How the New Year was celebrated in the USSR, and how it differs from the modern one. The history of celebrating the New Year in the USSR When they began to celebrate the New Year in the USSR

Snow made of cotton wool, a Christmas tree on a cross, shooting streamers and other holiday attributes originally from the Soviet Union

Deputy of the Supreme Council of the RSFSR, communist Andrei Mikhailovich Chepelev, his wife Zoya Vasilyevna, a kindergarten teacher, son Volodya and daughter Tanya during preparation for the New Year. 1985

New Year's Eve is one of the main holidays of the Soviet people. They prepared for the celebrations in advance and very carefully: the New Year was celebrated by all levels of society and representatives of all nationalities.

Now it seems that the New Year has always been celebrated. In fact, in the Soviet Union the Presidium decided to celebrate it only in 1947. At the same time, January 1 was declared a day off. Until this moment, the communists argued that “only those who are friends of the priests are ready to celebrate the Christmas tree.” Nevertheless, after the war, the holiday of the church Gregorian calendar was returned to Soviet citizens: a celebration, completely alien to the ideology of the party, entered into the everyday life of Soviet people. Thus was born a grandiose contradiction, which, having become accustomed to, the people laid the foundation for Soviet New Year's magical realism - and the most controversial holiday became a favorite for the entire country.

The second day of the New Year became a non-working day only in 1992, and the five-day New Year holidays, which together with Christmas form the long January weekend, appeared in 2004. Since then, many Russians began to leave in all directions, instead of gathering with the whole family at the festive table with Olivier salad and herring under a fur coat.

Christmas tree

The Samorodsky family of engineers and their guests listen to an address by US President Ronald Reagan, broadcast on Soviet television. 1988 (Photo: Alexander Konkov/TASS Photo Chronicle)

Buying a Christmas tree in the USSR was a troublesome task: too many lopsided or flat specimens were found at Christmas tree markets. However, buying a Christmas tree is only half the battle, because installation required time and effort. Someone knocked down a wooden cross with a hammer, in the middle of which a tree was attached, and someone filled an ordinary bucket with bricks and sand to fix the trunk. Then the bucket was wrapped in a white sheet, and sometimes cotton wool was laid out. On the resulting “snow” they placed Father Frost and the Snow Maiden made of papier-mâché - in paper outfits and with rosy cheeks.

After this came the most joyful part of the preparation. A garland with light bulbs, large balls and small toys were hung on the Christmas tree. Then the tree was abundantly decorated with tinsel and rain. All that remained was to apply the final touch - to attach the top, the most popular option of which was the red Kremlin star.

Kristina Dikova, director of Florista:

- In the Soviet Union there was not much choice - New Year's trees were bought at Christmas tree markets. These trees were not always beautiful, but they were guaranteed to spread a pine smell throughout the house, which, mixed with the aromas of tangerines and salads, created a festive atmosphere. Many made do with artificial trees. Often, plastic Christmas trees were stored on mezzanines for decades, and once a year they were dressed in garlands made by the skillful father of the family from small light bulbs. The trees were decorated with walnuts wrapped in foil, snowflakes and garlands cut out of colored paper, as well as glass toys, rain and tinsel. A live spruce was placed in a bucket of water so that it would stand longer and needles would fall off less.

Now there are fluffy pines on sale; if you wish, you can buy blue spruce or fir. A tendency has emerged to decorate the house with coniferous trees in flowerpots: on New Year's Eve they are decorated with toys and garlands, and after the holiday they are kept on the loggia. Some species can be planted in open ground at the dacha in the spring, and southern trees can be left in the apartment as house plants. In the 21st century, florist designers make special winter bouquets and table arrangements from pine needles, tangerines, pine cones, nuts, berries and candles. Wreaths made from fir branches with decorations that can be hung on walls or doors are gaining popularity.

New Year's decor and outfits

Old-timer Makariev Ivan Efremovich Buyanov (in the foreground) during preparations for the New Year celebration with his family. Kostroma region. 1989 (Photo: TASS Photo Chronicle)

The main characters of New Year's decor in the USSR were traditionally garlands and rain; whenever possible, windows were decorated with colored light bulbs. A technological innovation of the 1980s was the so-called light music - a garland that was connected to the TV so that it blinked in time with the sounds of the air. There was not much music on television, so often the garlands continued to flash in unison with the speeches of the Politburo members.

In terms of clothing, Soviet people were very sensitive to the New Year. Women bought dresses and had their hair done in advance - as a result, in December, the permanent shortage of clothes in stores experienced a seasonal aggravation, and in hairdressers there was a crush and confusion. Sometimes, for haircuts and styling, women stood in lines, worrying about the fate of the hot dishes - by that time the salads were already ready and waiting for the holiday on the balconies along with the cakes. There was not enough space for all the treats in small Soviet refrigerators.

For matinees in schools and kindergartens, children's costumes were sewn independently. Those who were especially skilled had a chance to make an impression: children in intricate outfits immediately caught the eye among the snowflakes and bunnies that looked alike. Mother's fur collars went on the foxes' tails, and a girl in an unusual costume could feel like a prom queen. On this day, children were allowed to dye and curl their hair, and the highlight of the matinees were masks made of painted papier-mâché. These artifacts have now become collector's items. The eerie fake faces of fairy tale heroes made an indelible impression: children wearing goat, fly agaric or Cipollino masks looked especially strange.

Alexander Korolev, head of the Alexander Korolev architectural bureau:

— In the 40-50s of the last century, mass production of holiday attributes was not established. This had a positive effect on the aesthetics of the toys: the decorations were handmade. Christmas tree decorations were produced by the artisan method, hand-painted, and natural materials were used - cotton wool and beads. At one time, there were even toys in the form of birds with real feathers.

In the 70s - the era of general standardization - the production of holiday paraphernalia was put on an assembly line and the country was filled with standard toys. In every house one could find a standard set: plastic snowflakes, Santa Claus, silver rain, shiny balls and a Christmas tree spire. Many people were looking for holiday sets from the GDR: such sets were different from their domestic counterparts and added variety to the usual holiday decoration. To give the decor a homely feel, Soviet citizens glued lanterns and garlands, cut out snowflakes, and mastered the art of origami.

From the 40s to the 70s, houses had mostly natural Christmas trees. The first artificial versions were made from rough plastic; they were expensive and did not look very aesthetically pleasing. In the early 80s, more sophisticated polyethylene options began to appear. It was considered the greatest luxury to get a silver artificial Christmas tree that looked like rain.

Special effects and postcards

Steelmaker Fedor Zakirov and his family on New Year's Eve. 1984 (Photo: Boris Klipinitser/TASS Photo Chronicle)

Fireworks on New Year's Eve could only be seen on Red Square - or on TV. However, Soviet people had their own recipes for creating special effects. The most New Year's lights were sparklers: they tried to light them before the solemn countdown of the last seconds of the outgoing year. At midnight, the general rejoicing was reinforced by soaring streamers of streamers and explosions of firecrackers, from which confetti scattered. Small plastic figures flew out; children immediately rushed to the floor to find them.

Nowadays, confetti is also used at holidays, but more often they fly out of special cannons, blasters and ceiling installations. Types and shapes have also evolved: modern confetti varies from foil squares and artificial snow to multi-colored leaves, hearts and stars. Alas, not all popular Soviet special effects have survived: paper percussion caps and toy pistols that loudly fired these percussion caps disappeared along with the firecracker figures.

Another indispensable attribute of the New Year is holiday cards, which were signed by the whole family and sent by mail. This phenomenon is partly due to the institution of distribution: after graduating from universities, graduates dispersed to different cities of the Soviet Union, spreading relatives throughout the country. Children signed cards for their grandparents, mothers and fathers, and decades later these artifacts became a source of joy at family gatherings. A collection of cards over the years was often stored in candy boxes. The images on the postcards were Soviet and life-affirming. In one of the popular stories, Father Frost's sleigh drove through Red Square against the backdrop of the Kremlin; in 1980, the Olympic Bear was next to Grandfather. Other humanized animals also became the heroes of the drawings: hares, wolves, foxes and birds surrounded by winter landscapes.

Maria Nikolaeva, head of the MAD Architects bureau:

— Among the postcards there were real masterpieces: sometimes they were drawn by famous artists and animators. Now such postcards occupy pride of place in collections of Soviet-era art.

The heyday of the Soviet postcard occurred in the 50-60s of the 20th century. The most spectacular and stylish were the series dedicated to the space theme. On one of the postcards, a Soviet rocket is carrying a New Year's tree to Venus, on another, a cosmonaut drinks on the moon with the Moon, on the third, boys in spacesuits dance around a tree in outer space. Santa Claus racing on a sleigh with a rocket, a boy flying astride a satellite - there was a lot of absurdity and naive optimism in the drawings, but this is precisely the secret of their charm.

Festive feast

Workers of the Baku Household Air Conditioners Plant (from right to left) engineer Tariel Hajiyev with his son Sanan, his wife Zeinab and their mothers Sabiga Hajiyeva and Gulara Guliyeva during the New Year celebration in a new apartment. 1984 (Photo: Becker Abram, Tavakalov Albert/TASS Photo Chronicle)

They began preparing for the main holiday in advance: Soviet families bought sausage and looked for scarce canned food - green peas, sprats, cod liver, squid and krill for salads. On New Year's Eve, folding holiday tables were opened in the rooms, families solemnly sat down between the wall-slide and a large carpet on the opposite wall. You could hear the clinking of crystal and the festive sounds of the New Year's “Ogonyok” on TV.

On the table there was always a vase with Abkhaz tangerines, a box of chocolates, “Soviet” champagne, Olivier salad, as well as options for puff fish dishes: “Mimosa” or herring under a fur coat. Vinaigrette, beet and carrot salads were prepared less frequently. The free space between the main courses was occupied by plates of homemade pickles: they were relevant not only because they were good for snacking on vodka, but also because fresh vegetables were only available in season. It was believed that the New Year's table should be bursting with food - in this case, abundance in the house would remain for the whole year.

These days, the return of religion and the association with Christmas are gradually introducing changes to the holiday menu. Those observing the Nativity fast abstain from meat, fish, dairy products, eggs and alcohol. And although this cannot be called a mass phenomenon, the holiday table becomes less heavy on the stomach. With the collapse of party ideology, Christian motifs began to return to New Year's design - for example, winged angels. And the star in the minds of Russians began to transform from the Kremlin to Bethlehem - a symbol of the birth of Jesus Christ. The long weekend finally connected the calendar New Year with the Christmas holiday. Nevertheless, such an essentially anti-Soviet holiday is still associated primarily with the USSR - after all, it was in this country that modern Russians learned to truly celebrate the New Year widely.

With the participation of Ekaterina Aistova

It would seem that the New Year is such a familiar and traditional holiday to Russians that for many centuries it has been celebrated in exactly the same way, as is customary in modern families. But in fact, even over the course of the last century alone, traditions have changed several times, and if you look at the celebrations in different decades in a little more detail, this difference will simply catch your eye. So, let’s take a short historical excursion and find out how the last days of the old year were spent and how our great-grandmothers, grandmothers and parents met their future.

New Year 1910s

If nowadays people strive to spend this holiday at home and with their family, then during this period every more or less wealthy person sought to take his family out into the world, to celebrate the holiday in society, in a restaurant, for example. Seats were taken in advance both in theaters and in restaurants. There was a huge excitement around public pre-holiday life. No one sat at home - people went out into the world, met their friends and loved ones, exchanged congratulations and gifts...

New Year 1920s

It was in 1920 that the “red” authorities banned the New Year, declaring this holiday, beloved by children and adults, exclusively “bourgeois” and religious. However, they did not stop celebrating it at all - people began to do it with their families, in a calm and almost secretive atmosphere, with traditional congratulations and gifts, especially for children. But without Christmas trees and social events. Those on duty these days walked along the city streets, and even looked into the windows of people's houses to determine if there were any violators among them.

New Year 1930s

Until 1935, the holiday remained banned, but the traditions did not dry out, and therefore by this date it was returned to people again. This year, Christmas trees officially appeared on the streets again, and factories began producing Christmas tree toys and decorations. The holiday has returned even to schools and kindergartens. But now no one even thought of considering it religious; on the contrary, the New Year became, as it were, a “party” event. For the first two years, people were still afraid of noisy celebrations, remembering the repressive measures, and greeted the holiday with caution, but then they forgot about the old ban, and everything returned to normal.

New Year 1940s

The New Year tree finally “passed into the service” of the Soviet regime. After all, even in appearance it was similar to the Kremlin with its five-pointed star, and now it has firmly become a symbol of the new system. But soon the war broke out, and people had no time for holidays, although modestly, as much as possible, the New Year was celebrated even in besieged Leningrad and in the difficult post-war years too. The best products were set aside for the holiday and at least something was prepared that could be presented as a gift to loved ones. There were no holidays celebrated at the factories - there was no time for that, it was necessary to raise the country from its knees. Only in 1947 was the first day of the year declared an official holiday.

New Year 1950s

But in the 50s, television appeared in most Soviet families, and traditions began to change radically. Now this device has become an indispensable holiday attribute along with New Year's programs and films. It was precisely this holiday that film premieres were usually timed, and the most striking example was “Carnival Night.” Despite the deficit and the rather difficult economic situation of the country, everyone tried to set the table as richly as possible and “get” more valuable gifts for loved ones.

New Year 1960s

Traditions remained approximately the same as in the previous decade. People bought food for the New Year's table in advance; women usually sewed evening dresses themselves, as well as costumes for children's matinees. There were Christmas tree markets in all large and small cities, and some enterprises helped employees purchase everything they needed for the celebration, in particular food, champagne and even delicacies.

New Year 1970s

By the end of the 60s, mass production of toys for decorating the New Year tree was established, and by the 70s it was possible to buy mass-produced simplified plastic versions, usually with Soviet symbols. By the mid-70s, the commodity shortage within the country became more acute, and many products that in the past appeared on New Year's tables had to be forgotten.

But a film appeared, which is still a television decoration for the New Year's table - "The Irony of Fate."

New Year 1980s

During these years, new musical trends appeared, and new fashion trends, and new toys, and, naturally, new traditions of celebrating the New Year among young people - they preferred cheerful mass discos at restaurants, clubs or in houses of culture. Middle-aged people sought to maintain the home traditions of the holiday that had developed in the previous post-war decades.

New Year 1990s

The holidays of this period remain in the memory of many modern people. Those who had money tried to richly set the table at home, send children to matinees and give expensive gifts. But some people didn’t have all this... However, no matter what the New Year’s table was, people came out en masse to the Christmas trees in the squares after the New Year, and the fun continued almost until the morning right on the streets.

New Year 2000s

The advent of the new millennium brought with it new trends: for example, official New Year and Christmas holidays appeared in Russia, lasting up to two weeks. Fireworks, firecrackers, firecrackers, and fireworks have everywhere replaced traditional firecrackers with confetti. Sparklers have become more diverse. Most Russians continue to celebrate the New Year according to established traditions - at home, with family and friends, but many prefer New Year's tours to distant countries.

So, despite all the political and economic upheavals, the New Year's Eve remained as cheerful and festive as it was a hundred years ago.

For Soviet people, this was a special, most long-awaited holiday. They started preparing for it back in the summer. Although the main elements of a home holiday have been preserved from Soviet times, in those days preparing the New Year in the traditional form was almost heroic, and many now remember with nostalgia that painstaking work.

They prepared for the New Year in the USSR long before it arrived: due to the fact that it was difficult to get food, everything they needed was bought several months in advance and carefully stored until the right moment. It’s hard to imagine now, but in order to get the main ingredients, for example, Olivier salad, you had to try hard: there was no mayonnaise, green peas, or sausage on the open market—they started stocking up in October. With great difficulty, they also obtained the main drink of the holiday - Soviet champagne.

So we also decided to prepare in advance and remember in a nostalgic selection how it was.

At first, New Year was not an official public holiday, but most families traditionally celebrated it along with Christmas, and the holiday was considered a family holiday.

For the first time, the New Year was officially celebrated only at the end of 1936, after an article by a prominent Soviet figure Pavel Postyshev in the newspaper Pravda.

“Why do our schools, orphanages, nurseries, children's clubs, palaces of pioneers deprive the working children of the Soviet country of this wonderful pleasure? Some, none other than “leftist” killers, denounced this children’s entertainment as a bourgeois undertaking. This wrongful condemnation of the Christmas tree, which is a wonderful entertainment for children, must come to an end. Komsomol members and pioneer workers should organize collective Christmas trees for children on New Year’s Eve. In schools, orphanages, in pioneer palaces, in children's clubs, in children's cinemas and theaters - there should be a children's Christmas tree everywhere! City councils, chairmen of district executive committees, village councils, public education authorities must help organize a Soviet Christmas tree for the children of our great socialist homeland.”

1960 Costumes and Christmas tree decorations reflected the power of the country: divers and cosmonauts on the Kremlin Christmas tree. The first satellite has already been in orbit, but the film “Amphibian Man” has not yet been shot.

Tickets for the New Year's Eve party for children were also difficult to obtain. You also need a gauze snowflake costume or a bunny outfit. The gift, which included caramels, apples, and walnuts, was provided to the parents by the trade union committee. The dream of every child was to go to the main Christmas tree of the country - first in the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions, and after 1954 - to the Kremlin Christmas tree.

Only after the war did the traditions of celebrating the New Year in the USSR begin to truly take shape. Christmas tree decorations began to appear: at first very modest ones - made of paper, cotton wool and other materials, later - beautiful, bright, made of glass, similar to the decorations of pre-revolutionary Christmas trees. By the end of the 1960s, mass production of Christmas tree toys was established, and it was possible to buy fairly simple plastic options, usually with Soviet symbols.

Festive table

We prepared for the holiday in advance. Firstly, you need to buy food - that is, “get it”, stand in hour-long queues, get sprats, caviar, smoked sausage in grocery orders.

Those who had a familiar salesperson in a grocery store could afford cognac for the New Year for 8 rubles 12 kopecks, semi-sweet Sovetskoe champagne, and tangerines.

Or stand in line for a long time, like in this photo.

Outfits and gifts

Every Soviet woman absolutely needed a new fashionable dress - it could be sewn with your own hands or in an atelier, or in rare cases, bought from black marketeers; the store was the last place to find anything.

New Year's gifts are another obstacle for Soviet citizens in the process of preparing for the New Year. There was tension with any goods in the country, and with beautiful goods the situation was even worse, so our parents went to visit, taking champagne, sausage, preferably Cervelat, canned exotic fruits (pineapples), and boxes of chocolates. For the holiday, women were given Soviet perfumes, which were in abundance in stores, and men were given colognes.

“Nothing makes a woman look better than hydrogen peroxide.” - this joke becomes relevant on the eve of every New Year's celebration in the Soviet Union. Even the most fashionable women did not know the phrase “beauty salon” then. People signed up for hairdressing salons several weeks in advance; preparing hair, makeup and the entire “New Year’s look” required Soviet women to have maximum time, ingenuity and independence - sometimes their hair was done by friends.

The last stage of preparation is to wipe (repair) the TV, which, as postman Pechkin claimed, is “the best decoration for the New Year’s table.” “Carnival Night”, “Irony of Fate”, “New Year’s Adventures of Masha and Viti”, “Blue Light”, “Morozko” - Soviet films, programs and cartoons in the morning, without which not a single Soviet citizen could imagine a holiday night.

They were carefully collected by our grandmothers and kept by our mothers. Because for some Soviet citizens, new toys were a luxury, while for others, old Christmas tree balls are associated with good memories and are treasured as a memory. Many toys have become the subject of private collections. People enjoy collecting and exchanging antique New Year's toys and displaying their collections online.

Bright Side presents a selection of Soviet Christmas tree decorations. They are not as bright and elegant as modern ones. But they evoke a warm wave of nostalgia for the times when we believed in Santa Claus and waited for the New Year as if it were a miracle.

Christmas tree decorations contain a special magic. Their fragility, thinness, and golden shine evoke a feeling of fragility and transience. The world can't always be brilliant. The holiday doesn't last forever. So these elegant trinkets reflect bright light for a short time and... again end up in the depths of boxes and cabinets for the whole coming year. Until the new Year...

However, these glass-and-cardboard toys, which are unshakable for us, are, from a historical point of view, very young. Until recently, decorations were different. The wonderful Christmas tree, near which amazing events took place in Hoffmann’s beloved Nutcracker, carried other decorations on its branches. "The large Christmas tree was hung with many golden and silver apples. Candied almonds, colorful candies and other wonderful sweets hung from each branch like buds or flowers."

The first Christmas tree decorations were edible. Candies in silver-golden wrappers, curly gingerbread cookies, waffles, cookies, nuts, apples, tangerines, pears, grapes and even eggs adorned the Christmas tree branches in abundance. Although, if you look into the very depths of centuries, you can see a completely unusual Christmas tree. The ancient Germans were the first to decorate coniferous trees. They used spruce trees for rituals, attached burning candles to their branches and laid colored rags on their fluffy paws.

According to one version, the custom of using a Christmas tree as a Christmas tree was born in the first half of the 16th century in the territory of modern France, in Alsace. According to another, the first “Christmas” tree was cut down in his garden by the German reformer Martin Luther, impressed by the wondrous glow of the heavenly stars breaking through the spreading spruce branches. He lit candles on his fir tree, which from then on symbolized the stars of the Christmas night.

In addition to candles, the tree began to be decorated with fruits; they represented gifts to the baby Jesus. Apples were the first among fruits, since spruce was considered a tree of paradise that bears fruit. New customs came in the 17th century. As a matter of fact, it was then that the “ancestors” of modern toys appeared. And even though, according to today’s understanding, they were “home-grown”, some of them were not lacking in grace. At first, materials were used that were always at hand - empty eggshells were covered with a thin layer of hammered brass, ordinary fir cones were gilded. The tin wire was rolled up, twisted into a spiral, then flattened to create silver tinsel. Artificial roses were made from paper, stars and snowflakes were cut out from silver foil. Even from sheets of brass, some craftsmen managed to cut out figures of fairies and elves.

Gradually, artificial fruits and sweets made from glass and cotton wool appeared. It is believed that the glass balls that are indispensable on modern spruce trees appeared due to a poor apple harvest. It’s as if there wasn’t a single apple left in the local cellars until Christmas, and the forest beauty would be left without the traditional fruit. But no! Glassblowers in a small German town took a chance and made a replacement - round balls. So in the middle of the 19th century, in 1848, in the town of Lauscha (Thuringia), Christmas tree balls, popular in subsequent years, were born. They were made of transparent or colored glass, coated on the inside with a layer of lead, and decorated on the outside with sparkles. Almost two decades later (1867), a gas plant was opened in Lauscha and large thin-walled balls began to be blown using gas burners with a very high temperature flame. The lead reflective coating was replaced with silver nitrate. Around the same time, glassblowers moved beyond the spheres themselves.
Birds and animals, pipes and bunches of grapes appeared. The finished products were covered with gold and silver dust. Women and children were engaged in coloring. Lausch remained in history as the world's first major manufacturer of Christmas tree decorations.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the “glass toy craft” was picked up by Bohemia, which was then part of Germany. And a new address appeared on the “Christmas tree” map - the city of Jablonec. The Japanese, Poles and Americans mastered this business much later. There was a period when the fashion for decorating the Christmas tree suddenly changed. At the turn of the century, glittery tinsel was relegated to the shelves. A Christmas tree in silver and white tones was welcomed. Later, figurines made of paper, cardboard and straw came into fashion. The factories of Dresden and Leipzig became famous for the production of these toys.

Leipzig was proud of its toys, made of embossed gilded and silver cardboard, which seemed to be made of the thinnest sheet of metal. Dresden - an unprecedented variety of "subjects" - numerous animals, musical instruments, spinning wheels, steamboats and even horse-drawn carriages!

Apparently similar toys decorated the Christmas tree described in the poem by A. N. Pleshcheev.

Toys attract a child's eye...
Here's a horse, there's a top,
Here's the railroad
Here is a hunting horn.
And the lanterns, and the stars,
That diamonds burn
And the nuts are golden,
And transparent grapes!
Christmas decorations in Russia

In Russia, the first toys were German. Later they opened their own production - in St. Petersburg and Klin. In addition to glass, papier-mâché was used - paper pulp mixed with glue, plaster or chalk. Then the products were covered with Berthollet salt, which is why their surface acquired shine and became denser. In the middle of the 19th century, numerous artels proliferated, which began producing garlands and chains made from thin foil in the form of pine needles, long thin threads from the same foil, later nicknamed “rain.”

To make Christmas tree decorations, cardboard and wood, metal sheets, straw and paper were used. Such toys were produced by special cardboard workshops. Cotton toys were very popular. The wire frame was lined with cotton wool, and the dolls' faces were made of papier-mâché or porcelain and painted. Christmas trees were decorated with wax figurines of angels; alas, they were short-lived as they melted from the heat.

In the twentieth century, carved wooden figurines also appeared - they also found a place on hospitable Christmas trees. In some families, the Christmas tree was not only decorated, but also its trunk was “ennobled” - they were wrapped in white paper, cloth or pharmacist’s cotton wool, sprinkled with Berthollet salt. They also “hid” the crosspiece to which the tree was attached.
Practical advice was published for its readers in 1909 by the Niva magazine: “The foot of the Christmas tree can be arranged as follows: lay a cross into which the Christmas tree is embedded, with green moss, dry grass and Christmas tree branches, among which you can put pebbles here and there; then install cardboard ones or cotton mushrooms with a small family, and if among this green pile you put a stuffed hare, which can often be found among children’s toys, then it will be very beautiful under the tree.”

At the end of the 19th century, a new surprise awaited the Christmas tree. English telegraph operator Ralph Morrison decorated it with a garland of electric light bulbs. Here the Americans have already “taken” the championship - the first electric garland decorated the New Year’s tree in front of the White House in 1895.

The XX century, rich in various events, brought new themes for Christmas tree decorations. In the USSR, the crowning Christmas tree “Star of Bethlehem” was replaced by a red five-pointed one with a hammer and sickle. Parachutists and hockey players, a polar bear delivering mail to Arctic explorers, and children of different nationalities appeared. Later they were joined by paramedic dogs, airplanes, and astronauts. The year 1937 was marked by balloons with portraits of Lenin and Stalin.

The appearance of cardboard mailboxes for New Year's letters dates back to the early 40s. XX century, at that time glass and cotton wool became an unaffordable luxury. The mailbox, no larger than the size of a matchbox, contained candy or small coins. Amazing snowflakes were made from crystallized salt crystals! The wire frame was dipped into a saturated saline solution, and after a few hours the toy was removed and dried. During the Great Patriotic War, glass balls were also made at home. Burnt out regular light bulbs or those taken from a New Year's garland were painted or pasted over with multi-colored paper...

Today, handmade toys are again at the peak of popularity. Some of them demonstrate the skill of professional artists, others, although not so magnificent and exclusive, carry the warmth of a home. A dear, cozy home, where, as in previous Russian homes, adults and children literally made the holiday with their own hands...

It's no secret that many residents of our country associate the New Year with Moscow, or more precisely with the striking of the chimes on the Kremlin's Spasskaya Tower. With the chiming of the chimes, we make wishes, say goodbye to the old year and hope that the next year will be more successful. Let's see how the New Year was celebrated in Moscow before.

Christmas tree in the St. George Hall of the Kremlin, 1950-60. The most important Christmas tree in Moscow and the country is still in the Kremlin, and the second most important tree has always been in the column hall of the House of Unions, next to the current State Duma.

We still owe the celebration of the New Year in the form in which we celebrate it now to Stalin. Before the revolution, as in other countries, in Russia Christmas was celebrated with a tree and gifts, which was immediately banned by the Soviet government, but only in 1935, before the new year of 1936, it was decided to put up Christmas trees again, make holidays for children, and call Santa Claus and the Snow Maiden, but all this was prescribed to be done exclusively on the secular New Year, which we still do.

It’s hard to imagine now, but this is Arbatskaya Square in 1959. In the background you can see the lobby of the Arbatskaya metro station on the blue line, which we continue to use now, but we enter it from the left side, through the new building, and not through the original large main entrance . The fact is that under Brezhnev, a huge complex of the Ministry of Defense was built around this lobby, and the Stalinist lobby still stands in his courtyard, which is very clearly visible on the satellite map.

Outbound sales of "Children's World" - another, probably, the most New Year's place in Soviet Moscow.

And this is how “Children’s World” itself looked on Lubyanka in the late 1950s.

In those years, Muscovites, even low-income ones, tried to put up a Christmas tree in their house for children, decorating it with cardboard and glass toys, mushrooms, balls, tinsel, “beads”, even multi-colored light bulbs; they put Santa Claus, the Snow Maiden under the tree, and the children put their own favorite toys, etc., and the “top of the head” was crowned with a star or a spire. They also hung sweets, chocolate medals, and tangerines.

Vechernyaya Moscow newspaper: “A few hours remain until the New Year. There is a lot to do: visit the hairdresser, go to the store, and send a congratulatory telegram. In short, we must hurry. In the photo you see Muscovites in the center of the capital - on Gorky Street the day before New Year 1961."

New Year's decoration of "Children's World", 1970-71.

"Children's World" in the 1970s

Christmas tree in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses, 1971

Tin chests from the Kremlin Christmas trees still gather dust in many mezzanine apartments. Grandmothers loved to store threads, buttons and other household items in them.

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Was New Year always a holiday in our country during Soviet times?

The best holiday

We now have many holidays - religious, secular, and personal. But the only common holiday for everyone is New Year. Almost everyone is preparing for the New Year. Men carefully “inspect” the Christmas tree markets, choosing the fluffiest Christmas tree and, with an air of triumph, bring the “forest beauty” home. Women buy so much food that it would be enough for a modest wedding, and children can only be called to order by saying that Santa Claus does not give gifts to naughty children. And all this pre-holiday bustle is filled with a premonition of happiness, miracles, and fun. The phone doesn’t stop ringing, the intoxicating aromas of some “signature” dish, prepared only once a year, can be heard from the kitchen, champagne is cooling on the balcony, peacefully adjacent to a “basin” of Olivier and tangerines in a bag. And also new clothes, hairstyles, gifts hidden for the time being, sweets, sparklers. And you need to have everything ready before eleven in the evening in order to spend the old year.

And with the first strike of the Chimes, having listened to the congratulations of the First Person of the country, open Soviet champagne and drink with the last blow, having time to make your deepest wish. And you can no longer fuss, exchange gifts, proclaim brilliant toasts and be absolutely sure that everything unpleasant is in the past, and the future is bright and joyful, that everything will be as we wished for ourselves. The Christmas tree sparkles with lights, the table is laden with food, celebrities congratulate us from the blue screen, and this holiday will continue for many more days. Everyone has long been accustomed to this kind of New Year celebration; this scenario is from our Soviet past.
The history of New Year celebrations in Russia begins, perhaps, with the reign of Peter Alekseevich, a great lover of reforms and an adherent of the Western European way of life. Tsar Peter I, by his decree, ordered to celebrate the new year 1700 and the new century on January 1, decorating homes with branches and trees of pine, spruce and juniper. Thus, the year 7208 from the creation of the world was replaced by the year 1700 from the Nativity of Christ. In Tsarist Russia, it was customary to decorate Christmas trees only in noble and landowner houses. The peasants did not celebrate the New Year, only Christmas and the subsequent Christmastide before Epiphany.

The smell of tangerines frozen on the balcony and a live Christmas tree, the hissing of champagne in thick tall glasses and optimistic songs from TV, the taste of Olivier salad and slightly stale chocolates... Anyone who remembers how they celebrated the New Year in the Soviet Union is familiar with all these sensations. As well as the most important feeling: in the USSR, the traditions of celebrating the New Year were much more common than today.

So much so that if in those days an outside observer had the opportunity to visit several hundred apartments scattered throughout the Union on New Year's Eve, he would have been amazed at how equally the holiday was celebrated everywhere.

Where did you come from, Soviet New Year?

Officially, the tradition of celebrating the New Year was returned to Soviet citizens only in 1935, and became widespread only 20 years later. After all, January 1 became a day off only in 1947, and only then did residents of the USSR have the opportunity to properly celebrate New Year’s Eve. And since an indispensable attribute of any holiday in Soviet times was a rich table, the majority of citizens of the Soviet Union began to truly celebrate only when the card system was finally abolished, and a sufficient number of products and New Year's food sets appeared in stores!

New Year, 1971

In addition, the Soviet New Year was, in fact, a city holiday. This is understandable: for a villager, December 31st and January 1st are no different from other winter days. Even if it was possible to refuse from performing obligatory daily rural work, it was not for the sake of an annual holiday - but only for a much rarer occasion, for example, for the sake of a wedding or the birth of a child.

Therefore, we can talk about the Soviet tradition of celebrating the New Year only from the beginning of the 1960s, when the share of the urban population in the country exceeded the share of the rural population. Moreover, it was in the 60s, with the beginning of Khrushchev’s “thaw”, that the right to private life and private holidays began not only to be recognized, but also to become part of the official ideology. And the stream of young specialists who poured into previously purely rural areas of the country to build new cities and factories, brought with them the urban tradition of celebrating the New Year.

A Soviet family brings food home to the New Year's table, 1971.

Soviet traditions

The first component of this tradition was the indispensable New Year’s “Blue Light”, broadcast on the first national channel. Since 1964, it has become an annual New Year's program, and for twenty years it was the songs and jokes from this television program that accompanied the Soviet New Year's holiday.

New Year's "Blue Light", 1976

The second tradition in 1976 was the film “The Irony of Fate, or Enjoy Your Bath.” Eldar Ryazanov's comedy was not only firmly associated with New Year's Eve (it was shown annually, only the start time of the show changed), but it itself served as the source of some traditions of decorating the house for the New Year.

Still from the film “The Irony of Fate, or Enjoy Your Bath!”

The third tradition was the food set for the New Year's table - the so-called “order”. Since the heyday of the national New Year celebration occurred in the mid-70s with their beginning shortage, the main source of products were “orders” that were issued at the place of work (by the way, such sets were issued almost exclusively in cities, which also worked to consolidate the image of the New Year year as a purely urban holiday).

Traditionally, the “order” included one or two jars of sprat, a box of chocolates, a bottle of “Soviet champagne”, a loaf of boiled smoked or raw smoked sausage, a pack of Indian tea “with an elephant”, “Lemon drops” and sometimes a jar of red caviar. At the same time, tangerines began to be perceived as a purely New Year’s delicacy: the USSR received the bulk of these fruits in the form of exports from Morocco, where the main harvest ripens in November-December.

However, it’s worth correcting yourself: perhaps the earliest New Year’s tradition - not new, but revived - was the custom of placing a live spruce in the house for the New Year. After the anti-religious campaign of the late 20s and early 30s, it was only in 1935 that the Soviet government again began to promote this custom. Since Christmas trees for sale were specially grown, they were also in relative short supply, and therefore were bought at the first opportunity, and not at a convenient time. A common sight, for example, in Moscow was people who, one and a half to two weeks before the New Year, carried Christmas trees tied with twine into the subway, bought for the occasion.

A Muscovite woman carries a Christmas tree home, 1972.

And of course, the famous phrase “Here is a gift (food, souvenirs, etc.), but this is for the New Year!” can be attributed to the New Year traditions of the times of the USSR. The same total shortage taught Soviet citizens that they need to buy what they need not on the eve of a holiday, but when the opportunity arises, it’s better to let it sit. Food was stored in the refrigerator or on the balcony, things were stored in closets or pantries, Christmas trees were hung outside the window or on the same balcony. Almost all family members knew what would be given to whom for the holiday, but this did not diminish the joy: the very opportunity to receive a new thing made me happy!

As it usually was

... The final credits of “The Irony of Fate” are floating on the TV screen, the champagne is sent to cool outside the window or in the refrigerator, vases with the indispensable Olivier salad (quick, satisfying and almost without the use of scarce products!), “custom-made” sprats and sausage are placed on the table. A few minutes later the doorbell rings: the first guests have arrived. Surely they brought with them a jar or two of salad for the New Year's table or homemade pies: a table put together by contribution was also a Soviet New Year's tradition. As, in fact, was the custom of celebrating the New Year with a friendly company: in those years, few could boast of their own large apartment, as well as the opportunity to set a rich table alone, so the holiday was celebrated in a wide friendly circle - it was both more convenient and simpler.

At the festive table, 1971

After the feast, many groups went outside, going for a walk or just in the yard - to take a break from the feast in the interval between hot (usually meat baked with cheese, onions and mayonnaise, or chicken - fried or also baked in the oven) and sweet. Often companies began to roam around different floors of the building: often high-rise buildings were departmental or belonged to enterprises, and most residents knew each other well from working together. By this time, the children usually had already gone to bed: although January was the time of the New Year's school holidays, children were still not allowed to stay up past midnight.

Children's Christmas trees

Oh, yes, about schoolchildren!.. Just as traditional as Olivier and tangerines were New Year’s “trees” - theatrical performances for schoolchildren, held from mid-December to mid-January in city recreation centers. The level of performances depended on what artists the organizers were able to find, but the most important pleasure from visiting the “Christmas tree” were the gifts - confectionery sets packed in elegant cardboard boxes. The best and main “Christmas tree” was considered to be the one held in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses. Tickets for it were practically not available for free sale, but were distributed among enterprises, going to managers and production leaders. The level of the performance at this “Christmas tree” was the highest, and the gifts were the richest: every year new unique plastic packaging was made for them, often representing approximate copies of the Kremlin towers.

Moscow. Children's New Year's Eve party in the Kremlin, 1955

But other “Christmas trees” delighted the children no less - primarily because of the gifts. By the way, children often received only part of the delicacies from the set, and parents saved the best sweets for New Year's Eve.

Probably precisely because the New Year was the most common holiday in the USSR (except perhaps Victory Day, but it began to be celebrated only in 1965), people of the older generation still remember it with nostalgia. Those who were schoolchildren during the late stagnation remember well the joyful anticipation that filled the days before the New Year.

After all, it was not just a holiday - it was also an opportunity to try dishes that are rare on other days, receive some new thing as a gift, and finally, just chat with friends without any political overtones - not like May 1 or November 7! Even the New Year’s televised address by Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev or “on behalf of the Central Committee of the CPSU, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the Soviet government” was perceived only as a preface to the chiming clock, heralding the onset of midnight - and the New Year, the most desired and free holiday...

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