Photos from the "old days"
- Thread starter DLD
- Start date
The Soviet Union was officially dissolved on December, 25th, 1991, as Mikhail Gorbachev resigned from his post of the President of the USSR and lowered the red Communist Party banner off the Kremlin Tower. This was taken yesterday in Moscow, as Russia was hosting an annual hockey tournament. As an old French adage goes, “plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose".
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A little known Leningrad magazine called "Aurora" (named after the eponymous light cruiser that fired the first shot at the Winter Palace in the 1917 communist coup and subsequently been turned into a memorial) on Leonid Brezhnev's 75th birthday in 1981 and the reprint of one of Brezhnev's speeches. The implied connotation of the Soviet leader "going downhill" forced the local Communist Party office, which controlled the publishing in general and of this magazine in particular, to recall the issue and destroy all the copies.
Yelena (or Elena) Mukhina, 1960-2006, the 1978 World Gymnastic champion from Minsk. She first broke her leg in a dismount but was forced to train anyway. Then she fell down on a spiral flip due to her inability to push off at full strength and broke her neck, spending the next 25 years of her life as a quadriplegic.
Vladislav Listyev began as a journalist during the mid-80s perestroika, exploring themes previously forbidden in the USSR. Toward the 90's, the state television had no one to host the Russian version of the Wheel of Fortune and asked him to "temporarily" take the job. Listyev became so popular, he added several more shows to his list and, under Boris Yeltsin, was appointed as the head of a main television channel half-owned by the state, with a financial participation in the project. Unfortunately for him, he began to clash with oligarchs and organized crime groups that skimmed the advertising funds. Listyev was assassinated by a gunman on March, 1, 1995 at the age of 38.
The end of the 1980's brought almost a complete absence of the state control over broadcast or print and making money became the primary goal. One of the top attraction was a "faith healer" Anatoly Kashpirovsky, who claimed to cure people via their TV sets. Those who believed the idea of state communism for their entire lives found his shtick quite convincing.
The Soviets ripped off the Keds design and manufactured them together with the Chinese under the brand name Two Balls. These were quite popular and fairly inexpensive @ 4 rubles compared to the cross training athletic shoes (aka krossovki). On the "Disliked it in the USSR" Facebook page, someone brought up the topic again yesterday and so I asked about the private market prices - they weren't sold at the government run stores - for the popular footwear brands such as those sold in the US of the 1980's - Nike, Adidas, Puma, Reebok, Converse, etc. The replies were that the most popular brands - Nike, Adidas, Reebok - were going for up to 250 rubles per pair. That's when an average engineer was making about 150 rub a month.
NorBro
Major Contributor
There were a lot of different brands that resembled those converse-like shoes...that's all anyone wore for like 20 years after their popularity grew.
As far as the other major brands, those countries sold a lot of Nikas or Reebooks, etc (not the exact names but you get the point), and I don't think, quite frankly, any of the people, especially the less wealthier families, knew the difference.
You probably had to have a television to know what's up...and even then.
As far as the other major brands, those countries sold a lot of Nikas or Reebooks, etc (not the exact names but you get the point), and I don't think, quite frankly, any of the people, especially the less wealthier families, knew the difference.
You probably had to have a television to know what's up...and even then.
I was a victim ... or a beneficiary ... of one of those "brands". Back in 1977, we reestablished contact with my grandmother's sisters, who emigrated to Palestine from Poland in 1926. Immediately, I began to clamor for blue jeans. But they weren't coming for a long time. Finally, we got a package in August of 1978, about three weeks after filing documents for immigration (not sure if the two events were related). Inside the package were Levi's jeans (size 42, when I was size 31, so they fit my mom's tush perfectly .... except she never asked for them), a Levi's collared shirt and two T-shirts for me, Adidos and Puma. Puma was legitimate, Adidos was Adidos. I figured out that, if I had left the top two buttons on my fall jacket open, only the letters "Adi" were visible and that was enough. (mine had the small logo on the left side of the chest)
NorBro
Major Contributor
The bottom of that logo is missing the 3 pieces...
This brings back memories though because I always used to rock new Nikes over there every summer and everyone was so amazed they were from "America".
I told you the story before how I went to purchase a Will Smith tape back in the 90s and it was a white guy rapping with an accent. [Russian - Polish - Ukrainian - probably one of those, sounded like it.]
I was a kid and I was really perplexed at why this exists and is happening. Just didn't make sense to me at the time.
The bootlegs in America that I knew were lower-quality copies of the actual work, not someone else recreating everything.
This brings back memories though because I always used to rock new Nikes over there every summer and everyone was so amazed they were from "America".
I told you the story before how I went to purchase a Will Smith tape back in the 90s and it was a white guy rapping with an accent. [Russian - Polish - Ukrainian - probably one of those, sounded like it.]
I was a kid and I was really perplexed at why this exists and is happening. Just didn't make sense to me at the time.
The bootlegs in America that I knew were lower-quality copies of the actual work, not someone else recreating everything.
In 1976, my mom took me to Moscow for two weeks of sightseeing. Our relatives left us their apartment, as they rented a cabin in the country (no hotels, at that time, to speak of). One day we dropped by GUM, the main and sole indoor mall in the whole of the USSR. There, at the entry into a records store, some dude offered me a Slade record for 5 rub.
I was 14 then - just turned 60 ... wow .. I just turned 60, a week ago - but knew my music market. An actual Slade - or Deep Purple or Pink Floyd - record was worth about 70 rub on the "black market". I declined and he walked away. And the record probably wasn't some Russian guy singing "Come on, feel the noise" but a Brezhnev speech in a fake wrapper.
I was 14 then - just turned 60 ... wow .. I just turned 60, a week ago - but knew my music market. An actual Slade - or Deep Purple or Pink Floyd - record was worth about 70 rub on the "black market". I declined and he walked away. And the record probably wasn't some Russian guy singing "Come on, feel the noise" but a Brezhnev speech in a fake wrapper.
Doktorskaq kolbasa (Doctor's Sausage, the Soviet version of a typical American prewar bologna), a staple of the USSR diet ... if one could find it at a supermarket, which wasn't always the case. As time went on, the quality of the ingredients took a major hit and its taste became barely distinguishable from the paper wrapper, in which it was sold. The name soldiers on.
