Kaliningrad – an ambivalent transnational region within a European-Russian scope. Evgeniy ChernyshevЧитать онлайн книгу.
of the 1950s. Life in the province was marked by a «method of rotation». Such shifting of population has formed a kind of psychology with a sense of temporality that to some extent stuck in the mentality of Kaliningradians152.
The city as a space for a new community of people would reflect the socio-economic development. However, the nature of the urban population of the Kaliningrad region in the early 1950s had a significant qualitative difference from the average Soviet indicators. There was a significant mix of rural and urban population in regional cities and villages in Kaliningrad Oblast. This leads to difficulties in adapting to unusual way and pace of life, and most importantly, to the other types of employment and professional occupation not typical for the average Soviet city.
The surprising fact: up to one third of the population of towns was engaged in natural household. It means that share of households and small farms of individual property in urban areas were somehow comparable to their share in villages. Lifestyle of urban residents was partly associated with agricultural work – about a third of urban households had a so-called «dacha», where they grew fruits and vegetables for their own consumption.
Migration flows, frequent change of residence, significant social disruption, and the complexity of development of the new territory led to the above-mentioned consequences. The song «Kaliningrad, my city, my garden» was very popular during the Soviet period. The distinction between town and country was present somehow conditionally for a long time.
The city did not exist in a typical Soviet sense of this word. By the end of the 1950s, the delay of recovery of the Kaliningrad was so obvious that became the theme for the local press153. On the pages of the official newspaper of the regional committee of the Communist Party «Kaliningradskaja Pravda»: «There are beautiful, well-lighted main street in every Soviet city: in Moscow, the avenue of Gorky; in Leningrad, Nevsky Prospect; and in Kiev, Khreschatyk. The workers love these streets, they are proud of them; these streets are their favourite places of recreation. There are no so far such streets in Kaliningrad. Many streets poorly equipped with lighting. We have some beautiful houses, but we have no streets that are one-piece architectural ensemble, architectural and artistic unity»154. It is obvious that this view expressed the anxiety of both ordinary citizens and party leadership of the city; otherwise, this article could not appear in the newspaper.
Together to build the entire city was the central point of identification of people with new place155: «We are the builders of this city». Not for nothing, in post-Soviet time was established a medal «For participation in the reconstruction of the Kaliningrad Oblast», as recognition for those people who were involved in the recovery of the regional economy and infrastructure. However, in Soviet time, nobody talked about ’restoration»; it was only about the «construction» of a new one. «The German architectural standard should be completely buried in oblivion, as it leads to discouragement of Russian people,» argued the largest regional newspaper «Kaliningradskaja Pravda» on behalf of Kaliningrad builders156. It means that new Soviet society must build a new city of future; this city needs a new art of architecture.
However, the division of the city in the prestigious and non-prestigious areas began to form in the Soviet time early. These areas largely kept pre-war urban planning, as well as historic architecture, parks, and gardens. In addition, there remained elements of the exterior of the old city, such as cobbled roads.
In general, Kaliningrad is a typical example of the division of s urban habitat in the Soviet Union, but it retained a number of local features such as the pre-war urban planning with clear local demarcation. During the war, the central part of the city was largely destroyed, so there was no integrity of the urban centre.
The city of Kaliningrad had to play a role of extension of the entire Soviet Union. That psychological and physical experience had to be associated with macro-national Soviet identity. The process of the reconstruction of the city was dominated by the construction of standardized Soviet-style modernist structures, new street layouts, and insertion of public spaces that are typical of many other cities of the Soviet Union. City planners viewed the wartime destruction of the city as an opportunity to disregard historical «layer» of urban space: This approach was related to the ideological concept of complete historical discontinuity between Königsberg and Kaliningrad157. Newcomers after the war did not feel a sense of belonging to the place and they had no sense of belonging together158.
The establishment of the «Soviet man» has required a feeling of belonging to a certain group of people, and this feeling was weak in Kaliningrad. The authorities knew it. Therefore, the city of Kaliningrad was chosen as the centre to establish a new society, which itself would create its place from scratch. The city of Kaliningrad became the centre of attraction of the population. From 1959 (first Soviet census) to 1989 (last Soviet census), the number of residents increased gradually, and it eventually doubled from 200,000 to 400,000159. It should be emphasized that up to the present time the growth of Kaliningrad population never has a negative dynamics.
2. 3. Generational change and perception of cultural and historical heritage: Change in cultural paradigm
2. 3.1. Primary perception of a new territory
The frame of perception of East Prussia as a territory with its own history and unique features was determined during the war. «Public opinion» of the Soviet people, mentioned in 1943160, was formed gradually as it evidenced by the rhetoric of official propaganda. The main medium of «public opinion» had to come from soldiers and officers of the Red Army, as they were the first who physically confronted with a new cultural and historical landscape. These people had to be important reporters of the official discourse.
Crossing the border of East Prussia, the Red Army were able visually to perceive negative information, which had accompanied them all the way to Königsberg. There were posters with similar content near the border pillars: «Warriors of the Red Army! You stand in front of the lair of the fascist beast!» Apart from Königsberg, no other German city was perceived as the concentration of aggressive and revanchist spirit. The first published literature explained in simple language the image of East Prussia161.
The newspaper «Pravda», as official media of the Communist Party, almost immediately after the assault on Königsberg voiced an official point of view in the article «The Fall of Königsberg»: «The history of Königsberg is a history of crime of Germany. Entire history of the city was full of plunder, and another life was unknown»162. This ideological axiom was supposed to be some sort of code for the perception of history and culture of the province.
The war was the auspicious background for the perception of such propaganda. Therefore, it was relative easy task to establish the corresponding mood among participants of hostilities, who have seen the enemy face to face.
A special «semi-closed» status of the Kaliningrad Oblast played role of positive background for official propaganda. On 29 June 1946, almost simultaneously with the decision to establish the Kaliningrad Oblast, a secret decree of the Soviet government was issued. This decree classified the entire territory of the Oblast as «closed border zone». The access to the area was allowed only with permission issued by the militia163.
Conservation of negative perception of the area among newly arrived migrants was a more complicated task. It required
Kostjashov, Juri: «Obratnichestvo» v processe zaselenija Kaliningradskoj oblasti v poslevojennye gody, In: Baltijckij region v istorii Rossija i Europy. Kaliningrad 2005, p. 211—219.
Hoppe, Bert: Op. cit., p. 150.
Zastroit i blagoystroit, Kaliningradskaja Pravda, 6 February 1954.
Sezneva, Olga: Modalities of Self-understanding, Identification and Representation in the Post-1991 Kaliningrad. A Critical View, In: Kaliningrad in Europe: Perspectives from inside and outside. Lüneburg 2010, p. 42.
Stroiteli, Kaliningradskaja Pravda, 1 May 1948.
Sezneva, Olga: Op. cit., p. 43.
Ibid., p. 41.
Data of the USSR census of 1959 and 1989.
Sovetskij Sojuz na mezhdynarodnych konferencijach perioda Velikoj Otechestvennoj voiny 1941—1945. Мoscow 1978. Vol. 1, p. 183.
Glebov, V.: Vostochnaja Prussia: Kratkij spravochnik. Moscow 1944.
Padenie Königsberga, Pravda, 13 April 1945.
Kostjashov, Juri: Sekretnye dokumenty otdela spezposelenij MVD USSR o zaselenii Kaliningradskoj oblasti v 1946. In: Problemy istochnikovedenija i istoriografii. Kaliningrad 1999, p. 64—67.