“Houses grew like in a fairy tale", the method of ‘people's construction’ in the Gorky region in the 1950s

The article reveals the history of the emergence and development of the method of “people's construction” in the Gorky region. The sources of personal origin (memoirs of the construction participants), which are currently in the fonds of Nizhny Novgorod archives (first of all, the State Socio-Political Archive of Nizhny Novgorod Region) and museums (the Museum of the History of GAZ OAO), were widely used in the preparation of the article. These documents make it possible to reconstruct vividly and figuratively, using specific examples, and reveal in an accessible form one of the most interesting and little-known pages of the Soviet history of the post-war period. The topic of “people's construction” is presented for the first time in such a source perspective. The sources are first introduced into a wide scientific turnover, which also determines the novelty of the research. Methodologically, the article is built on the principles of historicism and scientific objectivity. With the help of numerous examples the process of development of “people's construction” at various enterprises of the Gorky region in 1954-1958 and its further prospects is shown through the eyes of eyewitnesses. The pioneer and initiator of the method was the Gorky automobile plant. The peculiarities of the method of “people's construction” in construction, production, financial, personnel, social plans are revealed. The results of the implementation of this unique initiative of the citizens of Gorky region are shown, expressed in the actual solution by many enterprises of the housing problem for their workers and employees by the early 1960s. The material of the article is of undoubted interest from the point of view of studying the experience of resource saving, lean production and organization of zero-waste type of production. The text gives many examples of achieving this goal on the materials of different enterprises of the Gorky region. The article presents the housing and living context of the living conditions of Soviet workers in the second half of the 1950s. The sources allow us to reconstruct the perception of events (the housing problem, the construction of housing through the method of “people's construction”, the labor participation of workers in this process, the new apartments and settlements themselves, etc.) by citizens, which allows us to reconstruct a fragment of the picture of Soviet public consciousness of the first postwar decades. “People's construction” allowed to noticeably reduce the acuteness of the housing problem among workers and employees of enterprises of the Gorky region, and at a number of enterprises - to solve it by the early 1960s. The history of construction development shows a unique experience of realization (and support) of public initiative, which reveals the Soviet society of the second half of the XX century in a somewhat new way.