homes vacated by the fleeing Greeks.
Many collaborator bandits fled during the years of the War of Independence. Çerkez Davut, his brother Zekeriya, and Çördüklü Hüseyin were among the most prominent of these. On the eve of the Lausanne Conference, during discussions regarding the enactment of General Amnesty Law No. 487 dated April 16, 1924—intended to identify individuals who would be excluded from the scope of the Amnesty Law to be enacted pursuant to the conference— the government submitted a list of 600 names to Parliament and proposed that this number be reduced to 150. The names of traitors from Kirmastil also appear on the list of 150. Çerkez Davut, İsmail (son of Kara Ali from Çördük), Kopuk İbrahim, and Peder İbrahim—whose names appeared on the list of 600 but were not included in the list of 150—were later stripped of their citizenship.
On December 24, 1922, the district’s name was changed to Lalaşahin by a decision of the Municipal Council. However, since there was another district in Edirne named Lalaşahin, the name was changed again. After reviewing this proposal, the Council decided to rename Kirmasti “Mustafakemalpaşa” to honor Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha’s role as a leader and fighter for the Turkish nation. The decision was adopted by the Municipal Council and became official as of December 31, 1922.
Under the same resolution, the names of other neighborhoods in the district were also changed. The name of Karakilise Village was changed to Işıklar. The Armenian Neighborhood was merged with the Lalaşahin Neighborhood, and under the same resolution, the name of the Greek Neighborhood was changed to Yüzbaşı Sabribey Neighborhood.
In 1924, the Esnaf Club was founded in the Government Quarter, and the İdman Yurdu soccer club was founded in the Municipal Quarter. In 1926, these two clubs merged to form the Gençlik Club.
The first accurate census was conducted in 1927. According to this census, while there were 13,022 people in the city center, the total population stood at 53,272, with the number of villages dropping to 113 following the transfer of 26 villages to other districts. A major factor in the population decline recorded in this census was the separation of 26 villages from our district, along with the loss of approximately 6,000 of our sons as martyrs over the course of 19 years during the Balkan Wars, World War I, and the War of Independence. Following these years, the district’s population began to grow steadily.
Construction of the bridge began in 1926 and was completed in 1927. The contractor failed to install the iron railings, claiming they were not specified in the contract; however, after a lawsuit was filed and ruled in favor of the municipality, the contractor completed the railings. Thus, the bridge—commissioned by the district governor of the time, Ali Haydar Yücebaş, to replace the one destroyed by floodwaters in 1906—went down in the district’s history as its last wooden bridge.
In 1935, a bronze monument of Gazi Mustafa Kemal in a marshal’s uniform was erected in the Government House Square. It was placed on a prism-shaped marble pedestal covering an area of 25 m². Including the base, the monument stands 5 meters tall. From this date onward, ceremonies previously held in front of the City Hall began to be held in front of the monument to the Founder.
In 1937, the first Halkevi building opened. For many years, it served the district’s youth with its library, courses, and plays at the site where the Girls’ Vocational High School and the Teachers’ House are located today.
In 1938, the first Power Plant Building was constructed, and a coal-fired steam locomobile was installed inside. This was not the district residents’ first encounter with electricity. In the 1930s, those screening silent films across from the Şeyhmüftü Mosque used electricity generated by a gasoline-powered generator to both show movies and provide lighting for the mosque during evening prayers.
On New Year’s Eve, marking the transition from 1939 to 1940, the district suffered its worst flood. At the site where the regulator stands today, Italian companies had completed their drilling work, and the Ministry of Public Works had begun pouring concrete foundations. Due to the construction work, the municipal side of the stream had been dug out in places to create water tunnels. As a result, there was no protective barrier left to prevent the stream’s waters from spreading. The District Governor’s Office had announced warnings from Tavşanlı and Dursunbey to the public via town criers, and residents of the neighborhoods in the plain—Selimiye, Çırpan, and Hamidiye—were being evacuated to their homes. Suddenly, during the night, the waters rose, and water 2 meters high began flowing from what is now Balıkesir and Yeniyol. In the flood, 22 people drowned, 120 homes were destroyed, and the ground floors of 2,500 homes became uninhabitable. When the waters receded, they left behind a layer of mud known as “soğla,” and the carcasses of thousands of animals were scattered across the plain. The floodwaters had eroded both sides of the bridge, leaving it isolated in the middle like an island, yet the bridge had withstood the floodwaters.
In 1943, President İnönü visited our district to observe the construction of the embankments extending all the way to the lake. Malaria had gripped the entire district due to the swamps and rice cultivation. A 500-metric-ton office building was constructed to store the harvested wheat.
In 1948, the district got its first printing press. Ziya Tamburacı, who had been working at the Tan Newspaper in Istanbul but settled in the district after the newspaper closed, also began publishing the DİRLİK GAZETESİ, the district’s first newspaper. By 1950, the district’s population had reached 65,552. In recent years, swamps covering 10,000 dekar of land in and around the village of Karaoğlan were drained, successfully preventing the spread of malaria. President İnönü visited our district two more times.
The year 1952 brought many innovations to the district. Two of the most significant were the establishment of the first telephone exchange with 50 lines and the holding of the first “Balolu” wedding. Another innovation was the change in the district’s connection to Istanbul. Until that year, Istanbul had been reached by steamship via Bandırma; however, with the repair of the highways, it became possible to reach Istanbul via Mudanya and Yalova. From that point on, travel to Istanbul by steamship would remain a distant memory.
In 1955, two jet aircraft collided and crashed near Hara. The pilots were killed. That same year, the historic bathhouse—which had been operated by the municipality since 1932—was sold to the Red Crescent. The bathhouse was demolished, and in its place, a new bathhouse, hotel, restaurant, and wedding hall were built. In the name of modernization and urbanization, yet another piece of living history that had survived to the present day was lost. In 1956, the municipal building located at the bridgehead was demolished, and in 1957, it was moved to its current location at the Garage. Also in 1957, the prison built behind the stadium opened for service. The Health Center, whose foundation was laid in 1954, was completed and opened in 1958. Thus, another hardship for the district’s residents came to an end.
In 1961, the Susurluk and Kirmasti Rivers flooded once again, closing the Balıkesir road between Yahyaköy and Taşköprü for four days; passengers were rescued by military helicopters from atop the buses. In 1964, just as was the case throughout the country, workers from our district went abroad to work. From April through the end of the year, 200 residents of the district traveled to Germany and Belgium. Also during this year, the film *Vurun Kahpeye* was shot in our district. On October 6, an earthquake measuring 6 on the Richter scale struck the district, lasting 55 seconds. The epicenter was located between Gönü Village and Hara. As a result of the earthquake, approximately 2,000 homes became uninhabitable, 20 minarets collapsed, 2 children died, and 20 residents were injured. The villages of Çeltikçi Durumbey, Boğaz, Kavaklı, and Güllüce sustained the most damage. In 1966, the Municipality and the Forestry Enterprise opened the park in Danaçayırı Kavaklığı to the public. In 1967, the foundation stone for the Industrial Vocational High School was laid. In 1968, the district’s first television broadcasts began. On August 27, 1967, Vehbi Koç officially opened the Tat Canning Factory with a ceremony.
In 1970, the Adult Education Center began operations. According to the census conducted that same year, the district’s population was 25,686 in the town center and 58,680 in the villages, for a total of 84,366 people. On September 12, 1974, a fire that broke out across from the Şeyhmüftü Mosque destroyed the Old Cinema Han, as well as 87 businesses in the Köseleciler and Kunduracılar Markets. In 1976, construction began on the Industrial Park, which was to consist of 262 business premises on a 108-dekar site. The Hallaçoğlu Cinema, which had opened in 1974, closed two years later due to the rise in television ownership and was leased to Tekel as a warehouse.
The year 1986 witnessed the opening of many structures. The indoor sports hall, whose construction had begun 10 years earlier, opened this year. The Meliköy Bridge was completed. The 18-classroom Züferbey School and the four-story Girls’ Central Quran Course Center were opened to the public.
According to the 1990 census, the district’s population had risen to a total of 100,804, with 37,795 in the town center and 63,009 in the villages. In 1991, the district’s second bridge was opened to traffic without a ceremony.
Source: Mustafakemalpaşa Municipality