Two male figures on the clock

The contrast between the massive case housing the clock mechanism and the dynamic, sweeping sculptural composition is striking. It seems like one more second — and the ball will roll away and the footballers will leap off the pedestal.

The true "Shlomo"

The clock with the figures of footballers was gifted to a man who was both solid and swift at the same time. Solomon Savelievich Gindinson was the chief engineer of the Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant during the Great Patriotic War. Afterwards he headed motorcycle production, was a passionate motorcycle-sport enthusiast and the curator of the plant's "gold" motorcycle racing team. He initiated the creation in Izhevsk of the Industrial Institute (now Izhevsk State Technical University named after M.T. Kalashnikov). He was also an avid football fan, organizer of the factory football team and head of the Izhevsk branch of the Voluntary Sports Society "Zenit." The gifted clock ticked cheerfully for nearly thirty years. But in 1977, when its owner retired, the clock stopped too...

Three items in the exhibition dedicated to the history of Izhevsk arms production. A desk set: a clock and a pen holder. Dignified, solid and simple. Soviet style of the 1940s. From this set one can imagine the whole atmosphere of the chief engineer's office. Beside it, a dapper men's toiletry kit — an indispensable item on business trips. A separate mirror in a case. Containers for shaving accessories. Leather, metal. Made in the 1930s, Germany. The chief engineer had been there on a business trip on the eve of the war. And right next to them, a carved wooden figurine. You can feel the hand of an amateur, but how much expression! A whole family of such figurines was given to the chief engineer by the German specialists who worked at the Izhevsk machine plant before returning to their homeland. All three items combine in an astonishing way, as if growing into one another. They conceal not only signs of the era but also a portrait of their owner: a charismatic and self-sufficient man. One who did not catch the "director's" disease and remained a professional. A true "Shlomo" (the Hebrew pronunciation of the name Solomon) — calm, whole and complete.

He was born on August 20, 1902 in Voronezh, into a large family of an artisan-craftsman. On his father's side he was related to the well-known Izhevsk baker and confectioner Aron Ashbel. In addition, the Ashbel family headed the Jewish community in the settlement Izhevsky Zavod. In 1918, due to the advance of the White Poles, the large family (seven children) moved to Izhevsk. The sixteen-year-old eldest son of the Gindinsons started work as a fitter at the "Izhevsk Arms and Steelmaking Plants." A couple of years later he married Liza Timofeeva, a records clerk at the district health office. In 1921, on a Komsomol assignment, Solomon Gindinson was sent first to a workers' faculty and then to the mechanical faculty of the Petrograd Polytechnic Institute. He later graduated from the Leningrad Military-Mechanical Institute. He regularly completed practical training in Izhevsk at his home plant.
The story of Elizaveta Gindinson (Timofeeva) is remarkable. She was also born in 1902, on September 10. Only before her death did Elizaveta Nikolaevna reveal her secret — she had adoptive parents. She was born in Sarapul to politically exiled German students who could not support her. As an infant she was taken in for upbringing together with the woman's niece by Anisya Karpovna Timofeeva. In her youth Liza sang in the church choir; she had a naturally trained voice, a mezzo-soprano. The young Gindinson family in Leningrad suffered a tragedy — their firstborn Zhores died of meningitis in 1929. In 1930, with his engineering diploma, Solomon Gindinson returned to the Izhevsk plant for good; that same year his son Albert was born, and in 1935 his daughter Maina.

The 1930s were years of rapid career advancement for Gindinson: from process engineer to assistant chief engineer. In 1940, at the age of 37, he was appointed chief engineer of the machine plant. The family moved into a wooden cottage for management staff on Borodina Street; Gindinson was assigned a personal service ZIS. According to his daughter's memories, at the outbreak of the war Solomon Savelievich simply moved into the plant: it was necessary to receive evacuated enterprises and specialists and to organize production. The plant quickly mastered Degtyaryov and Simonov anti-tank rifles, the aircraft cannons of Shpitalny and Nudelman, and of course produced Mosin rifles and carbines. Until the end of 1941 the Izhevsk plant was their sole supplier to the front. In just a few months, through enormous effort and precise calculation of shortened operation times, production of Mosin rifles was increased to 12,000 per day. K.E. Voroshilov, who came to inspect the plant, was astonished when he saw rifles "flowing like a river" along the conveyor. On January 18, 1942, Orders of Lenin appeared on the enterprise's banner and on the lapel of the chief engineer's jacket. Implementing a conveyor up to the assembly, already at the machining stage, was an exhausting production marathon. Gindinson ran it confidently and even with enthusiasm. In September 1944 a traveling Plenum of the Technical Council of the USSR People's Commissariat of Armaments on the issues of conveyorization was held at the plant. After it ended, the VIPs were invited to be photographed outdoors: in the yard of one of the management cottages. Perhaps the very one where the Gindinson family lived. In the photo the gates and corner of the wooden house are clearly visible. Everyone looks tired, their poses tense, their gazes dull. The director M.A. Ivanov, sitting third, seems to have shrunk. Only Solomon Savelievich (first on the left) sits with a straight back, chin raised, and a bold look...

During the war relatives evacuated from Leningrad lived in the chief engineer's large house. Elizaveta Nikolaevna worked in hospitals and on the distribution of war bonds. With the choir of the republican radio committee she organized concerts and sang herself for the wounded. From age four their daughter Maina studied with a private teacher, then at the first music school. During concerts she often accompanied her mother. Notably, the family owned an excellent piano — at one time the best instrument in the city with a beautiful, deep sound. Artists from the Riga operetta who evacuated to Izhevsk rehearsed at the Gindinsons' home!
The engineer-colonel, a four-time recipient of orders and a Stalin Prize laureate, fell under a ministerial "axe" in 1947 and was relieved of his high post. Gindinson remained loyal to the plant, worked in motorcycle production until retirement, and lived to almost eighty. The photographs and belongings of Solomon Savelievich for the history exhibition were brought to the museum by his daughter Maina.

A beautiful couple

She is the youngest in the family, but not spoiled. Immediately beautiful, but intelligent and unpretentious. She found mathematics and chemistry easy, but loved literature. Right after school Maina Gindinson worked at the machine plant — first as a specialist in the personnel preparation department and then as a chemical engineer in the chief metallurgist's office. After graduating from the faculty of philology Maina taught at an evening school, and then for many years worked in the editorial department of the Mechanical Institute. She met her future husband, Livadiy Koryakovtsev, while still at school. Of course, education was separated back then. But boys would come to their girls' school to help organize the chess club.
Livadiy was born on February 22, 1935 in Izhevsk. His father, Georgy Azarievich Koryakovtsev, worked as an electromechanic at the Izhevsk circus and came from the family of the merchant Azariy Aleksandrovich Koryakovtsev, owner of one of the first Izhevsk cinemas, "Illuzion." When choosing a name his parents consulted the church calendar but found nothing pleasing and invented a beautiful and unusual name themselves. His mother, Lyudmila Alekseevna Koryakovtseva (née Yalunina), worked as an accountant at School No. 22. Livadiy entered that school in 1942. While at school he took up chess, achieved first-category status, and participated in serious competitions. In his student years Koryakovtsev took up track and field, became a republican champion, played basketball for the regional team, and continued to play chess. The ability to think logically, analyze and plan, developed at the chessboard, helped him in his later design and organizational work.

Maina and Livadiy — what a beautiful couple they made! Two charismatic people came together: theatrical, athletic, witty, musically gifted, cheerful, the center of any company! They married in 1956. At the wedding, besides relatives, the entire fourth-year mechanical institute student group of his and the entire philology faculty student group of hers somehow fit into the three-room Gindinson apartment.
After graduating, Koryakovtsev was assigned to the design bureau for meteor rockets and rocket launcher installations at the Izhevsk machine-building plant. He carried out experimental work and took part in rocket launches. In January 1959, by the plant leadership's decision, L.G. Koryakovtsev was transferred to M.T. Kalashnikov's design group. The next four years became one of the most intense, rich and interesting periods of his life. Later, in his book "Unknown Kalashnikov," Livadiy Georgievich accurately recreated the atmosphere in that team and gave vivid portraits of the chief designer and his colleagues, friends and relatives. Koryakovtsev participated in the epic process of adopting the unified machine gun and often went on business trips.
Once he was sent to troop tests in the Baltic Military District, and Maina went to see him in Kaliningrad. They stood for a long time at Kant's grave, then wandered arm in arm through a city ruined by war yet still beautiful. They bought records for their home music collection — a scarf for her and a new tie for him. Livadiy Georgievich always looked "like a picture." He could stay clean even when working with parts and grease. He stylishly wore a worn hat and an old autumn coat. In November 1961 the entire idle maternity staff and the walking patients pressed to the windows to look at Maina posing with a bouquet and her dapper husband with their daughter Lenochka in his arms.

In 1966, at the very beginning of automobile production at Izhmash, Livadiy Georgievich Koryakovtsev headed the design-experimental bureau. He quickly became deputy chief designer of automobile production, then deputy general director for testing. From 1987 Koryakovtsev worked in the State Acceptance office at Izhmash and as deputy director of one of the productions. He traveled a lot on business, now around the world: to Japan (training on the repair and operation of automotive test stands), to Poland (he led the Soviet team in an international car rally), to France (testing Izhevsk cars for compliance with UNECE safety requirements). From each trip he brought gifts for his wife: three genuine Sèvres porcelain vases from France, a maple-leaf vase from Japan, and his father's clock with the footballers that stand on the shelf beside them.

Two striking male figures side by side all their lives. Powerful characters, self-sufficient personalities, true professionals, senior leaders. And yet Maina Solomonovna did not get lost against their background! She recently celebrated her 89th birthday. A remarkable person with an inexhaustible supply of vitality and wit, clear memory and firm principles, a lively spirit and a kind heart. Maina Solomonovna Gindinson-Koryakovtseva embodies and connects two generations of Izhevsk arms-makers in her own person.
It must be admitted that throughout its history the Izhevsk plant produced real men of action. Continuously and in large batches. But each time — a one-of-a-kind individual.