How to raise a child like Lenin

Don’t you lie – ever!
G. Shubina, 1965

Truth will triumph. It always does. However, I figure truth is a variable, so we're right back where we started from.

Galloway Gallegher, in "The Proud Robot" by Henry Kuttner

What a wonderful water-color poster it is! It gives a perfect opportunity to understand what Soviet educational system was about. Education is not only a social institution with kindergartens, schools, colleges and universities. These are the places where knowledge is passed on, but schoolbooks can not give an impression of what ideas all young soviet citizens were absorbing from the youngest age.

Honesty was one of the basic virtues. According to the point 7 of Moral Codex of Communism Builder approved at the 22 Soviet Party Convention in 1961, every Soviet Citizen was to be “Honest and sincere, was to be moral, was to be plain and modest in social and private life”.

In 1940 a talented Soviet writer Mikhail Zoschenko published his “Stories about Lenin” – a set of fiction short-stories abridged for children, with Vladimir Lenin as the main character. Every short-story was illustrating a virtue – kindness, courage, will, intelligence. The very first short-story called “Decanter” went back to Lenin’s child years. Once young Volodia went to his aunt where he occasionally broke a decanter. When asked neither Lenin nor the children he played with admitted the fault. Fortunately no punishment followed but Lenin’s remorse was torturing him for the next two months until he finally confessed to his mother. And only after that he managed to have a good sleep. A naive story told in a language simple enough for the young to read and comprehend it. So after the War “Stories about Lenin” became obligatory reading in all schools of the Soviet Union. The message was quite clear – Soviet leaders are the most honest and sincere people of the world and every Soviet child should do his best to be like them. Unfortunately in those schoolbooks there was no mentioning of the author of the “Stories”, as in 1946 Zoschenko was called the “most vulgar writer of all the Soviets’” for the humorous short-stories he was brilliant at writing, and got in disgrace. Again the bright fiction had loose connection with reality. Zoschenko was exonerated only after Stalin’s death in 1953.

Plowed ground smells of earthworms and empires

Break virgin lands!
V. Livanova, 1954

There was a time they loved an accordionist, and now the time has come when they love a tractor driver.
A Russian proverb

Here is another poster which proclaims developing of virgin land as main means of agricultural boosting declared by Nikita Khrushchev . The slogan says: “Break virgin lands” and is accompanied by a short quatrain:

These lands are priceless.
Year by year
We should raise more and more
Grain for people.

Before the Revolution tractors were scarce as peasants did not have property rights on land they were cultivating and could not even dream about mechanization. And after the Revolution another problem occurred: the horses were all confiscated for army needs during the WW1 and the Civil War and the cows were all confiscated as a result of the War Communism policy. So when the whole thing settled down a bit, there were no draught means to plow and the peasants could not physically pull the plows themselves as during the war years the land became virgin. So in 1923 the first Soviet tractor “Zaporoshets” was built. It was an unsophisticated machine with three wheels, no cabin and torque engine, which worked on crude oil. The tractor was very simple to service and operate and it did play a great role in agricultural development of the country.

The caterpillar-tractor on the poster is the most popular model of the fifties called “Stalinets – 80”. It was named after Stalin like many other things in the Soviet Union. The women behind are “plugary” – plow-operators. They were lifting the plow at turnabouts or in case there was a stone. This was an extremely hard work because of the huge clouds of dust and exhausts from the pulling tractor. Stalinets’ production started in 1946 right after the War. For Soviet workers and peasants this was a machine from heaven – it had a full metal cabin with folding canvas roof, tilting windows and a powerful diesel engine which was capable of 92 horsepower at 1000 rpm. It could pull 8800 kgf at a speed of 10 km/h. In 1946-1958 there were built more than 200 thousand of S-80 tractors which were working at construction of Volgo-Baltic Waterway, during Antarctic exploration, on Karakum’s channel, at Bratsk hydroelectric plant, BAM and many other ambitious Soviet projects not to mention regular duties like plowing and towing.

This is why tractors were always a kind of a fetish for Soviet propaganda - it were these simple machines which paved the way to the Gagarin’s launch in space.

God exists, but we do not recognize him

“Atheist at the machine sit” magazine. 1925 subscription.
D. Moor (Orlov), 1924

During the War Communism years the Communist Party was fiercely fighting with the Orthocox Church. The Church had always been a part of the state and was actively supporting monarchy. And above all before the Revolution the Church had been the second greatest landlord in the country after the Tsar having great influence on rural population. So not only the temples were confiscated for common needs like warehouses and orphanages but also the minds of the citizens became the arena for ideological battle.

On the forefront of anticlerical propaganda was “Atheist at the machine sit” Magazine. It was published in 1923-1928. Its editor-in-chief was appointed Dmitry Moor (Orlov) – one of the best graphical artists of the time. Very soon the magazine turned into a general edition which covered a great variety of topics like socialist society problems, new life, international news, medicine, agriculture, history of the revolution. It became very popular among all Soviet social groups. In every library and village reading room there was always a copy of the “Atheist” available. In 1925 the supporters of the magazine founded a “Society of militant atheists” with 3 mln members by 1939.

The Magazine artwork and articles were so impressive and high quality that the Magazine quickly got famous abroad. “The Morning Post” even appointed a journalist who was attacking the “Atheist” articles on a regular basis. Catholic Church hated the magazine and got it banned in several European countries. The Archbishop of Canterbury - leader of the Church of England - even condemned it at a sitting of English Parliament.

The main fictional hero of the Magazine was Antipka (Antip – a traditional Russian name) – a lively revolutionary-tempered boy who appeared in almost every issue of the “Atheist”. His image is on the poster above. Antipka has a budenovka on his head – a military cap, which was a part of Semyon Budyonny cavalry uniform. On his chest there is a badge with Lenin’s image. The bright slogan says: “I am an atheist”. Amazingly Antipka had a living prototype: once Moor met a ragamuffin who said a brilliant phrase - “God exists, but we do not recognize him”.

I call architecture frozen music

The advertisement of GUM
V. Mayakovskiy, A. Rodchenko, 1923

Another classic constructivist poster. Again Mayakovsky wrote the rhymed text and Rodchenko did the graphics. The poster says: “Guests from cities, towns and villages, do not waste your soles on searching – go to GUM, where you’ll find everything – fast, neatly and cheap!”

This poster advertizes the GUM (Gosudarstvenniy Universalniy Magazin) – the State Universal Store in Moscow. GUM was a common name for the biggest department stores in the Soviet Union. The GUM in Moscow is actually a shopping mall with unique architecture.

Before the revolution the GUM building was known as the Upper Trading Rows. They were built in 1893 by Alexander Pomerantsev (responsible for architecture) and Vladimir Shukhov (responsible for engineering). Shukhov was an engineering genius – some compare him to Edison and Eifel. He developed practical calculations of stresses and deformations of beams, shells and membranes on elastic foundation, which allowed him to build the first Russian oil pipeline, various oil tanks and refineries. But he was most famous for his architectural projects including about 200 original towers (hyperboloid towers) all over the world, the most famous being the 160-meter-high Shukhov Tower in Moscow (1922); about 500 bridges; the Kievskiy Railway Station in Moscow (1912-17); several constructivist projects, designed in collaboration with another world-renown architect Konstantin Melnikov, notably the Bakhmetevsky Bus Garage (1926-28) and Novo-Ryazanskaya Street Garage (1926-29).

The Upper Trading Rows received Sukhov’s trade-mark feature – the giant glass-roof. This is a firm construction made of over 819 tons of metal with a diameter of over 14 meters. Illumination is provided by huge arched skylights of iron and glass, each weighing some 820 tons and containing in excess of 20,000 panes of glass.

In 1928 Stalin turned the store into office building but right after his death in 1953 the building’s original function was restored. During the soviet times it was one of the main sources for consumer goods with queues long enough to quit the building and reach the Red Square. All visitors from all over the country had the same list of Moscow places of interest – the Mausoleum, the Bolshoi (the big) Theatre and the GUM.

Forerunning Revolution

“The Battleship Potemkin” movie poster
Stenberg V. A., Stenberg G. A., 1929

The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe.
You have to make it fall.

Che Guevara

The Battleship Potemkin is a silent film directed by Sergei Eisenstein and produced by a Russian film-studio Mosfilm in 1925. Potemkin has been called one of the most influential films of all time, and it was even named the greatest film of all time at the World's Fair at Brussels, Belgium, in 1958.

The film presents the Battleship Potemkin uprising, a real-life event that occurred in 1905 when the crew of a Russian battleship rebelled against their oppressive officers during the reign of Tsar Nikolas II. The uprising was caused by the harsh discipline in the Imperial Navy and the low morale due to the defeat in the Russo-Japanese War. The revolt was sparkled after the sailors were given rotten meat with maggots as their ration. The instigators were caught and sentenced to death. During the execution the ship was taken under control of the sailors and the officers were thrown overboard (as seen on the poster). Then Potemkin headed for Odessa where a general strike had been called. The demonstrations involved lots of clashes between civilians and troops throughout the city with plenty of causalities. After visiting Odessa Potemkin encountered a joint squadron sent for its interception. However the ships did not engage in the battle when Potemkin refusing to give up sailed right through the centre of the squadron. The crossed and lowered cannons on the poster depict the sailor’s deviation to fire at their brothers in arms. One of the squadron’s battleships - Georgiy Pobedonosets — even joined Potemkin in his rebellious quest. This is where the film ends. Later Georgiy Pobedonosets surrendered to the authorities and the Potemkin sailed to Romania where the crew went ashore as the supplies and fuel was all used up. After a while the Romanian government returned the ship to Russia.

The film was created to commemorate the 20 year’s anniversary of the first Russian Revolution of 1905. In Russia the film received mixed success however becoming a hit worldwide both among the general audience who was impressed by the violence level of the movie, and among the professionals of the cinema. The film was soaking with new ideas and techniques proving the revolutionary theories of Sergei Eisenstein. Take the last shots – the black and white panorama of the sailing Potemkin has the soviet flag, which was painted bright red by the film director himself. In the time of black and white silent cinema this was mind-blowing.

And indeed the film shook the cinema industry. Quotes from Battleship Potemkin are present in German cinema classic Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will, The Godfather, The Untouchables, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Terry Gilliam's Brazil, Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult by Abraham brothers and numerous other movies.

No holds barred

Father, kill the German!
Nesterova, 1942

In a couple of weeks we will be in Moscow. I will wipe this damned city off the face of the earth, I will dig an artificial lake on its place. The word “Moscow” will become extinct.

Adolf Hitler about Moscow

“Kill the German” – this a phrase from Ilya Ehrenburg’s article published in Red Star millitary newspaper in 1942. This article and leaflet based on the text is probably the most controversial piece of all Soviet WW2 propaganda.

The article had several extracts from letters of dead German soldiers with description of violent treatment of Soviet prisoners. The article ended with a call to kill Germans, which quite resembled the Nazi anti-Jewish and anti-Soviet propaganda:

“Now we understand the Germans are not human. Now the word “German” itself has become the most terrible curse. Let us not speak. Let us not be indignant. Let us kill. If you do not kill the German, the German will kill you. He will carry away your family, and torture them in his damned Germany. If you have killed one German, kill another. […] Do not count days. Do not count miles. Count your kills. Kill the German – that’s what your old mother calls for. Kill the German! – begs the child. Kill the German – cries the native land. Never miss. Never fail. Just kill!”

Antony Beevor (a famous British historian and author of “Berlin - The Downfall. 1945” book) attributed Ehrenburg's message as a motivating factor for the violence against German civilians which according to his sources took place as Soviet troops advanced through Nazi occupied territory toward the end of the war - thus encountering a great deal of criticism in Russia. The Russian ambassador to the UK denounced the book as "lies" and "slander against the people who saved the world from Nazism." O.A. Rzheshevsky, a professor and President of the Russian Association of WWII Historians, has charged that Beevor is merely resurrecting the discredited and racist views of neo-Nazi historians, who depicted Soviet troops as subhuman "Asiatic hordes" (citation from Wikipedia).

A sound body keeps a sound mind

If you want to be like me, just train!
V. Koretskiy, 1951

“Be ready for work and defense” (BGTO) – this was the basic physical training system in the Soviet Union. As it was declared, the system’s aim was to “strengthen people’s health, to allow them to develop fully and to make them ready for work to the benefit of the Motherland”. The training system was introduced in 1931 by Leninist Young Communist League of the Soviet Union (Komsomol). All sport clubs and training facilities had to have BGTO as the basic training. It included various sport disciplines: gymnastics, sprint and long distance racing, broad and high jumps, discus and javelin throwing, swimming, cross-country skiing (with cross-country running in the snowless regions) and sharp shooting. It had several stages according to the age – first stage for boys and girls below 16-18 years old and the second stage for adults age 19+. After you achieve certain standard results at a special competition event you receive a badge – here is a photo (100kb).

The poster above shows a soviet athlete and a boy. The athlete has a Coat of arms of the Soviet Union on his sport shirt, which indicates that he takes part in international competitions. The boy has a book with BGTO standards. Also he has a red tie, which is a symbol of the Pioneer organization. Actually it is a red kerchief with a special neck-tie. Its three endings symbolized unbreakable connection between three generations: the communists, the komsomol members and the pioneers.

The style of the poster is the same pre-war socialist realism. In 1953 Stalin was alive (he died only two years after the poster was published) and his personal cultural preferences still rulled the country.