Tag Archives: kids

Good-Natured Humour Postcards from the 1950s

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…and we are back on air after our short break! Sorry it was unan­nounced, but very much needed — and we are delighted to recon­nect with you again. We’ve got lots of great stuff com­ing — from kids sum­mer camps through to some amaz­ing ama­teur pho­tog­ra­phy as well as we shall look at each decade in detail — what 1940s, 1950s, 1960s and so on meant to the Soviet Union, and how it lived dif­fer­ently to the rest of the world. So — thanks for your feed­back and stay tuned!

Just a very light post for today, before we dig any deeper — a very neat col­lec­tion of humor­ous post­cards — great to see some good natured jokes all the way from 1950s and 1960s.

by valk 500x371 Good Natured Humour Postcards from the 1950s

Future Cham­pi­ons. By G. Valk.

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21+ Depressing Photos of Post-Revolutionary Russia by Arkady Shaikhet

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When the new Soviet coun­try was born, the peo­ple were promised a won­der­ful future under the social­ism — just a few more years, the bill­boards boasted — and we’ll live in a glo­ri­ous state. How­ever the early days were more than gloomy: the  run­down econ­omy, dis­ori­ented soci­ety, the reek of fear and uncer­tainty — and that clearly can be seen through the pho­tos of a promi­nent Soviet pho­tog­ra­pher Arkady Shaikhet.

This col­lec­tion of pho­tos starts off with nice, clearcut images of what the coun­try was por­trayed as by the media and pro­pa­ganda — and pro­gresses to a unsweet­ened world of the sim­ple folk, vagrants, and peas­ants. Please let us know if there is a photo below that has touched your heart — we always value your feedback.

photoshare 003 500x373 21+ Depressing Photos of Post Revolutionary Russia by Arkady Shaikhet

Gym­nasts. Red Square. 1924

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Wrap Your Baby in Old Newspapers — the 70 Years of Deficit of Everything.

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1111 500x375 Wrap Your Baby in Old Newspapers the 70 Years of Deficit of Everything.

A typ­i­cal Soviet shop with bare shelves.

One of the main criti­sisms of the Soviet Union now, from an every day per­spec­tive, was the huge deficit of every­thing. The planned econ­omy failed to sup­ply a con­stant flow of goods nec­es­sary for the well being of peo­ple. It was not the mat­ter of inca­pac­ity — no, the means cer­tainly allowed to build space shut­tles or cre­ate extra strong tanks.  The short­age for goods was cre­ated arti­fi­cially — due to the rea­sons of the strange Soviet ideology.

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The Patriotic Education in USSR. Part 2 — Pioneers, Soviet Boy Scouts

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pioner1 The Patriotic Education in USSR. Part 2 Pioneers, Soviet Boy Scouts

We are the pio­neers, sons of work­ing class (a pop­u­lar song)

As you remem­ber from the pre­vi­ous post, at the age of 9 the Soviet Kids grew out of their Octo­ber Kids affil­i­a­tion. The next ide­o­log­i­cal rite of pas­sage was pio­neer­ing which the Soviet coun­try placed a huge impor­tance on. Loosely based on the Amer­i­can Boy Scout’s move­ment, pio­neer­ing cov­ered all kids till the age of four­teen and worked in close rela­tion with schools. Just like any­thing else Soviet style, it had its idiosyncrasies.

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Enthusiastic Photography from Soviet Russia, 1950s — 1960s.

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Just a very pleas­ant col­lec­tion of pho­tos from a pri­vate fam­ily archive. All pho­tos were taken in 1950s — 1960s, in the streets of Yaroslavl, a small town not far from Moscow. Sim­ple things — out­door sports, fish­ing, swim­ming, enjoy­ing the music or spend­ing time with the fam­ily — these 38 pho­tos are rel­ish­ing small plea­sures and bring­ing a smile to a face.

As always, click on the mag­ni­fy­ing glass icon to see the pho­tos in detail. All pho­tos are cour­tesy of Sergey Kulikov, a grand­dad of one of our con­trib­u­tors. He is 86 years old now, and pho­tog­ra­phy has been his hobby all along. Let us know which ones you like — or if you have pho­tos in your fam­ily archive which you’d like to share.

1 500x329 Enthusiastic Photography from Soviet Russia, 1950s 1960s.

Wait­ing for the play off.

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Technological Advance of the Classic Rocking Horse

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Wooden Toys Horse On Wheels1 500x375 Technological Advance of the Classic Rocking Horse

The Wooden Horse on Wheels

This myth­i­cal crea­ture of the Soviet kids’ child­hood, some­thing between a Cen­taur and a bicycle, has come into being within a Soviet man­u­fac­tur­ing indus­try dri­ven by an over­pow­er­ing desire to “give all the best” to chil­dren. Most bril­liant minds of the Soviet sci­en­tists were work­ing on the cre­ation of the ideal cross-breed. The mutant was offi­cially labeled a “Pedal Horse” and its large-volume pro­duc­tion was finally kick-started by the end of 1950s. It became very pop­u­lar quite fast as it was really excit­ing to own a “real” horse that could move around in the street, a horse more real than a wooden rock­ing horse.

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