Elena Evgenievna Krasnozhenova,
Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, St. Petersburg, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Workers of Leningrad Industrial Enterprises (1941−1944)
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2025-2-7
The article shows the state of the workforce of Leningrad industrial enterprises under the Leningrad Siege (1941−1944). The number of industrial workers in the city was rapidly decreasing due to mobilization into the army, joining the people’s militia, evacuation of the city’s largest industrial enterprises along with personnel, mobilization of workers for defense work, mass hunger, and shelling. The need to ensure an uninterrupted production process has led to a mass recruitment of new workers to industrial enterprises, with a significant part of them lacking the necessary qualifications, which had a direct impact on their productivity. Under the blockade, the age composition of the workers changed, as the proportion of younger and older age categories increased. There was a mass influx of women into production, who had to master male professions. The exception was defense enterprises, where qualified productionpersonnel were kept. The need to ensure the operation of Leningrad industrial enterprises led to the introduction of various forms of advanced training for workers − industrial and technical, individual and team training, schools for masters of socialist labor, and short-term courses, in which training was conducted both with and without interruption from production. During the training process, workers who became employed at industrial enterprises were given the opportunity to master basic technological knowledge and skills to perform their production functions.
Publishing: 28/04/2025
The article has been received by the editor on 02/02/2025
How to cite: Krasnozhenova E.E. Workers of Leningrad Industrial Enterprises (1941−1944) // Historical Courier, 2025, No. 2 (40), pp. 95–104. [Available online: http://istkurier.ru/data/2025/ISTKURIER-2025-2-07.pdf]
The study was supported by the Russian Science Foundation № 25-28-00518 (https://rscf.ru/project/25-28-00518).
Links: Issue 2 2025
Keywords: Great Patriotic War; blockade; industrial enterprises; workers; personnel problems; women; teenagers; qualifications; education; personnel training