Alexei (Andrei) Stakhanov: Labor Hero and Stakhanovism

The city of Donetsk became the home of the famous “Stakhanovite” movement—that is, the drive for exceptionally high production output, aimed at improving the country’s prosperity in the shortest possible time.

The figure in whose honor the movement was named was A. G. Stakhanov, whom his fellow workers aptly nicknamed “Stakan” (Russian for “glass”). Unfortunately, researchers have yet to establish his first name conclusively. According to one account, a journalist misspelled it in an issue of the newspaper Pravda while praising the famous record: the article’s headline read “Alexei Stakhanov” instead of “Andrei Stakhanov.” The already famous worker Stakhanov then wrote an angry letter to Stalin, complaining that his name had been misspelled in the party newspaper. Stalin, however, reportedly replied, “Alexei… A fine Russian name… I like it…” Soon afterward, Stakhanov received a new passport bearing the name “Alexei,” and his former name was forgotten forever.

Alexei Stakhanov was born on January 3, 1906, in Oryol Governorate, to a poor peasant family. He did not finish village school, and in 1927 he went to Donetsk, where he took a well-paid job as a miner. Before Alexei Grigoryevich Stakhanov set his heroic record, he was an ordinary coal cutter in one of the region’s many mines. The life of this legendary man changed dramatically on the night of August 30–31, 1935, when miner A. G. Stakhanov and the two coal cutters Borisenko and Chegolev set a record, exceeding the average daily coal-mining output by 14 times. They were said to have mined 102 tons of lignite in 5 hours and 45 minutes—a genuine record. A little later, on September 19, Stakhanov and his team set another world record: 207 tons of coal mined during a single shift—a record that was soon surpassed by other participants.

In a short time, an ordinary miner became a working-class hero of an entire era and a living legend, not only in Donetsk but also as the inspiration for a socialist competition movement named after him: the “Stakhanovite movement.” The movement spread rapidly throughout the country and produced notable achievements, such as those of locomotive driver Petr Krivonos, blacksmith Aleksandr Busygin, and the Vinogradov sisters, who were weavers. This innovative movement sought to raise labor productivity by using modern technology and improving workers’ cultural and technical skills. It was intended to drive the country’s successful industrialization and economic growth.

However, the Stakhanovite movement, though supported by communist ideology, also gave birth to a monster: it attracted followers in every field of work, from childcare workers to divers, all striving to meet—and exceed—their quotas. Product quality often suffered as a result, because the sheer quantity produced took priority. The Stakhanovite phenomenon spawned practices such as “servicing multiple machines,” “combining occupations,” the “200 movement” (meeting two or more quotas per shift), and the “1000 movement” (meeting ten quotas per shift). Dental technicians pledged to exceed their tooth-extraction quotas, theater directors the number of performances, scientists the number of discoveries, and NKVD employees the number of people convicted. “Stakhanovite mania” had spread to every field of work. “We are living better now; life is more cheerful now”—these are famous words Stalin spoke on November 14 at the All-Union Congress of the Stakhanovite Movement. “Our necks are thinner now, but longer too,” the undaunted people added.

Later, the adapted Stakhanovite movement evolved into a less aggressive form of socialist competition. A successor movement in Soviet society, the “Communist Attitude to Work” movement, gave rise to similar phenomena, such as “shock workers of communist labor” and “heroes of labor,” before disappearing forever with the collapse of the USSR.

Even so, to this day Stakhanov’s compatriots in Ukraine and across the former Soviet Union admire his outstanding achievements and the courage with which he set out, and continue to follow his work traditions. In 1970, Stakhanov was awarded the Order of Socialist Labor. Later, following a nervous breakdown, he was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, where he died in a tragic accident on November 4, 1977. But Stakhanov’s surname outlived the famous miner from the Donetsk region and became a generic term for “shock work”—working to the limits of human endurance.