Meat, butter, pay rise!

Novocherkassk is a small town in the South of Russia, also known as the unofficial capital of the Cossacks, the Slavic military community. Unfortunately this town was the place of a huge tragedy, when in 1962 the civilian demonstration was opened fire on.

The turmoil started on June, 1 when the Soviet government announced the grocery price increase of about 30 per cent. The riot began at the progressive electro locomotive factory: just before the price increase, the salary had been lowered, which already was below the living minimum (about a hundred rubbles). The workers demanded an explanation, and threatened to strike. Faced with an ultimatum, the CEO Kurochkin mounted the platform and demanded that people went back to work. ‘If you do not have enough money for meat, buy the liver pie’ answered Kurochkin with the snarl.

This phrase sparked the unrest. The news about the riot quickly spread through the factory, so more and more labourers stopped their work. Someone made a fire using the portraits of the country leader Nikita Khrushchev as fuel. At the same time the factory illustrator drew some posters with the workers’ claims. Later, for writing four words “Meat, butter, wages increase” on the poster he was imprisoned for 12 years.

Novocherkassk Mosaic Wall

The strike leaders sent the representatives to other factories of the region – so a large meeting was scheduled for the day after.

By the evening the army entered the town, headed by the vice-minister of internal affairs, as well as a huge group of government representatives. The order to arrest the riot instigators was issues, but it failed to stop people from protesting – by now, the crowds were approaching the town centre and the City Council offices.

Perhaps the tragedy could have been avoided if the Saturday was not a working day. People came to the factory and gathered in front of the factory building. With the red banners and portraits of Lenin in their hands, the march to the town centre had begun. While they were moving through town, a lot of students and ordinary city dwellers joined the demonstration – mainly because of idle curiosity. No one could imagine that it may turn to carnage, mayhem and years in prison.

The crowd came to the main town square and broke into the City Council building: off the balconies speeches were being made addressed to the public and the Soviet government, demanding wage increase and better price policies.

Meanwhile the army troops kept arriving from the neighbourhood regions. The situation was labelled as coup – it is still unknown whether the order to open fire was issues by Khrushchev himself, but the reality was that it was very unlikely without his approval.

About fifty soldiers of special troops tried forcing people back. First some soldiers made the warning one-off shot in the air. Immediately there was a shout from the crowd that it was blank shooting – so the people made a move at the soldiers. That moment the fire was opened.

People rushed in all directions causing chaos. Several dozens of people were on the ground, with blood all over. The whole thing did not last an hour.

Right away the fire fighters were called to wash the blood off the square and posters with a promise of a dance party for the following day were put up to make the citizens forget about the tragedy

The news about shooting quickly spread around the town. The spontaneous protest meeting of outraged people continued in the night after the tragedy. Introducing a curfew the army troops forced people to leave the square. The next few days were the real challenge for thousands of citizens who were afraid that they had been caught by the KGB photographers during the march. That time the government leaders discussed various options to prosecute the people involved in the unrest. Some of them even proposed to deport all the town citizens to the Middle Asia.

The Soviet government feared that the news about the riot in a small town would spread around the country and around the world. To prevent this, the KGB attracted several special machines to control the radio frequencies which could transmit the information about the tragedy. All the mail sent from the town of Novocherkassk was opened and looked through.

Novocherkassk Riots Memorial

Long after the unrest the KGB officers found the leaflets with claims and slogans about the protest. The tragic outcome was 33 persons lost and 90 injured. 122 people were arrested where 7 were blamed for terrorism and were later executed. The majority were imprisoned for 10–15 years for participating in abortive riots.

The cases were revised after the resign of Khrushchev. Some people were later released, but it was poor consolation for families of the killed civilians.

Related posts:

1. Best of Winter 2009–2010
2. May, 1st: Soviet Labour Day.
3. Soviet Brands: The Scent Of Communism. Part 1 of 2

Be Vigilant! Disclose an Enemy Under any Mask!

1953 was the last year of long and terrifying governing of Stalin. In January the huge country although accustomed to repressions shuddered from the new horror – this time the enemies-saboteurs were Kremlin doctors of a Jewish origin. The commenced persecution also applied to ordinary doctors.  Soviet people who believed to the politically edited stories broadcast in the media were scared to be patients of Jewish doctors. On March, 5 of 1953 Stalin passed away and the case of Kremlin doctors was dismissed. Humiliated, maimed doctors were released. However this was only the beginning of the political repressions of the Jewish specialists and today we would like to introduce you to a striking example — the story of my family.

1951. Soviet doctors with the patient and recovered sight

My grandfather graduated from the Marine Military School in 1945, the last year of the Second World War. The training for the young officers was accelerated as the country was preparing to start the war with Japan. Soon my grandfather chose the profession of the submariner. He was a sailor on the most little submarines – so called ‘baby-submarines’ where the conditions were especially harsh. When the war with Japan ended he had a 5 year service contract in Port-Arthur in China.

By 1953 my grandfather was already a successful military officer who was preparing  to get the position of the submarine commander two months later. My grandmother was a doctor, but in winter of 1953 she did not work as  she gave a birth to her daughter, my mother. That February,  just within a day all the officers of Jewish origin were dismissed fromtheir work. No, they were not imprisoned, nor withdrawn from work completely. They were simply sent to work for the Training Troop Base in Vladivostok, the camp traditionally used as a punishment camp for alcohol-addicted or misbehaving officers. With no explanation, a huge group of people  — from navigators to mechanics, including highly qualified staff  from the Leningrad Military Engineering Academy were sent to the Training Troops Base.

In March 1953 my grandfather, offended by unfairness to the innermost of his heart, wrote to Nikita Khrushchev. He satated that he had graduated from the Marine Military School with merits, had 5 year of experience of military service on submarines with permission to control and that he wanted to continue his career there. Surprisingly he received a reply, albeit not from Khrushchev personally.  The Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Marine Army replied that the order for transfer would not be reversed and that was the end of story. He did not provide any explanation or apology.

With time, the doctors were rehabilitated but the innocent officers were not. The years after that were full of career obstacles, like a total ban on further study, should one enter the Military Academy. At the same time my grandfather’s colleagues of non-Jewish origin were aquiring the experience on the most contemporary nuclear submarines. None of them are alive at present as those first nuclear submarines were too dangerous for the health!

Surfacing Soviet Submarine

The overt discrimination of the Jews in different forms continued till the very end of the Soviet Union. Being accused of anti-Semitism was not something the Soviet officials liked: so there usually were formal examples of successful careers of Jewish specialists. For instance, the General of the Red Army Comrade Dragunskiy, who held a high ranking  post despite his origin. However, that was exceptionally rare and was nicknamed as ‘museum rarity’.

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1. The Victory Aftermath. Russia in Second World War.
2. Best of Winter 2009–2010
3. The Patriotic Education in the USSR. Part One: the October Kids.

Military Parade in Moscow

In accordance with the official history the Second World War  (in Russia called ‘the Great Patriotic War’) was commenced on the Soviet territory by Germany: the treacherous attack on 22 June, 1941when they invaded into the USSR.  This official version of the Soviet Government is written in every history book.  At the same time there is numerous evidence of Stalin’s desire to start the war first with the intention similar to Hitler’s . And that is why there is the theory that Stalin provoked German aggression against the USSR.

In 1939 the USSR government signed a historical agreement with Germany (‘the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact”). This non-aggression pact guaranteed that both parties never make war with each other. Signing this document, the USSR implicitly permitted Germany to commence the war against the West.  This would have allowed Stalin to start the emancipation movement of the countries which would have been invaded by Hitler. It was the right moment – Germany, exhausted with its Western campaign, would not have been able to fight in the East (East being the West of the USSR), should the USSR invade the German borders later. By winning the war with Hitler, the USSR would become the main World Saviour and, as per the Lenin’s precept, it may be the start of World Communism Revolution.

What would have happened if the USSR began that war?  The war – is the Mother of revolution, and the world war – the mother of World revolution.  According to the main revolution philosopher Friedrich Engels, the World War with the victory of Communists would result in the ‘total exhaustion and creation of conditions for the ultimate victory of the labour force’. Fortunately, this guy died before the Second World War and, unfortunately, Lenin — the follower of the idea of World Revolution gained an access to power in Russia and created the monster Stalin.

Joachim von Ribbentrop third from right watches his Soviet counterpart Vyacheslav Molotov seated sign the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact of non-aggression on Aug. 23 1939. Josef Stalin (AP Photo/File)

In 1939 a  German colonel Heinz Guderian paid a visit to the Soviet Locomotive Factory which also produced tanks. The number of tanks produced daily was 22(!). That was a time when Soviets were not participated in any war. Just six years prior to that, Germany which was not at war, did not have any tanks at all.  Also when Germany commenced the war they had only 3200 tanks – the same amount which could have been produced by the Soviet locomotive factory for less than half a year! And now a little bit about those tanks. Similar to the Soviet cars, copied from the American templates, that tank’s prototype was first created in the USA (where it was never put into mass production) and transferred to the USSR with the utterance of forged documents where it was listed as the agricultural tractor.

Later, this ‘tractor’ was copied and then assembled in tremendous numbers  under the brand HST – High-Speed Tank. First HST could gather speed of 100 km/h. Even at present this speed for the tank is considered to be enormous. The shape of the tank’s body was simple and rational. None of the tanks in the World had such an armour shape. The best tank of the Second World War, T34, was the direct descendant of the HST. The principles used in this tank was later copied by the German ‘Panther’ and then spread in the world. In 1936 these tanks could move on the bottom of the deep creek — almost underwater. In 1938 these tanks were assembled with the diesel engines – unprecedented feature for that time. Finally, these tanks were equipped with the very powerful weapon. Those tanks had only one disadvantage – they were useless on the territory of the Soviet Union as they were not adapted for the impassability of roads rather than to good roads of  Europe…

BT-7 — High Speed Tank

Another instance of Soviet pre-war weapon was the Soviet pursuit plane which was the first one in the world equipped with rockets. By that time the Soviet engineers already created the unique plane IL-2 with the armour body – the real “tank” able to fly, with the super power equipment including 8 rocket missiles. Did the Soviet aviation have the supremacy in the air then? No.

Mostly Russian pilots including the pilots of pursuit planes were not trained to conduct the fight in the air, rather they could strike the targets on the ground. According to the code of the military aviation they were directed to conduct one superior offensive war destroying the enemy planes on the airfields and then holding the supremacy in the air. In 1929 the magazine ‘War and Revolution’ in the article ‘The beginning of the War’ concluded: ‘It is very advantageous to seize the initiative and start the war first, making a surprise attack’. Later, this conclusion was cited in all the Soviet aviation codes.

IL-2 — Flying Tank

One more proof to the alternative version of the offensive war intentions were the howitzer artillery groups created in the USSR as a part of the Red Army military force. If the Sovet government prepared to the defensive actions then they would have produced cannons as they are initially designed for defence – as grazing fire forces the enemy to stop. In an opposite case, however, howitzer is better as it has a high-angle fire trajectory and proved to be the best to smoke out the defender from the trench. Should the Soviets predict  the defensive actions they would definitely have built cannons rather than howitzers.

The debates over the different versions of  the reasons of Germany attacking the USSR have started in early 90s. These debates are concentrated on Stalin’s obscure intentions when he maimed the entire country while creating the unique system of governance. What was his ultimate purpose?

There are only two possible outcomes – the first one is complimentary for the USSR while the second one is deteriorative. Unfortunately for the Soviet adherents there is no proof that Stalin prepared for the defensive war and this fact puts the Stalin’s regime on the same line with the Hitler Nazi one.  Sometimes it seems to be better not to look back in history where the old myths let the Stalin’s supporters live in a fool’s paradise.

Related posts:

1. Happy Birthday Dear USSR! The Great October Socialist Revolution. November 7th 1917.
2. Declassified: the Great and Powerful Stalin.
3. The Patriotic Education in USSR. Part 2 — Pioneers, Soviet Boy Scouts

A good example of how the ideas to make a new car were born is the story of the factory “Communar”. The Minister of Car Manufacturing made a call to the factory where designers thought over the scheme of a new Ukrainian car and literally said: “I heard you were going to make a spring suspension from the “Volkswagen” but I actually like the Italian Fiat-600”. Shortly the factory commenced the production of ZAZ-965 –nearly the exact copy of the Fiat.

ZAZ-965

By the way, the next model of ZAZ was the replica of German NSU Prinz 4. This car was remembered by the nicknames “Soap Box” and “Big-eared”.

The car for the middle class which replaced “Pobeda” was labelled  in the honour of the great Russian river “Volga”. The design of the car was very much identical to the design of Ford Mainline, 1954, purchased by GAZ as a pattern alongside with Chevrolet Belair and Plymouth Savoy. Even before the new car was put into production, the popular Soviet magazine “Ogoniok” awkwardly published pictures of these three cars with an arrogant headline: “New Soviet cars for the middle class”.

Volga

Despite the popularity of Volkswagen around the world their Soviet copy was not really popular among the consumers. To produce another mass car the Soviet government signed the  contract with Italian Fiat. The capacity of the factory allowed to produce about five thousands cars per year.

At the time, Leonid Brezhnev was ruling the country: he was passionate about cars and racing. In 1965 he got an exclusive American Lincoln Continental sent to USSR right from the Car Exhibition in New York.  The car was purchased by the Soviet Ambassador and was built by the company Lehman & Peterson. This had brought stretch limousines into the fashion.  Lincoln was sent to ZIL where the engineers made a copy which was sent to production by the anniversary of the Great October Socialistic Revolution in 1967.  No doubt, the original Lincoln was much more elegant and graceful than its replica ZIL-114.  Nevertheless, the new Soviet limo was not that bad.  In early 1970s the car was redesigned, based on another American sample. A Cadillac Fleetwood 75 was turned into a ZIL-115 — to serve the aged and weak-minded Soviet leader.

Right up to the collapse of the USSR the Soviet car industry used the same procedure of shameless copying. In order to build “Moskvich-1241″, the engineers slightly disfigured Chrysler 1501. Famous “Zhiguli” was copied from Nissan Sunny 1978 although later they were slightly modernized by the engineers of Porsche.

Probably, “Niva” were the only exception – it was made in a way to make people to cry. That car was ‘too-Russian’ to be good.

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1. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 2 of 3
2. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 1 of 3
3. Soviet Automobile Industry — Part 2 of 2

In early 1930s without any licensing arrangements the Soviet engineers copied the first limousine car  for the Communist party executives. In 1932 six limousines were copied off the American Buick 90L. However,  later the factory production line was switched to producing caterpillar tractors,so the limousine business was shifted to Moscow Stalin Factory.

ZIS-101

The car, based on the engine of the Buick and the body copied off the Cadillac, was given another non-poetic name, ZIS — 101.  It also had Buick radiator bars.

By the beginning of the Second World War there were three huge car factories in the USSR.  Despite the fact that the USSR already had its own highly educated and talented engineers,  the very first post-war limousine ZIS-110 was also a copy of an obsolete American car.   When making a decision about the launch of a new car, the engineers selected four models – Packard 180, Packard Clipper, Cadillac 75 and Cadillac 63.   Stalin himself was to make the decision, and he picked the Packard 180.

Chaika

In August 1945 the Soviet government issued a decree on the opening the Moscow Factory of Small Capacity Cars.   The same decree established the technical features of the new car as well as the commencement dates for the production lines.   The patterns for the new car were also selected by Stalin.  The Soviet leader liked the pre-war German Opel Cadette.  In order to please Stalin, the Soviet engineers urgently found several trophy C-38.   The cars were dismantled and the designs of the parts were sketched.  The first five engines were made by November 1946 and the cars were on the road by the end of the same year.  Interestingly enough, thenext generation of cars under the brand “Moskvich” was made on the basis of American Ford Prefect and Ford Taurus rather than the German range.   The samples of those cars were purchased abroad.

The denouncement of the Stalin cult and a new seven-years plan to develop the Soviet economy for the period of 1959–1965 had  inspired the Soviet engineers to create more cars.  The flagman cars of that time were the ZIL-111 and GAZ-13 “Chaika” developed after the trial runs of best American executives cars.  The ambitions towads the rapidly changing American fashion had made the ZIL-111 obsolete by the beginning of 1960s.   That is why this car was later redesigned in the Cadillac style of 1960–1961.  Nevertheless, the production of GAZ-13 “Chaika” was continued without any changes in its design till the 1979.

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1. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 3 of 3
2. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 1 of 3
3. Soviet Automobile Industry — Part 1 of 2

Once some music composer said  that “There are only seven notes which compose all the music in the world.  No wodner some songs sound alike”.  Undoubtedly,  all cars  have got four wheels, so plagiarism in the automobile industry is hard to pinch.  In this article we deliberately ignore a popular Soviet point of view that a steam locomotive, an airplane and the radio were not invented in Russia.  All we attempt here is to make a small digression into the history of Soviet automobile industry in order to identify its origins and its development.

ZIS-110

A Russian  philosopher Vasiliy Rosanov once noted that in Russia every single case of wealth originates from theft or extortion.  Historically, the economy of the Russian Empire before the 1917 was so deeply integrated into the European economy that the exchange of ideas, something, which now would have been hugely copyrighted, was very common.  Like, in 1901 in St Petersburg the carriage factory Freze and the Riga bicycle factory Leitner successfully assembled the French oil engines De Dion Buton as part of Russian carriages. Another factory Aksai in Rostov-on-Don purchased the license for the production of the American Oldsmobile Carved Dash.  In 1906 a Russian engineer Boris Lutskoy organised the assembling of  Mercedes cars for the Russian market. At last, the main pride of Russia – the automobile Russo-Balt — was made from foreign parts – the chassis with four-cylinder engine was adopted from a Belgian company with a Swiss name Fondu.

The October revolution of 1917 created  a popular in  Russia myth that all things have been invented in, well, Russia.  The reasons for that would be merely ideological: the new born country needed new morale.  According to an old Soviet joke, even “elephants come from Russia”.  The most progressive country in the World, as coined by the revolutionary communists, should strike the rest of the world with advanced technologies, the propaganda advised.  In order to create the real Soviet cars,  the communists established the Research Automobile Laboratory (later known as NAMI). The very first Soviet motor car NAMI-1 was actually a graduation project by a young engineer Konstantin Sharapov.   The car turned out to be so successful that it was put into production right away. Later,  in 1979, Konstantin confessed to copying  the charts for NAMI-1 off the Czech Tatra-11.

The notorious NAMI-1

During the period from 1927 to 1930,  the factory assembled 403 NAMI-1 models.  Despite all its advantages, this car was not planned for the mass production.  At the same time,  any manager of the robust mind realised that the Soviet Industrialisation needed mass production.   The Soviet Russia wanted giant factories, but what would be the product?

In 1929 the USA was stricken by a severe economic crisis.   As the result of this crisis, the production of Chevrolet halved, the production of Ford dropped three times!   Despite the absence of diplomatic relations between the USSR and the USA, both Chevrolet and Ford offered their production to the Soviet government.  No need to guess,  shortly afterward the awfully cracked Russian roads were voyaged by the dazzling American beauties of all kinds.   The long rally was won by Ford A and, consequently, this car was put into production in the USSR.

The Soviet Ford

The first automobiles under the brand GAZ left the factory in December, 1932.  Quite rapidly these cars got nicknamed as “Soviet Fords”.   Even the logo was very similar – blue oval with the brand GAZ instead of Ford. The car was not a success, however,  as the open body and the lack of boot turned to be its main downsides. Within 5 years the new car GAZ M1 replaced the old model.   Now the body was copied from 1934 model of Ford, although the model was adapted to suit the severe Russian conditions. The front suspension was based on two springs rather than on one, unlike  in the American version, and the wheels were of a different shape.   Later on, the design charts for  GAZ M1 were utilised  for almost all Soviet-made cars.

To be contunied.

Related posts:

1. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 2 of 3
2. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 3 of 3
3. Soviet Automobile Industry — Part 1 of 2

The great shortage of almost everything required for normal well being was one of the most distinguished features of the Soviet economy. Surely, there was food, clothes and some cosmetic goods in the Soviet shops in 1950s-1970s but the variety was incredibly poor.

However, the philosophy was that the Soviet people were used to comparing their life standards with the ones of the Second World War – so any small-time luxury was very warmly welcomed. Being a nation of plain tastes, the Soviet people were happy to be buying things made in the USSR – they understood that even not so long before, it was impossible.

Many people still associate the fragrance “Red Moscow” with their childhood. All women, especially those who wanted to be elegant, were in love with this perfume.  “Red Moscow”, created exclusively for the Russian Empress Maria Feodorovna, in 1913, had quickly become a tremendous success both in Russia and abroad. Henri Brocard, the owner of the largest Russian factory of pomades, perfumes and soaps before the Revolution; had created the perfume “The Empress’s Favourite Bouquet”. When in 1917 his factory was nationalised and renamed into the “Zamoskvoretskiy Soap Factory No 5”, the perfume was also renamed as “Red Moscow”.

Perfume street vendor, circa 1920s

“Red Moscow” was just what you could expect from a Russian perfume: complex, full-bodied, rich smelling; yet much warmer that one would want in a cold climate.  Technologically, it was a completely synthetic perfume: the gist was that there was no need for costly French perfumes with their natural essential oils when synthetics smelled equally Along with this one, the range had such fragrances as “White Acacia”, “Red Poppy”, “Lilac” and others. In 1970s, a new scent was introduced – Silver Lily of the Valley – which, unsurprisingly, had become a huge success just as rapidly.

As for the famous “Chanel  No 5”, the Soviet women did not get to know it for a long time – apart from brief pieces in Polish fashion magazines, there was very little knowledge of the foreign perfumes. In 1980s, however, the situation began to change to the better. “Climat” and “Magie Noir” by Lancome and “Opium” by Yves Saint Laurent had become extremely sought after in early 1980s.

Really rare and expensive perfume ‘Climat’

White Acacia

Red Poppy perfume

Famous Red Moscow

The male market segment had divided the men into two large groups: those who preferred the perfume “Shipr” (slightly more up-market) and those who liked “Three In One” (a cheaper brand). Funnily enough, the latter one had become a popular one for consumption with the alcohol addicts. “Shipr”, however, was meant to be an exotic, warm smell of flowers and sandalwood (hence the name, which is French for the island of Cyprus. Just like the “Three In One” perfume, “Shipr” contained no less than 70% of ethyl alcohol.

Three In One Perfume

To a modern man, spoilt with choice for perfumes and fragrances, these two would have a fairly strong smell of fir tree and excessive musk and might even remind of a insect repellent. But back in the days, however, a rare man would not get this year after year for his birthday!

“Shipr” (Cyprus)

The legend goes that the “Three In One” perfume was created in France in the early 18^th century specifically by the order of Napoleon Bonaparte as a disinfectant – it was meant to have a refreshing, hygienic and therapeutic effect – and in 1913 it won the Gran Prix at the World Cosmetics Exhibition in Paris. A few decades later, it arrived in Russia under the brand name of “Three In One”. Originally, though, the bottle was sold with the annotation enclosed: “Young people should consume 20–30 drops, elder people – 50–60 drops daily diluted with water or wine. It helps to protect against rapid heart and head aches”.  So the habit to use the cheap toilet water as a substitute for vodka has a historic background!

Three In One Perfume, 1917

It does not seem like much but these brands listed above would compose the whole range of perfumes available in the Soviet Russia until, maybe, very late 1980s. The only other alternative was to be lucky enough to have a perfume imported, as a gift. The reasons behind such limits were purely ideological as spending time and money on beauty products was labelled as absolutely unnecessary.

To be continued…

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1. Soviet Brands: The Scent Of Communism. Part 2 of 2
2. Best of Winter 2009–2010
3. Best of Fall 2009

The very though of women competing for the title of the most beautiful was a fairly adversarial concept for the Soviet ideology. A woman, first and foremost, was a worker, an achiever, a mother and a wife, and nobody would consider judging one on the physical attractiveness — let alone allow women spend the valuable time and money on pointless fashion, cosmetics and hair styling.

A uniform parade was the closest thing to a beauty pageant in the USSR. It was an honour to participate in one.

That’s why, when across the globe beauty contests became popular and widespread after the Second World War, the USSR had its ban on such events. Until 1989, when the very first beauty contest took place in Moscow — trying to find the prettiest of them all.

Needless to say, the public interest and anticipation for the performance were huge: the tickets for the show never came on sale, but were distributed only to the people “in the know”. At the same time the ordinary people could enjoy the show live broadcast on the TV during the six long hours (and that’s the running time, as TV commercials did not exist in the USSR back then). The finalist of the competition was a 16 years old schoolgirl from Moscow Julia Suchanova. Julia was granted theright to participate further in “Miss World”  but her parents refused point-blank to sign the contract on her behalf. When the young beauty came of age she moved to the USA where she started the modelling career and later owned a company specialising on the sport equipment.

Yulia Sukhanova. No, she was not married, it is just a ring.

Yulia — the first Miss USSR, 1989, Gettyimages

The interest for the second beauty pageant was just as huge as to the first one. Contenders for the title “Miss USSR — 1990” were selected from over the country. The winner was the 17 years old Maria Kezha from Belorussia.

Maria Kezha — Miss USSR 1990, photo by Jack Goldenberg

The beauty pageant “Miss USSR” took place only twice as in 1991 the USSR collapsed. Nevertheless, the competition resuscitated under the new name “Miss Russia” in 1993. Sadly, just like Yulia Sukhanova, Maria never pursued the modelling career to the full. She got married shortly after the contest and later emigrated to Germany.

It cannot be helped to note that the first “officially” recognised Soviet beauty by the West was the winner of pageant “Moscow Beauty” Masha Kalinina from Moscow in 1988. Masha was in good graces with the destiny also after the competition -  she continued to work as a model for the well-known Germany Company “Burda-Moden”. Later Masha enrolled into the acting school in Hollywood where all her expenses were paid by an elderly American couple who she met at the reception at the White House, where she was invited by George Bush-Sr.  Visit Masha’s official website.

Masha Kalinina (in the middle) — Moscow Beauty, 1988

Maria Kalinina nowadays

Have a look at this 26 min interview with Masha for Russia Today. What does it take to be one of these girls and how do you obtain a crown, and, most importantly, what happens next.

Related posts:

1. Fashion in the USSR. DIY.
2. Soviet Brands: The Scent Of Communism. Part 1 of 2
3. A Trip Around the USSR: Leningrad 1972

Building binge commenced in the Soviet Russia in 1955 when the Central Committee of the Communist Party  issued a decree “About elimination of unnecessary extravagance in architecture”.  The pre-war, Stalin-approved  architecture was notable for monumental columns, high-stud ceilings and indispensable stucco mouldings.  This  was a Soviet version of Empire style (or “Vampire”, coined by contemporaries) and it was about to fade away.

Project of the Palace of soviets (1772x1374). Sadly, was not built due to the lack of financing.

Nikita Khrushchev who replaced Josef Stalin  made a decision to build cheap houses at  mass volumes. At that time the residential accommodations in еру USSR was  in a totally disastrous condition – only 10–15% of urban population had private apartments;  the majority of this group appertaining to the governing elite. The ordinary Soviets mostly lived in d.i.y wooden sheds  -  that comprised to around 30% out of all urban accommodation ( and possibly even more in some regions, like Siberia).  Now those sheds are hard to imagine, however, there are still remnants of those  in some remote places. Toliets, bathrooms, and even water supply were often missing.

A survivor. This one is up and still going. You’d hope to live upstairs, wouldn’t you?

So the mass construction of houses without unnecessary extravangances had commenced. To understand the scale of those developments, simply compare the following figures.  From 1917 to 1941 (when the  War began) 200 mln of square metres of accommodation was built. 70 mln was destroyed during the War but about 50 mln  was restored in late 1940s. Whereas during the seven-year period from 1959 to 1965 more than 300 mlns of sq metres of accommodation was built — and hundreds of new flats got occupied right away. The  first wave were the  brick houses (those are still highly valued on the modern secondary house market). Despite tiny kitchens and quite pokey layouts, those flats had  balconies and (sic!) separate toilets and bathrooms as well as soundproof walls! Really, those  brick apartment blocks were a good deed of the Soviet system.

House on the bank of Moscow River

As it turned out in 1957, the  population growth exceeded the speed of the construction.  The change of power from Stalin to Khrushchev gave optimistic hopes to Soviet people, which in turn resulted in the Soviet baby boom. So, after two years after the first resolution, the Communist Party issued a second one “About residential accommodation development”. This resolution stated that constructors did not pay enough attention to panel and block-based construction and, hence, made a start to a new type of  buildings. They were  five-storeyed panel blocks without rubbish chute or elevators,  assembled in less than a month. This manic constructing of 1950s was one of the most popular themes of the Soviet art. Mass demolitions of wooden sheds and, at the same time, demolition of antique buildings of tsarist Russia, were celebrated in a number of the Soviet movies. The typical movie showed a close-knit family moved into a separate flat where the typical urban landscape was studded with building cranes. That was an end of the era of shared households where people tenanted in huge communal flats with public kitchens and shared facilities.

Typical urban view, early 1950s

Certainly the difference to those wooden sheds was tremendous. Still, it is interesting to see what a typical Soviet flat looked like.  The main distinguishing  feature was a toilet of an incredibly small size. It was personally set by Nikita Khrushchev who tried the model of the toilet and said “If I fit into this toilet, they would also fit”. As the result,  the toilets designs were based on the Khrushchev’s dimensions.

Khrushchev announcing the commencement of housing development, mid 1950s

As for the kitchen, it was often small enough to fit only one person of average size, whereas somebody bigger (let alone obese) may not have fitted at all.  It is believed that the tiny size of the kitchen originated from the communist ideology. It was supposed for the people of this society to have lunch in a workplace and dinner at a cafeteria. It was also assumed that would be no need for the pantry as everything would be available from a local food shop. This approach resulted in the lack of space for the fridge. Instead, these flats were equipped with a so called “Khrushchev’s Fridge”. It was a small closet under the window approximately 1 x 1 metre in size where people could store some food only in the winter time, as it had an actual hole in the wall.

Literally — apartment blocks.

New suburbs, early 60s

Interesting to note how these apartments were allocated to people. One had to file a formal request for an apartment, and then wait for an approval. Importantly, the wait was never longer than a number of years and usually those who needed their own dwelling — like, young couples — were granted it. The queue might have been sped up in some extraordinary circumstances — like, for academics, sportsmen, high achievers on the production line etc.

The scheme of allocation usually worked as followed. The couples with no kids were given a studio, a living room with a separate kitchen. A family with a child were entitled to a one bedroom apartment. Two kids family would get a two bedroom flat. Three bedrooms was as big as any apartment got — no matter how many kids one had, they all would have been accommodated in three measly bedrooms. Oh well, with an average of 2.1 kids per Soviet family, and an overall scarcity of accommodation, this never seemed insufficient.

These five-storeyed buildings were being built until 1985 and they spread across the whole country. In 1985 the massive construction stopped. It was replaced by convenient individual construction of apartment building where the new apartments were not available for the majority of ordinary people any more. Then, it actually turned out that Khrushchev’s massive construction of tiny and inconvenient flats was not a bad thing  — rather, an act of humane care, actually the one out of a small number of positive things of that time.

A well-to-do Soviet family having dinner in their relatively luxurious Moscow apartment. They are among the few in the city who have a new, modern apartment and elegant furnishings. — Image by © Wally McNamee/CORBIS

Related posts:

1. Сollective Housing
2. Best of Winter 2009–2010
3. Best of Fall 2009

Zaporozhets, ZAZ 968A

In 1960 the construction of a huge car plant in Ukraine was finished and the new car “Zaporozhec” ZAZ-965 (later nicknamed “Humpbacked”) was offered for sale. In terms of design, it was a unique car despite the numerous talks that it was just a replica of Volkswagen “Beetle” and Fiat “Topolino”. This car had a hard roof (unlike Fiat) and an air-cooled engine (unlike “Beetle”). This small inexpensive car rapidly gained high popularity with people not only in the USSR but also abroad.

Zaporozhets, ZAZ 965

By the middle of 1960-s the volume of car production was not high enough to meet the growing demand. In 1966 the Soviet Government issued a decree on the construction of new car plants. The Moscow car plant was reconstructed and the volume of production was increased from 90,000 cars to 180,000. However those were not  sufficient volumes and then it was decided to start developing cars in collaboration with the Italian FIAT.

FIAT, ancestor of Lada 1300 (VAZ 2101)

The first car made due to this collaboration was VAZ 2101 “Zhiguli” which was partially copied off the FIAT-124. Nevertheless there was a sufficient difference between these cars. VAZ was equipped with a newer engine, brakes and reinforced body to fit the condition of a longer-term service, which was probably different to the one in Europe. After the redesign and modifications the car mass production had commenced.
Almost after the production was launched, the USSR stopped its collaboration with the FIAT. As the result they denied the production of full replica of FIAT “Mirabell” (as supposed by the agreement) but developed the unique model “Niva”.

Lada Niva

Realistically, the “Niva” was one the best cars ever produced in the Soviet Union. This car was the realisation of the concept of a “beach crossover” which became a poster child in the rest of the world. Later ALL foreign developments made on the edge between real off-roader and 4WD station-wagon cars were the copies of this concept, initially used in model VAZ-2121 “Niva” in 1977.

Lada 1600, VAZ 2106

In 1984, the Soviet engineers presented a new family of cars under the brand “Samara” initially introduced by VAZ-2108 (later supplemented with VAZ-2109 in 1987 and VAZ-21099 in 1992). This car was widely selling in Germany, France, GB and Canada in large extent because of the low price (in comparison with main rivals Ford “Escort” and Toyota “Corolla”) and powerful economic engine.

Lada Samara, VAZ 2108

Meanwhile another car plant in Soviet city Izhevsk produced the concept model IZH-2126. This was a car of absolutely new generation – equipped with automatic transmission, ABS and double axle drives. Nevertheless the production of this car started only in 1992 in a well-simplified version.

IZH-2126, Oda

At the same time in the late 1980s the car production industry in the USSR began to lag behind  its competitors in the US and Europe. Funding of the production of new models stopped (as it was in the planned economy of the USSR), car part suppliers did not have the new  parts, and parts made were frequently defected. Nowadays the car plants industry is mostly a legacy of the Soviet Union whereas the models of the cars are still sufficiently behind their Western counterparts but the price ranges are similar to the new European cars of a far better quality.

Here and below are some of the most popular cars in 1990 by Los Angeles Times chart.

Mazda Miata MX 5

Lexus LS400

Related posts:

1. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 3 of 3
2. Soviet Automobile Industry — Part 1 of 2
3. Soviet Cars: History of the Copy-and-Paste Industry — Part 1 of 3