In 1930 in the village of Novonikolaevka (Vladimrovsky district of the Astrakhan region) the collective farm "Plow and Hammer" was created.
Now it is very interesting to get acquainted with the statements of the Novonikolaevites. They, these yellowed leaves, covered with a far from calligraphic handwriting (few people at that time were literate) seem to take us to Novonikolaevka eighty years ago.
"And I always went to work as a drummer on the basis of collective farm reinforcement …"
The time at that time was such that if you did not join the collective farm, then it seemed as if you dropped out of the general course of life. Therefore, sometimes and not experiencing a keen desire to become collective farmers, people still turned to the management with a request to be accepted into the collective farm. But it was not there. One was not listed among the poor, the other did not pass what was put in the semifond, the third was suspected of political unreliability … And they were refused. And people wrote statements over and over again.
“I hereby ask the members of your collective farm to receive me, I ask you not to refuse. Devkin Grigory Alekseevich, December 22, 1932.
The general collective farm meeting decided: to refuse Devkin. Exactly one month later, in January thirty-third, Devkin again writes a statement.
“I ask gr. collective farmers, take me to the collective farm in view of the fact that I fell asleep, in view of the family of 3 souls, by stratification I am a poor man, I do not have a horse, but I undertake to contribute as much money as the village council charged. For this I will sign - Devkin."
This time Devkin and his family were accepted into the collective farm.
Promotional video:
“I, citizen Zhigulina Evdokia Ivanovna, ask you to accept me on the collective farm with the whole family. My family is my mother Daria Vasilievna and brother Ivan Ivanovich. And we want to work on the collective farm. I am listed as a poor man by stratification, and I have one cow and a bull of 3 years old and 3 sheep. December 21, 1932.
On the application there is a note of acceptance and the entry: "Property on the collective farm."
“At the present time I am asking the collective farm board to accept me on the collective farm, since I worked in the fishing industry, but now I wish to be a collective farmer and ask you not to refuse. I have two eaters. I myself am 55 years old, my wife is 54 years old. What I will sign. Zhuvagin Kupriyan Ivanovich. 1933.
Resolution: "Refuse as a decomposer of collective farm construction."
Konstantin Nikiforovich Sidorenko also asked to join the collective farm. He was denied due to non-fulfillment of supplies to the Semfond. On February 8, 1933, he writes to the board:
"I fall asleep seeds, although not completely, but as much as I can, because I did not plow, did not plant (previously Sidorenko worked in production), and what I will earn on the collective farm, I will hand over to the seed fund."
In January the thirty-third decided to join the collective farm and 27-year-old Ivan Andreevich Menshakov with his wife Ekaterina Panteleevna. They had four children - starting with 6-year-old Raisa and ending with six-month-old Nikolai.
The resolution was imposed vague: "To refuse on the basis of the decision of the Presidium of the KraiZU." I wonder how the fate of the tiny failed collective farmer Nikolai developed? Perhaps the longest statement was written by Ivan Nikolaevich Lipchansky. At first, they did not take him to the collective farmers either, and he tried to justify himself in his statement and again asked to join the collective farm.
“I, an ordinary member of the Plow and Hammer collective farm, who joined in 1931, where I handed over my property to the stratification of a low-powered middle peasant. When he joined the collective farm, he was always a conscientious worker, as evidenced by the Bassoli certificate (card of the drummer of the grinding and transport department of Bassoltrest for breakfast, lunch and dinner for November 1932). During the whole time I was not among the lagging collective farmers, but always went to work as a shock worker on the basis of collective farm strengthening.
For a period of time, due to his inexperience, he could fall under the supervision of the Vladimirovsky regional OGPU, which saw classless crime, but released me. This oversight of my unforeseen act of guilt influenced the finding of grain to fill the seed pool.
At present, my farm consists of 6 people, of whom I am a worker, one is able to work. Before joining the collective farm, I did not have a class origin, since I left my father in 1927, worked as an independent worker, as a number of witnesses can testify to. The misunderstanding on my part, in my sense, in fact, cannot serve as damage to anything. Before and recently I have found that it is impossible to live without an ordinary collective farmer, and therefore I ask the board, if you find any crime of mine, to forgive me with a warning in the future, to rank me among the comrades of collective farmers. March 23, 1933"
On letterheads, posters and certificates
What the statements are written on is also noteworthy. It was difficult with paper in those years, and the reverse side of various forms, certificates, statements was used for applications … The forms, for example, were as follows: "Information about the hotel of cows", "About the shipment of wagons", "Work plan of the fruit and vegetable commodity farm for the harvesting period ".
The village council's certificate issued to Mark Yegorovich Rudikov is written on a piece of a target poster used by the Osoviakhimites at that time. In another case, leaflets about the development of children's technical creativity, a stub of a cash receipt, a poster-instruction for the processing of fur-bearing animal skins, a poster "Who and How Fights for the Development of Collective Farm Trade" "And even the reverse side of the eerie document" Inventory of property for non-payment of a single agricultural tax."
Almost ninety years have passed. Novonikolaevka can still be found on the district map. The local collective farm was renamed many times, but for the longest time it bore the name of Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin. The team has almost always been the most advanced in the area. The collective farmers were lucky to have the chairmen, they kept the farm properly, they treated people with respect. Now, instead of collective farmers, farmers are working on this land. You can't say anything bad about them either. The land loves care, and it doesn't care who its owner is - a collective farmer or a private owner.