Why in the USSR did everyone work in a Stakhanov way, except for Stakhanov himself

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The career of Alexei Stakhanov is an example of how people became incredibly popular during the Soviet era. There was everything: nationwide recognition, shaking hands from party leaders, even a photo on the cover of the American "Time", but the main thing is that his name, or more precisely, his surname, is immortalized in the people's memory, becoming a household name, to denote those who work contrary to the circumstances. However, Stakhanov himself was not always a model of Soviet industriousness. The story is silent about this, but the miner, whose image was elevated to a cult, had spots in his exemplary biography.

An ordinary miner from Donbass literally overnight became not just famous, but headed the Soviet labor hierarchy. The exemplary workaholic was trumpeted not only by the Soviet media, but even the American edition dedicated an editorial to him. An event unheard of in those days. On the one hand, the Americans recognized the labor feat of the Soviet worker, and on the other hand, the Soviet ideologists did not see anything seditious in this and allowed the publication to appear. Stakhanov became a model of hard work and dedication at work, not only in the Soviet Union, but also abroad.

At the end of 1935, a photograph of Stakhanov appeared in the American edition, and in 1936 material about him appeared there under the title "Ten Stakhanov Days".

Fulfill and overfulfill the five-year plan

Economic growth was impossible without high rates of industrialization, for this various measures were taken. Including the five-year plans, as another measure for the allocation and definition of production plans. Already in the first five-year plan, it was planned to noticeably increase production volumes. Obviously, it was planned to do this at the expense of the workers.

New collective agreements were concluded everywhere, according to which workers had to work more for the same wages. Simply put, production standards were raised and if earlier they had to do less for a certain remuneration, now production rates have been raised everywhere and for the majority the amount of pay has decreased.

Of course, in the shops and at the machine tools they began to be indignant - they had every right. But here, too, the state managed to distract the workers, with new enemy elements - now they began to look for pests at enterprises that pull production back, most often old specialists who had worked since pre-revolutionary times fell under the flywheel of repression. The new external enemy actually reduced the number of dissatisfied with the new working conditions.

However, despite the fact that reports of high performance and incredible success were heard from the high tribunes, in reality the results were much more modest. But the important role of workers' motivation was recognized. And since it was not possible to move them towards industrial feats with the help of monetary rewards, ideology came to the rescue, calls from the stands and overestimation of results, they say, we are moving in the right direction, but we need to move even faster. After all, there is a bright future ahead, not otherwise.

The second five-year plan set even more stringent conditions, it was necessary to work not just hard, but at the limit. The belts were tightened even more, in accordance with the previous principle of increasing production rates and reducing wages. In order to control the mood of the working masses and prevent strikes at factories, party organizers appeared, he had to extinguish conflicts on the spot, carry out explanatory work and was responsible for free-thinking on the ground.

It was the party organizers who brought Stakhanov to light, making his record heroic. In particular, Stakhanov's example was gladly intercepted in the capital, turning him into an all-Union campaign. Did they understand that records are always isolated cases, and in order to apply the Stakhanov method in practice, special working conditions are needed, including equipment, new specialists. As much as those who were responsible for industrialization did not want to set industrial records on the stream - it was an unrealistic task.

But how much did the propagandists understand in the production process? It turned out with Stakhanov, so this is real. But what a beautiful story! In addition, the example of a miner made it possible to raise production standards again, based on a very real fact.

Record holder candidate

Alexey Stakhanov, a native of the Oryol province, was no different from childhood, he came to Donbass to earn money, at first he drove a horse team in a mine, and then went to the face. The mine in which he worked was not particularly outstanding, it was more about somehow reaching the constantly growing plans, and not about overfulfilling them.

Despite the fact that the mine itself worked anyhow, she was lucky with the party organizer, he, as a true PR manager, calculated that if there is a famous record holder in their mine - a star of the working people, then no one will pay attention to the actual implementation of the plan, the mine will become advanced simply by the fact of the work of the foremost worker in it. The only thing left is to set this record. And for this, the search for a record holder began. Yes, everything was not prosaic and even cynical.

The party organizer, whose name was Konstantin Petrov, personally took up the selection of a candidate for the role of a record holder. It was supposed to be a simple, hard-working guy. No, Petrov has not yet targeted his candidate for a world-class star, regional recognition was enough for him. But he approached his plan with a soul.

So, the candidate had to be proletarian-handsome, come from a simple working-class family, have physical strength and be liked by others. Stakhanov approached this role, moreover, after listening to the proposal of the party organizer, he thought, and agreed.

Then it was a matter of technology, the record should have been timed to coincide with the International Youth Day. To make it clear - Stakhanov actually made the record, only for this all the necessary conditions were created. After all, there is a difference between when the record was set because a person worked hard, constantly overfulfilling the plan, and when it was decided to overfulfill the highest indicator, having previously planned and enlisted the support of colleagues. The latter circumstance, incidentally, played an important role.

Stakhanov went into the face alone, the rest of his colleagues strengthened the places where a collapse could occur with logs, and the future record holder chopped the seams and did nothing else. Although in a normal workflow, there is no need to talk about the continuity of production. In addition, on this night shift, when Stakhanov was supposed to set a new record, the party organizer Petrov himself, the head of the section, two miners who were supposed to support the face and a local journalist went down into the mine. It was impossible to do without the latter, because he had to tell the Soviet public about the new record and the hero of his time.

The output of Stakhanov for one night shift was more than 100 tons, which is the norm for a two-week work. The incident was immediately reported in the local newspaper, because it was not for nothing that the journalist was present. The party organizer hurried to report on the record in his party line, so the information reached the capital, the People's Commissar of Heavy Industry liked it, and then Stalin.

Party organizer Petrov knew his work, the image of Stakhanov and the record that he set was an extremely timely event. A real Stakhanov movement began, and not only in the field of heavy industry, but also in all other areas. Meanwhile, Petrov was already forging a new record holder. After all, he needed to secure success not just for the name of an individual Stakhanov, but for the whole mine, which forges record holders.

Dyukanov, a colleague of Stakhanov, produced 12 tons of ore more than Stakhanov for a shift built in a similar way, but he did not get a drop of the popularity that Stakhanov had. The miner's life changed dramatically, but was he, a simple hard worker, ready to become a symbol of the era?

Woke up famous in the morning

Stakhanov, and even his party organizer, were hardly prepared for everything to go so far. A couple of days later, the record holder was allocated a new apartment, moreover, already equipped at the expense of the enterprise. Stakhanov even had a landline telephone - a huge rarity for that time. But that's not all, the miner had his own horse, and even the coachman was attached to it. Subsequently, he broke his own record, thereby establishing himself as a leader in production, in fact, this is where his career ended. At least a miner's career.

They began to invite him too often to various cities in order to start the Stakhanov movement, or in order to inspire the people who were in it, during one of such trips he met his future wife, who at that time had barely finished 9th grade. Meanwhile, Stakhanov himself, at the time of his labor feat, was already closer to 30. However, the parents of the young schoolgirl did not oppose the relationship, realizing that their daughter had drawn a lucky ticket.

Yesterday's miner is invited to a meeting of the Stakhanovites, which was attended by Stalin himself, where Stakhanov receives the highest mark of honor - the Order of Lenin, in addition, he is taken into the party, and bypassing all bureaucratic obstacles - by special order. Now Stakhanov is moving to Moscow, where he is also given an apartment, and in an elite house, he has a car. At the same time, his image was published in the American edition, where only heads of state had previously appeared.

They decide to teach Stakhanov further, so that such an illustrative example could apply his record skills in a larger-scale production. He enters the academy, where he prepares to become a production manager. He became the people's defender, because almost every hard worker in the country could easily turn to him with a request for help, and Stakhanov, in turn, could humanly ask for a favor from almost any manager or party leader. It was not customary to refuse Stakhanov, and even more so to come to visit a former miner empty-handed.

Alcohol flowed like a river, and over time, much more became known about Stakhanov's drunken "exploits" than about labor. In addition, if there were only two of the latter, then the first were performed with enviable regularity. He either lost the Order of Lenin, then was seen in a scandal in a restaurant with Stalin Jr., then broke the windows. The country's leadership has repeatedly arranged checks both in the address of the worker himself and in his apartment. The members of the commission came to the conclusion, and this is documented, that Stakhanov does not read anything and is culturally lagging behind, but he walks in restaurants and has problems with alcohol.

When it's time to prove it

However, the party leadership turned a blind eye to all these pranks, they say, the heroes are supposed to have weaknesses. But with the beginning of the war, he was sent to lead one of the mines. This period was very short, moreover, there are too different opinions about Stakhanov as a leader. Some said that he had failed the task, others, on the contrary, insist that the mine went to the front line. But the fact remains - Stakhanov was recalled back to Moscow and no more posts were offered. Apparently his labor merits as a leader were greatly overestimated.

He was appointed head of the coal industry socialist competition department. And all his duties involved rewarding the outstanding. It was a real failure. After all, huge horizons opened up before him, besides, the personal favor of Stalin, who loved unexpected and loud appointments, was very encouraging.

At the same time, alcohol was not the only and far from the main problem of Stakhanov. He did not have a broad outlook and did not at all strive to develop. He was forced to read, and from under the stick. It was impossible to allow the symbol of the proletarian youth to degrade. Moreover, the party assumed the constant development of the proletariat. Libraries, books, theaters, cinema, opera - you are always welcome.

After the end of the war, when there were a lot of new heroes in the country, people began to remember Stakhanov less and less often. He held all the same position, which existed nominally. In 1957, Stakhanov went back to Donbass, or rather he was exiled back to his homeland. There were no obvious reasons for this, but the fact remains. He worked as an assistant manager of the trust, then he was again demoted. In addition, he returned to Donbass alone, since his wife did not plan to return to her husband's homeland and remained in the capital. Stakhanov returned alone - no one needed and forgotten.

He rightly felt as if he was first pulled out of his usual rhythm of life, showered with gifts of fate and undeserved rewards, and then, having played enough, returned to his former place, actually breaking his fate and making him feel undeservedly forgotten.

What did Stakhanov actually do in his homeland, abandoned not only by the country's leadership, but also by his own family? Considering that even during his heyday he loved to kiss the bottle, then he did not deny himself anything.

During the events dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the Stakhanov movement, it was ordered to find Stakhanov himself and make a report about him. Petrov, the party organizer who made Stakhanov a star, by that time was still cheerful and active, he also helped to find Stakhanov. However, the former miner barely recognized Petrov and began to wonder if he had a drink. Having received a negative answer, he began to expel those who came.

Just like that, they did not lag behind Stakhanov, they washed him, dressed up and took him to the honoring of the miners. After that, they tried not to lose sight of the aged leader of production, they took it on bail and did not allow him to finally get drunk. He often met with young people and industry leaders. A couple of months after his death, the city in which he lived was renamed in his honor.

Despite the fact that the work of Stakhanov himself can be called shock, he made a huge contribution to the development of the coal industry, at least by the fact that he was an excellent motivator for thousands of ordinary miners, stood at the origins of the Stakhanov movement and how he could try to bear this burden … Even if not everything was up to him.