Figure 1.--Images like this provide insights to Soviet life, but also many interesting questions. The children look to be about 1-9 years old. It is clearly a warm day, presumably summer. The children do not lookmlike they are dressed for school. They are wearing light clothes, the boy a singlet, but black long stockings more associated with winter wear. Also notice the books. That seems strange, to bring books along on an outing. Perhaps the photograph was taken just after school. We do not know about Soviet libraries. Perhaps the books were purchases in a market. Click on the omage to see the writing on the back, we believe the names.
Images like this provide insights to Sobiet life, but also many interesting questions. This is a family portrait taken during the summer at a make-shift studio. We see mother with her four children. We do not know where father was. As this looks like a studio set up, father presumably did not take the portrait. Perhaps at work, but mother also probably worked, so this must be day off and a family outing. This would have been taken just before Stalin introduced the 'continuous working week' (the 'nepreryvka'), an 11-year experiment that ultimately failed. The children look to be about 1-9 years old. It is clearly a warm day, presumably summer. The children do not look like they are dressed for school. The boy's had was the most popular style in the Soviet Union at the time--a kind of woirker's styke. We are not sure what the girl's headwear is. They are wearing light clothes, the boy a singlet, but black long stockings more associated with winter wear. Also notice the books. That seems strange, to bring books along on an outing. Perhaps the photograph was taken just after school. We do not know about Soviet libraries. Perhaps the books were purchases in a market. Which leads us to another issue. Stalin by 1929 was in control of the Soviet satate and had ended Lenin's New Economic Program (NEP). This meant that all productive enterprises had to be owned by the sate. We assume this meant even very basic operatiins like this make-shift studio. We do not think this was the father's set up, because camera ownwership was not widespread and this does not look like an especially prosperous family.
