Translated material
I am a pioneer of the Soviet Union
"...Entering the ranks... in front of my comrades, I solemnly swear: to passionately love my Motherland, to live, study and fight, as the great Lenin bequeathed, as the Communist Party teaches, to always fulfill the laws of the pioneers of the Soviet Union..."
It seems so. I remember, although the thin green notebooks for two kopecks, where the Laws of Pioneers or the Oath were printed on the cover, had already decayed. All of us who are over thirty are able to “automatically” give the Pioneer salute, tie a Pioneer tie with our eyes closed and know the rhyme about the old crocodile with a Pioneer badge stuck in his butt...
This is our youth, son.
Not even youth. Childhood.
We were accepted into pioneers at church
Aron SHAPIRO, born in 1913, says:
“I joined the pioneers in 1927, I was 14 years old. Our pioneer organization was under the Union of Co-Workers of Kremenchug, and my dad was this same co-worker, an accountant. Then, when my older brothers went to work at a tobacco factory, I was transferred to the pioneer organization already at this factory. And at the age of 16, he was chosen as a delegate to the First All-Ukrainian Rally of Pioneers. The entire pioneer organization of the city accompanied us to Kharkov - then it was the capital of Ukraine - they held a rally at the station... There was such honor, we walked proudly, with our noses in the air...
We stayed in Kharkov for three days, and I was selected to be part of the delegation that went to Moscow for the First All-Union Rally of Pioneers. As we passed through Ukraine, a brotherhood rally was again held in Kursk, at which the pioneers of Russia greeted the pioneers of Ukraine.
It was my first time in Moscow. It seemed that Moscow in those days (August 1929. - - M.D. ) turned into a huge pioneer camp. Pioneers are everywhere. If ten pioneers gathered at a tram stop, the passengers would clear the tram for them. I don’t know why.
We were fed at the Aragvi restaurant, and we spent the night in the apartments of Muscovite workers. Our detachment from Kremenchug, seven people, was settled on Palikha Street. When we arrived, a meeting of residents again took place in the square courtyard, at which Alexander Bezymensky spoke: “We don’t know who exactly your parents are, but you are from Ukraine, and we will be proud and happy to accommodate you!”
We were assigned to apartments, and I ended up on the fifth floor. FIFTH!!! It was a dream!
The Dynamo Stadium was full of people; in the stands were Maxim Gorky and the wife of the revolutionary Sun Yat-sen, Mao Zedong's predecessor. We had a rehearsed number. We - a whole group - were taken to the football field and loudly asked the question: “Who drew up the Treaty of Versailles?” We (in unison): “Thief!”
I remember at some meeting they showed me Max Goeltz - there was such a German revolutionary who came to us after their revolution failed in Germany under the leadership of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht. And here I am standing with an apple in my hands, my mouth open to bite into this apple, and then they show me Max Goeltz. I completely forgot about the apple. I stand with my mouth open, devouring my German comrade with my eyes. And Max comes up, snatches the apple from my hand and takes a bite. And he looks at me: Will I pay? yell? what will I do? And I, with my mouth open, don’t believe my luck. Immediately the service staff came running and threw a bunch of apples into my bag to keep me from yelling. That's how I became a hero.
But the most important event was the conference in the St. George Hall of the Kremlin, where representatives of the delegations gathered. And I got there. Whenever I remember this hall, my forehead still starts to hurt. I didn’t know that there were walls made of mirrors. I walk, I walk, and I hit this mirror!..
In front of us sat the poet Demyan Bedny, Minister of Health Semashko, Krzhizhanovsky, the author of GOELRO, Podvoisky, the first commander-in-chief... Everyone spoke, and then everyone was tied with a tie and accepted as an honorary pioneer. Suddenly young Lazar Kaganovich comes in and says: “You know, I really love the pioneers, but do they feel it or not?” And then someone will jump out of the hall and throw themselves on his neck with this pioneer tie... Well, I think now he will let him feel...
And then Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya appeared. Two young ladies led her by the arms. She walked in a sundress that dragged along the floor, her eyes were somehow bulging and painful. And for some reason, when she performed, her teeth jumped violently.
Nadezhda Konstantinovna said that Vladimir Ilyich loved the young pioneers very much, and called on us to be Leninists and fulfill Ilyich’s behests. She spoke for about ten minutes, quietly and offended, I don’t know who. The teeth didn't hold up very well. She spoke for about ten minutes and was led away by the arms.
And then someone said loudly: “Be prepared to fight for Ilyich’s cause!”
And we all answered with one voice: “Always ready!”
We were very ready to fight. There was such romance in this pioneer! I won’t forget how we famously sang:
Bravely-o-o we will go into battle
For the power of the Soviets
And how one die-r-r-rem
In the fight for it!
We walked down the street in formation, in front was Borka Mogilevsky, our pioneer leader, with a whistle. The drum is beating and a banner is being carried nearby. And we are so proud!! We liked it so much that we would all die as one! It was such a wonderful prospect, such joy!
You walk and look around: does everyone see? The people looked around. And it seemed to us that the whole city was delighted with us.
We were accepted into pioneers in a church on the outskirts of the city - they made a club there. It was necessary to take the oath: “I, a young pioneer of the Soviet Union, in the face of my comrades...” And those who had already taken the oath could greet each other with a salute. And everyone else was jealous of them. Therefore, I felt especially proud if someone saw us saluting each other, for example, adults sitting on benches, cracking sunflower seeds.
But the pioneers were not allowed to have seeds, God forbid! No way. And it was impossible to cry. One day I came to this church of ours and sat on a couch, and its seat was made of small plywood that was not nailed down. And I failed! It hurt so much, everything hurt so much! But I remembered in time that a pioneer should not cry, and I endured everything with dignity.
What were things like for the pioneers? Yes, there was nothing to do. The Timurites appeared later, after 1940. We just sang songs and walked.”
As of 2007, the Moscow City Pioneer Organization numbers just over 1,000 people (and among them are 52 adults—today’s Pioneers have no upper “age” limit). Modern pioneers have formulated and written laws and customs, partly reminiscent of the ancient pioneer prohibitions on seeds and crying: “A pioneer strives to lead a healthy lifestyle, he struggles with his bad habits. A pioneer does not bring his bad habits into the organization. The pioneer does not whine or squeak, even when it is difficult.”
Not worthy to be a pioneer!
It was Alexander Bezymensky who didn’t care whose children came to him in Moscow for the rally. But in 1937 it was no longer all the same.
From the story of Galina AGRANOVSKAYA ( material provided by the international society “Memorial” ):
“My father was arrested. Mom and grandmother told me that dad was on a business trip. And I was nine years old, and I didn’t understand anything. I was a pioneer, this was my party activity... And one fine day, on the line, my tie was taken off. And, taking off her tie, the pioneer leader said: “Children of enemies of the people cannot wear a pioneer tie!” It was a shock. When I came home, I didn’t cry—everything seemed like a misunderstanding to me. And my grandmother - she did not live to see my father’s return - repeated to me: “My Andel - she spoke like that in the old Moscow way, not an angel, but an andel - don’t be upset, it’s not a sin what happened to you.” She considered despondency to be the worst sin and really wanted me to calm down.
My father worked at a newspaper and was the first person in our small town to be imprisoned. After my father’s arrest, my mother was fired from school, we lived on my grandmother’s penny invalid pension, we didn’t have enough to buy bread. But soon they imprisoned the chief engineer and someone else... And my mother took me from my school, where I remained an outcast, and transferred me to another, to an elementary school. And it became easier for me there - I didn’t know anyone, and no one knew me. Mom got a job there herself...”
But such stories were still few. Or rather, an order of magnitude less than the stories of expulsion from the party or the Komsomol. I can’t say that they tried not to touch the children. They were touched - and the topic of repressed childhood is separate and absolutely painful. But they were touched outside the framework of the pioneer organization.
From a conversation with Dmitry LEBEDEV, coordinator of the Moscow City Council of the Pioneer organization:
-- You are celebrating the 85th anniversary of your organization. Doesn't it bother you that you are dragging with you the entire burden of your ideological past?
- We're not carrying anything. This is our history, and we are proud of it. What bothers you?
- Well, for example, that children of enemies of the people were expelled from the pioneers...
- Where did you get the idea that it was? Did anyone in particular tell you this?
- Yes.
-Have you checked this?
-- No. How can I check this?
- That's it! You take my word for it! And if this is not true?.. (after thinking) Although, let's be honest, there were cases - the children of enemies of the people were actually expelled from the pioneers. But was this the system of life of the pioneer organization? No! These were episodes that were organized by adults. And the Pioneers are an organization of children!
After this dialogue, I immediately remembered what had always confused me about pioneer leaders: cheerful rhetoric and the ability to conduct political disputes. A skill that has only grown stronger over the years.
Live like a pioneer
The pioneer organization in the USSR has always been political: all pioneer activities stood on the powerful theoretical platform of Lenin’s behests, decisions of Komsomol and party plenums, and the rejection of personal doubts in favor of a collective decision. But since the pioneers dealt with children, and children are enthusiastic, playful and inconsistent people, communist education in the pioneers was always very cleverly linked with the education of patriotism and the organization of children's leisure time, that is, with things that were certainly necessary. Timurites helped the elderly; during the war, pioneers collected warm clothes and medicinal herbs for the front, pioneer detachments collected waste paper, and excellent students, on the pioneer's instructions, helped those lagging behind. All these were simple matters, understandable to every child, in which even if communist ideology was mixed in, it did not bother anyone and did not confuse anyone.
I asked my Jewish aunt, who turned ten years old in 1948, if she remembered how cosmopolitans were beaten, and if this had any impact on her pioneer childhood? Maybe they didn’t want to be accepted into the ranks? “No, I don’t remember. I was in the third grade of a girls’ school on Arbat, and in our class there were an eerie number of children with such surnames. But they were accepted into pioneers not on the basis of nationality, but on the basis of academic performance. I only got straight A's, and I had a great time at the Pioneers. I was very active."
While the adults were focused on basic survival, figuring out which sausage stick to make soup from, the children grew like grass, left to themselves, the street and the community. The pioneer organization occupied their leisure time and educated them. The way you talk to children is how they begin to think. The pioneer era taught to be friends like a pioneer, to live like a pioneer, to think like a pioneer. And at the same time she explained why the collective is more important than the individual, why it is so important to fight for the cause of the Communist Party and “with a joyful step, with a cheerful song” to speak for the Komsomol. The children were not fixated on ideology, but the feeling that you live in the best and fairest country and that your older comrades will always correct you entered into your blood.
Today, not everyone is sure about the best and fairest country, but the laws of today’s pioneers still say that “a pioneer loves his homeland, values its history and prepares to become its defender.” And among the responsibilities of a pioneer is the following: “In a timely manner, inform the organization about his personal (family, educational and other) plans and existing problems that may complicate, at least temporarily, his work in the organization.” By the way, about the organization. “A pioneer is obliged to value the honor of the organization, to strengthen its authority through his deeds and actions... The commander’s word is the law, but the main commander is the general assembly.”
Lyubov STARODUMOVA, born in 1947:
“We were accepted as pioneers as a whole class, on Lenin’s birthday, under his monument. They repeated in chorus: “I, a young pioneer of the Soviet Union, solemnly promise: to live, study and fight, as the great Lenin bequeathed, as the Communist Party teaches.”... Oh God, I remember! Can you imagine?
We all really wanted to be pioneers. The worst thing was if you did something and they told you: “That’s it, we won’t give you a reference, they won’t accept you as a pioneer!” Oh, how we were afraid of this! Of course, all the children were ideological; they knew everything about the revolution and the war, and the names of all the leaders. But we had a desire for knowledge, we tried to read more, to become better.
Parents then also spent the entire day at work. And the children were at school, busy with useful work. Clubs, all sorts of pioneer feats: waste paper, scrap metal, cleaning the territory, community clean-ups in public gardens. I was very active, all the years I was the chairman of the detachment council. Sometimes I didn’t even have time to do my homework, but the teachers forgave me, saying that such a patriotic deed had been done.
And if someone did not study well or did not complete the assignments, they are worked on at a general meeting. But these were not cruel meetings, but fair ones. And we did not exclude anyone from the pioneers; no one deserved this. There was one boy, a hooligan, and they simply didn’t accept him at first. He didn’t even join the Komsomol later. He immediately became a thief.”
Natalya VORONTSOVA, born in 1964 :
“I really liked being a Pioneer, I was the boss of everyone and managed to become the chairman of the squad council in the fifth grade. I gave speeches at all pioneer gatherings, drew wall newspapers, helped poor students with their homework, visited veterans...
I had the key to the pioneer room, and my girlfriend and I skipped classes there. They said that we had some urgent pioneer business, but they locked themselves there and learned dances that they themselves invented on the spot.
I really liked the schools of the pioneer activists; they took place in the houses of the pioneers. The councils of the squads of different schools gathered there, and we were given tasks. For example, it’s as if a delegation of pioneers is coming to us from some distant island and we need to quickly figure out how to welcome them: a slogan, a dance, a speech with pantomime...
They also sent me to wave flags at the 25th Congress of the CPSU, and I saw Brezhnev, although he seemed no bigger than the head of a pin, because I was waving flags in very distant rows. But the most powerful impression was how we took off our leggings in the St. George Hall, we were changing clothes there... And the living Elena Vodorezova entered our bus, chock-full of flag fighters, and we looked at her, our mouths open, - the living figure skater who used to be We only saw it on TV. And it was stronger than Brezhnev’s pinhead...”
On the drum
Pioneer work was led by senior pioneer leaders; each school was entitled to such a leader (together with a pioneer room and a bust of Lenin).
From a conversation with Dmitry LEBEDEV:
“You can’t imagine how many schools come to us today and ask: “Give us a counselor, and we will have a pioneer organization!”
-- How many?
- Why do you need this?
- Understand how widespread the return to origins is.
- You can rest assured that this is so. Do you know why we managed to maintain a functioning city-level organization? Because we saved the footage. The staff of MSPO instructors are volunteers from 17 to 70 years old, and everyone has experience in pioneer work: methodologists of extracurricular work, professional senior pioneer leaders... All of our instructors have gone through the organization. They don't need to be taught the basics.
One can only guess how different people worked as senior pioneer leaders in Soviet times.
Boris BELENKIN, who worked as a senior pioneer leader in the 1970s:
“Once a week I had to go to the district committee to study. There was a cracking ideology there. They told us about the ten pioneer commandments or announced when we had a line of solidarity with someone. Once I even went to a rally of pioneer leaders near Moscow. They lived in tents, learned chants, and sang in chorus. The presenter held a poster with the words of the song with both hands, so that all eight hundred counselors could see: “Vologda-where-where-where”... Almost all of them were girls 18-20 years old.
From the very first seconds, my work as a pioneer leader was reduced to absolute fraud and hackwork, to reports and work plans. But this deception did not come from me, the pioneer leader Belenkin, who carried “The Gulag Archipelago” in his bag. This was a condition, a rule of the game. I provided my reports to the director, and there was mutual responsibility for everything. The work of a pioneer leader was mainly limited to organizing children's leisure time.
I had a pioneer room. One day, after locking myself up, I laid out the samizdat volume of “The Archipelago” on the table. Suddenly the door opens and the head teacher for extracurricular activities enters. It turns out he had his own key. But nothing happened. We then exchanged literature with him, he brought me Doctor Zhivago.
There were some unpleasant moments in my life as a pioneer leader. For example, admission to the pioneers. One day, the class teachers told me that the children dreamed of joining the pioneers right opposite the Mausoleum. We come to Red Square, the children are lining up, the high school student holds ties. And they quietly push me to the side: "Now an oath!" I say: "Yes, good, oath." And I understand that I don't know the text. I was thrown into cold sweat. True, they quickly found a notebook, and I read it very artisticly.
With the children I had complete understanding. If schoolchildren really did not want to go to any lesson, I gave them the keys to the pioneer room, and he told the teachers that children help me organize the day of solidarity with the Nicaragua people. In one school, I even had a fictitious council of squads. Parents of the children whose literature I led quickly, and we exchanged books with them: they brought me collections of Tsvetaeva, “Red Terror” ... And so I gathered these girls, apologized to them and explained: I have such work , reports. I had to hold a wall newspaper contest-twice a year so that you would go in construction with a song-once a year, and some once a year a banner on a common ruler was taken out there. They said: "For your sake we can do everything." Very smart children were very talented.
When I graduated from my pedagogical institute and it was time to get a job, they told me in all schools, learning that I have such a great work experience as a pioneer: “As a teacher we don’t need you, but we would like to see you as a head teacher of extracurricular work” . It was a disaster. I brought my work to complete and categorical profanity, and it turned out that I was the perfect pioneer leader. And for me it was absolute evidence that there is no more communist ideology in this country. ”
Be ready!
According to VTsIOM surveys, 95% of Russians over 45 years old believe that the pioneer organization was useful. 85% of respondents believe that such an organization is needed. 40% - for the reconstruction of Pioneer, and 45% want another single children's organization. According to half of the respondents, the children's organization needs ideology.
Today, pioneers help veterans, go hiking, spend holidays in orphanages and boarding schools, give each other a salute, wear red ties, now this is the color of good, love and scarlet sails of Green.
Says Dmitry Lebedev:
- We are not attached to any party, but we are not apolitical. We have our own pioneer patriotism. Traditional, classic, Nekrasovsky: “What a citizen is a worthy son ...” After all, a patriot is a person who loves his homeland and tries to benefit her. The child should feel his participation in creative social practice, to do what he can. And to touch the history of the country, and without exemptions, and not such that we lived very well under the king-father, and under the Soviet regime-very bad.
This is an accomplished task, although very complicated. Now it’s hard to form heroes ...
Well, again the pioneers are heroes. They cannot without this taste of struggle. He is in the blood in the blood.
And therefore, a pioneer organization, even without Lenin, will never be just an organization of children's leisure. The cry of pioneers as it was, remained: “Pioneer! Be ready! - Always ready! "