Nikita Blagovo: We will have a new Stolypin. Karl May School step: book tickets for an excursion or tour

The Karl May School in St. Petersburg is widely known. Entire generations of the Rimsky-Korsakovs, Semenov-Tyan-Shanskys, and Benois studied here (25 members of this family studied “with May”). Graduates of the school have achieved great success in various fields of science and culture. More than 100 of them became doctors of science, 29 were elected full members or corresponding members of the Academy of Sciences. Many artistically gifted people came out of the May School: Alexander Benois, Nicholas and Svyatoslav Roerich, Valentin Serov, Konstantin Somov, Lev Uspensky, Dmitry Sergeevich Likhachev also studied there. Warm memories of the school were preserved by its former student - twice Hero of the Soviet Union, Doctor of Physics -mathematical sciences cosmonaut G.M. Grechko (in 2012, a memorial plaque dedicated to the school students, cosmonauts G.M. Grechko and A.I. Borisenko, was unveiled in the school lobby).

We will touch on the origins of this school, which has produced so many famous people. Its creator is the talented teacher Karl Ivanovich May (1820-1895). He came from a poor family of St. Petersburg Germans.

At one time, he graduated with honors from the Main German School of St. Peter (1838) and the Faculty of History and Philology of the Imperial St. Petersburg University (1845).

After graduating from university, he was a home teacher in the Dashkov family, and later taught geography at the Forestry Institute. By the age of 30, he already had a reputation as an excellent teacher.

Alexander Benois found Karl Ivanovich already at an advanced age and described his first impressions of meeting him: “I immediately liked his unique, I would even say curious, appearance. He was a small, frail, very bent old man, invariably dressed in a long black frock coat. In his senile, emaciated, seemingly flabby hand, he always twirled a snuffbox, which he often used, and a large red and yellow handkerchief stuck out of the back pocket of his coat. All this “pushed” Karl Ivanovich somewhere far away in time and gave his appearance some kind of poetic antiquity... His blind, somewhat inflamed eyes were armed with gold glasses. Karl Ivanovich moved quickly, not quite evenly mincing with his old legs.” All the years since the founding of the school, K.I. Mai was its director.

According to Karl May, upbringing comes first, and only then education, and the development of mental abilities is at the forefront.

The May School - a private German men's school - was opened in St. Petersburg on September 22, 1856. 160 years ago. The first classes took place in K.I.’s apartment. Maya at Vasilievsky Island, 1 line, building 56 (Borisov House). The school was originally an elementary school, and since 1861 it received the official name “Real School at the Gymnasium Degree,” which reflected the enhanced applied orientation of education: content and methods were oriented towards a close connection with the fundamentals of other sciences and with life. The motto of the school was the saying of the founder of pedagogy, John Amos Comenius, “First to love, then to teach.”

During the first years of the school's existence, K. Mai himself taught arithmetic, general history, ancient languages and geography. With the development of the school, May passed on some of the lessons to other teachers, but Karl Ivanovich did not part with his beloved geography and taught it for almost 40 years.

In the lower grades, he began by asking the children to draw a plan for their class. From the plan of the room they moved on to the plan of the school, its courtyard, then to plans of St. Petersburg and, finally, to geographical maps. Students often drew maps by heart. Nicholas Roerich recalled that they not only drew maps, but also sculpted relief images from plasticine. Large sizes and new combinations of bright colors were especially encouraged. K. Mai often asked lessons that had already been completed a long time ago, so the students got used to summarizing the current material. Even after leaving the post of director, K.I. continued to teach geography.

From the very beginning the school consisted of two departments. Children who showed humanitarian abilities were called Latinists in the early years and studied in the department, later called the gymnasium. Here, in addition to German and French, ancient languages were taught - Latin and Greek. Gymnasium students, as a rule, prepared to continue their education at the University. Young men who were more inclined towards the natural sciences were called non-Latinists: in the real department, they received more knowledge in the exact sciences and prepared themselves for engineering activities. There was also a small commercial department where English was studied instead of French. Thanks to this structure, the official name of this secondary educational institution became “K. May’s Gymnasium and Real School.”

Accordingly, a team of gifted teachers was created. In the 1860s, the most original personality was the mathematician Emil Schneider, the terror of his students. Despite the severity, he was an excellent teacher and, first of all, made sure that his students learned the proofs and rules, and did not cram them to no avail. Schneider often sent one of his students to the kitchen for turnips or potatoes and cut out various cones and pyramids from them in order to more clearly explain the rules of geometry to the students. Schneider was quick-tempered and hot-tempered, but not vindictive. One day he came to class, sat down on a chair and collapsed on the floor along with the chair amid the general laughter of the class. Schneider himself laughed heartily. The watchman brought a new chair, Schneider grabbed it with a powerful hand - the chair was shattered. Finally, a chair was found of such a respectable size that even a young elephant could sit on it without the danger of falling through. Finally, everyone in the class calmed down, the lesson began, but suddenly one of the students giggled again. “What is this?” Schneider shouted, “we all laughed like noble people, and now you, scoundrel, dared to laugh again.” It smells like the street. Get out of class. If I were Emil Schneider if you came in again." The books of the unfortunate laugher also flew out the door. The next day the anger passed and everything was forgotten. Schneider could not stand it when students disputed the grade. One day someone asked him in an offended tone: "What, just a four?" - shouted the formidable mathematician, - three, two, one - get out of class!

The best teacher of ancient languages at the May school was F. Urtel. This young, but extremely knowledgeable and capable philologist was discharged from abroad in 1866 (7). Arriving in Russia, he very soon learned the Russian language and became interested in Russian literature. In Latin lessons, he liked to refer to Russian writers and especially to Pushkin, whom he highly valued.

Karl Ivanovich May handed over his post to school graduate Vasily Aleksandrovich Krakau. (1857-1935) V.A. Krakau was born on December 7, 1857. into the family of the prominent St. Petersburg architect Alexander Ivanovich Krakau (1817-1888). Vasily was sent in the footsteps of his older brother Alexander “to May” in 1866. He studied well in all classes and on June 14, 1876, he was the first to graduate from school. In 1881, like May in his time, he graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University as a “candidate.” The first years after graduation V.A. Krakau taught history and geography at the 2nd progymnasium (Fontanka, 40). However, in 1886, he applied to teach history at K. May's private school. In his heartfelt parting speech, the founder of the school spoke of his successor in the following way: “I have learned enough about your inclination towards the teaching vocation, your ability to tirelessly work. From you, Vasily Alexandrovich, I can hope and expect that the spirit of the school will remain unchanged. I can therefore calmly and with a clear conscience entrust you with a matter dear to me.” V.A. Krakau introduced music, dance, and fencing lessons (optional) at school. He introduced the division of the class in language lessons into 2 groups of “strong” and “weak” students, but this experience did not give the expected result - improving the knowledge of weak students, because there were lazy children who, with their answers, did not allow the teacher to focus his attention on those who were lagging behind.

The third (and, as it turned out later, the last) director of the gymnasium was Alexander Lavrentievich Lipovsky (1867-1942). He was elected to this post by secret ballot at a meeting of the pedagogical council of the gymnasium in 1906. Unlike his predecessors, he was not a native of St. Petersburg, but was born in Tashkent, graduated from high school there with a gold medal. Then he graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University in 1890. A year later he was hired as a supernumerary teacher of history and geography at the May gymnasium. In addition to lessons, Lipovsky also gave lectures to high school students on the history of world literature from ancient times to modern writers. Kindness for A.L Lipovsky was a principle. But this trait did not prevent him from being consistent and persistent in his concerns about further improving the activities of his school, of course, in the spirit of the “May” traditions.
For the first twenty-five years, the school was German, since lessons in all subjects, except Russian language, literature and history, as well as some real disciplines, were taught in Goethe's language.

The system of upbringing and education created by K.I. May provided for mutual respect and trust between teachers and students, constant interaction with the family, the desire of teachers to take into account and develop the individual abilities of each student, and teach them to think independently. All this, combined with the high quality of education, made it possible year after year to graduate highly moral, well-rounded young men from the school, ready to work useful for society.
The composition of the students, both by social status and by nationality, was very diverse: the children of the porter and the sons of princes Gagarin, Golitsyn, Counts Olsufiev and Stenbock-Fermor, representatives of the families of entrepreneurs Vargunin, Durdin, Eliseev, Thornton and descendants of the intelligentsia Benoit, studied here. Rimsky-Korsakov, Semenov-Tianshansky.

In the late 1850s, one school play opened with a procession of heralds carrying flags depicting the cockchafer; The director and everyone present really liked this symbol. Since then, those who studied at this school throughout their lives called themselves “Maybugs.” And the special atmosphere of trust and mutual respect was called the “May spirit.”

It must be said that K. May’s school has a long and interesting history, the main stages of which can be found on her personal page on the Internet:

http://www.kmay.ru/hist.phtml

Conventionally, the history of the School can be divided into four major periods:
- pre-revolutionary 1856 – 1918 (gymnasium and secondary school)
- pre-war 1918 - 1937 (Soviet school)
- military 1937 - 1944 (6th special artillery school)
- post-war 1944 – present (5th secondary school).

...It was only in the 1960s that the name of Karl May was first mentioned in the museum of labor and military glory created within the walls of the former gymnasium. However, the “grassroots” initiative was soon stopped - the museum was closed. The name of Karl May returned only in the mid-1980s, largely thanks to Dmitry Likhachev, who studied here. It was he who opened the museum in the former gymnasium in 1995. The museum was created on the initiative of the director of the institute, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Rafael Yusupov. A memorial plaque was unveiled on the façade of the building and a bas-relief of a cockchafer was recreated.

In 2010, at the Smolensk Lutheran Cemetery in St. Petersburg, in honor of the 190th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding teacher, a revived monument to Karl Ivanovich May, the founder and first director of the famous gymnasium on Vasilyevsky Island, was opened. The inscriptions on the obelisk reproduced exactly those that were on the previous obelisk. Two of them, in Latin, translated as follows: “He was a traveler to the light of those who sought him” and “Grateful students to the teacher.” Another epitaph, in German: “First to love, then to teach.”

2016
Photo: postcard with a view of the facade of house 39 on the 14th line of Vasilyevsky Island in St. Petersburg.
Architect G. Grimm (1909-1910).

Publication in the newspaper New Countrymen
https://www.neue-semljaki.de/-/--/200----.html

SPECIAL PROJECTS

We stand, study the stands in the Museum of the History of the Karl May School and are perplexed: how can this be?! In less than a century of existence, among the graduates of this school there are 33 (!!!) academicians and corresponding members, more than 100 doctors of science, eight “World of Arts” students... A hundred schools could be proud of such graduates or more. But another list brought us here: this is perhaps the only school museum in Russia where the memory of school students who suffered from repression is collected and preserved. The creator of the museum himself, a representative of the ancient Blagovo family, graduated from this school in 1949

: In the 15th–17th centuries, the genitive case was often used as a surname, and there were, for example, Chernovo, Myasnovo, Dvorovo, Tsvetovo. There are also more famous surnames starting with “o”: Durnovo and Khitrovo. When the passport system began to appear, most bearers of such surnames dropped the letter “o”. There was Chernovo, and became Chernov, there was Tsvetovo, and became Tsvetov, and so on. The bearers of the Blagovo surname have never been distinguished by nobility and wealth, as E.P. wrote. Yankova in the famous historical chronicle “Grandmother’s Stories,” but they served their fatherland faithfully. The book I wrote, “Six Centuries of the Blagovo Family,” is dedicated to the history of this family. I have distant roots: in the 14th century, my ancestors lived in Smolensk, then settled in Moscow, then branches appeared in Tver, Kostroma, Kaluga. And on April 4, 1712, by decree of the Senate, Peter Vasiliev, son of Blagovo, was sent to build a city on the Neva. This is how my distant ancestors appeared in St. Petersburg.

Nikita Vladimirovich– he’s a very interesting person and talks in such a way that you’ll listen,” they warned us before the interview, which we also filmed on video. – But he doesn’t like any kind of disorganization and untidiness: for example, those who keep their hands in their pockets. ...This warning seems redundant not even because my hands are busy taking pictures, Marina has no pockets, and our interlocutor exudes friendliness - it’s just that the air of this school museum instills clarity, kind severity and neatness.

N.V.: You know, of course, that during Soviet times it was dangerous to be interested in your ancestors. Until 1925, there was a provision: those who completed their studies at school and wished to continue their education had to receive a recommendation from the pedagogical council signed by the director. Only children of proletarian origin could receive such a certificate. If your dad is a worker or, say, a cab driver, you were given such a recommendation, of course, if the graduate had good grades. If the father, for example, held an engineering position, this is already a non-proletarian category, and his son’s path to university was closed. And if your ancestor, God forbid, served as an officer in the tsarist army, then all roads to further education were blocked for such children. The most important thing then was proletarian origin, academic achievement was in second place. Here is a specific example from the history of our school: in the class of 1924 there were 15 people, some graduated well, others not well. But 3 people whose parents were of 100% proletarian origin were sent to the university.

And that’s why the parents hid their origins?

N.V.: Then everything was hidden. When I was in school, where my last name was often distorted, I began to ask my father about its origin, about who my grandfather was. The father, a stern and reserved man, hearing this question, slammed his palm on the table and said: “Don’t ever ask me about this, I’ll never tell you about it!” Even when he was terminally ill, and I reached the mature age of 44 and asked him again about my ancestors, this time he was just as categorical: “No! I’ll never tell you!” It was a scary time: if your close relative owned two horses or your grandfather had a mill or furrier’s workshop, such people were considered an “anti-national element.”

Blagovo Zinaida Mikhailovna and Konstantin Petrovich

How is your life, the life of your family connected with the events of 1917 and what followed them? with civil war, repressions? Has this affected your family?

N.V.: It touched me directly, and repeatedly. I first learned about this a long time ago, in early childhood. I remember well June 10, 1937, 4 am. We lived in a communal apartment. My mother died when I was born, passing her life on to me. I was raised by my grandparents, my mother's parents. If there is anything good in me, it is thanks to them, Vera Nikolaevna and Mikhail Nikolaevich Khudozhilov. My mother’s brother, Uncle Kolya, lived in the room next door. Before the October Revolution, my mother’s father served as a teacher of geography and labor in the Alexander Cadet Corps, which he never hid. A Russian officer, an educated, multi-talented man, he played the piano well, drew beautifully, and took part in a competition to erect a monument to Pushkin. When the new government came, he no longer taught anywhere and was only able to get a job as an accountant in a small cardboard artel. Shortly before my birth, he was arrested and served a three-year sentence in Syktyvkar. His son had no opportunity to get a higher education. He was only able to get a job as an assistant locomotive driver (fireman) on the Oktyabrskaya Railway.

Khudozhilov Mikhail Nikolaevich

And then, on the morning already mentioned, I woke up from the noise made by the NKVD officers, who turned everything upside down while conducting a search. Uncle Kolya was completely confused. I remember this, although I was a little old. He kept saying that they would sort it out and he would be back soon, saying: “Lidusya, don’t cry; Mom, don't cry; dad, don't cry." We never saw him again. Grandmother and I constantly went to Shpalernaya and carried parcels. When I read the famous “Requiem,” I thought: maybe Anna Andreevna and I once stood next to each other in lines. These mournful visits to the gloomy house ended when one day it was reported that the arrested man had been sentenced to 10 years without the right to correspondence, which meant, as I learned much later, execution by executioners on December 20, 1937. At the beginning of January of the following year, Uncle Kolya’s wife, Aunt Lida, and her two-year-old daughter Natasha, my sister, were arrested and exiled to Vyatka. And we lost all contact with them for a long time, until after the war they finally returned to Leningrad. The aunt and sister said almost nothing about their stay in the camp and exile, and if they rarely remembered something, then what they heard, as they say, gave “goosebumps.” Natasha's whole life was crippled. Being in exile, then in boarding schools, made her withdrawn, taciturn, she did not create her own family and passed away with a depressed consciousness. One day, when my acquaintance with Natasha and her mother, who all the time suffered from tuberculosis contracted at a logging site, had already resumed, I called my sister and said: “I congratulate you on Victory Day.” As you know, this date was not celebrated until 1965, but it was still customary to congratulate. And suddenly I hear in response: “Don’t ever congratulate me on this day and never remind me of it.” In response, I ask in surprise: “Natasha, but why?!” “And because,” he says, “I was then in a boarding school. And suddenly they are ordered to urgently go to the line. Everyone comes out, me too, it’s a sunny, spring day, the mood is good. The director appeared and, seeing me, immediately shouted: “And you, the daughter of an enemy of the people, have nothing to do here! Go away!" It was May 9, 1945. These were the “educators” who crippled the child’s soul forever. Therefore, I became acquainted with repression, injustice, and cruelty very early. And I cannot have any other opinion other than that those repressions are a national catastrophe, anti-people terror. Moreover, having studied the history of my family quite widely and deeply, I now confidently say: 23 of my relatives, to varying degrees at different times, suffered cruelly and unjustly from that regime, four of them were shot.

Khudozhilov Nikolay Mikhailovich

My grandfather on my father’s side was among the first to be affected by the repressions. I’ll tell you separately how I found out about this, because these circumstances also characterize that era. My father passed away in Moscow, where he had another family. I came to Moscow for a funeral, and during the wake, an unknown elderly woman suddenly exclaimed: “Well, finally we saw Volodya’s children (me and my half-brother), whom he told us about, but never showed.” I perked up and met the author of the exclamation. It turned out that Aunt Natasha (that was her name) was the daughter of my grandfather’s sister, i.e. was my aunt. Hearing this good news, I immediately tried to find out something about my ancestors from her. But the situation did not allow such a conversation, and we agreed to talk when I could visit my aunt. Such an opportunity soon presented itself. When I again asked my historical question to the mistress of the house, Aunt Ira, who lived with her, immediately said: “Natasha, do you remember, Volodya strictly forbade him to tell his sons anything if they suddenly began to become interested in their grandfather.” But Aunt Natasha resolutely objected: “No, they have nothing to be ashamed of their grandfather for. They can and should know the truth." Feeling close to discovering the long-awaited secret, I became bolder and asked about the availability of photographs. Aunt Ira, however, continued to stick to her line: “Natasha, don’t show it! Volodya forbade it!” In response, Aunt Natasha firmly said: “I am the eldest, you must obey me. Nikita, take the stepladder and get that suitcase from the mezzanine.” I watched impatiently as my aunt opened its lid. And finally I saw a photograph of a stately officer of the Russian army. This was my grandfather, captain Konstantin Petrovich Blagovo.

K.P. Blagovo, Knight of St. George

He came from the nobility of the Tver province, received a military education first at the Yaroslavl Military School, then at the St. Petersburg Infantry School, then served in the 147th Samara Infantry Regiment, which was stationed in Oranienbaum. There he married Zinaida Mikhailovna Lanskaya. And from there he went with the regiment to the Russo-Japanese War, was wounded, rose in rank, and participated in the Great War, which later became known as the First World War. I have the wording from the order awarding him the Order of St. George for his distinction during the assault on Mount Makuvka. Then, on May 15 of the same year, he showed courage in the battle of the village of Lesovitsa and was awarded the Arms of St. George. In that battle, he lost his arm and was sent to Crimea for treatment. The well-known monsters Bela Kun and Zemlyachka came, and what happened next is known: 96 thousand people were innocently shot. More recently, Anatoly Yakovlevich Razumov, who publishes the Leningrad Martyrology, helped me find published lists of those victims. And so I read list No. 27 and suddenly I see: “Blagovo Konstantin Petrovich, Colonel.” Without an arm, he could not fight in the White Army, even if he wanted to, but he, like others, simply came to register and was immediately arrested... Last year I went to Feodosia, there, at the site of the executions, on Ilyinaya Gorka, there is a wonderful monument on which it is written - I especially liked the wording: “To the victims of the Bolshevik terror.” This is how, on December 30, 1920, the life of my grandfather, a holder of 7 military orders, a man who served the Fatherland faithfully and truly and was always, according to the testimony of those who knew him, “the personification of the Russian nation in its best manifestation” ended.

Monument in Feodosia

The Karl May School History Museum, founded by you, pays special attention to the fate of students and teachers who suffered during the repressions.

N.V.: When I began to study the history of the school where I studied from 1944 to 1949, since this topic is close to me, while studying the fate of students and teachers, I paid special attention to those who were repressed. Thus, a special stand was gradually formed, on which there is a list of victims, their photographs, in the display case there are some objects and publications, there is also a map of the country, which shows the locations of 253 camps. The list, unfortunately, is growing all the time... Fates are very different. I was familiar with one of the characters. Imagine, Soviet unified labor school No. 217, 1934. 9th grade students come to school and suddenly notice that three classmates are absent from class. No one day, two, three... It was not customary to ask about the reasons for absence in those years. Over time, it turned out that friends Seryozha Kozhin, Andryusha Frolov and Borya Ushakov often came to visit each other and discussed common affairs and problems. For some reason, neighbors suspected them of anti-Soviet intentions, wrote a denunciation, and the schoolchildren were arrested. Why do you think three schoolchildren were gathering in a communal apartment? They had, of course, a specific task - to kill Stalin... No more, no less... An amazing woman, Antonina Petrovna Prosandeeva, who graduated from our school in 1935, played an interesting role in this story. One day she comes to the museum and brings a small cardboard. And there is a drawing on it - a portrait of a young man. He says: “My life is coming to an end, I want to donate this drawing to the museum. I was an activist in the class, but we had one boy, Tolya, who could not be involved in school life. One day we were walking home from school and turned out to be fellow travelers. I finally got him talking, he turned out to be a very advanced student, well-read, and also knowledgeable about art. I had a lot of fun with him. And we somehow involuntarily began to try to leave school at the same time. Perhaps even some kind of school feeling arose. We left for the holidays. He went to rest at his dacha, located somewhere near Luga. Suddenly I receive a letter from him, and in it is this drawing with a dedicatory inscription, and I have kept it for a very long time. After the holidays, everyone returned to the city, we study for a week, two, three. One day Tolya was not in class, he did not come the next day, and he did not come on the third. And no one went home to find out - maybe he was sick, or maybe he needed help. Because it was dangerous to do so. Those were the times... And I never saw him again.”

This Tolya was arrested along with three young men who “wanted to kill Stalin,” in the language of the security officers. But if the boys who bore the Russian surnames Kozhin, Ushakov, Frolov returned home after four months, then the brothers Tolya and Vitya Klinge, who bore the German surname, were shot and never continued their studies.

Repressed "Maits"

Or a completely different fate. The Vekshin brothers studied here. They created the first school aviation club in Russia. Soviet aircraft designer O.K. wrote about this. Antonov. Kolya Vekshin was involved in yachting and was a candidate for the 1912 Olympic team, but did not go to Stockholm. Then he lived and worked in independent Estonia. As a member of the Estonian team, he won a bronze medal at the 1928 Olympics. After the annexation of the Baltic states, Nikolai competed in the USSR and became the country's champion and master of sports. But the valiant security officers did not sleep when they learned that he was from bourgeois Estonia, and they sent him to the camp where he died.

The total number of repressed students and teachers of our school reached 151, among them 46 people were shot, 12 died in the camps! But the search continues. Unfortunately, this list is not final...

Over the 22 years of its existence, approximately 22 thousand people visited the museum. And none of them said: “Why do you have this section, why remember this, why tell this to schoolchildren?” This is encouraging. But, having been to many school museums, I have never seen anywhere that there was an exhibition dedicated to repression. This is upsetting.

School Museum

What evil do you think that has taken root on our land and among our people in this post-revolutionary century should we first of all recognize, comprehend and condemn so as not to pass it on to our children?

N.V.: Of course, we need to give a reasoned, balanced and firm negative assessment of everything that happened, because the October Revolution is a national catastrophe, and that’s the only way it can be called. We can talk for a long time about the reasons. Now, for example, they write a lot about the role of different people in this disaster and to some extent, perhaps, they want to weaken the role of Ulyanov. In general, I will allow myself to express such bewilderment: how could people who had such an education, who knew the sad experience of the French Revolution, follow in the same footsteps and continue the atrocity only in the worst case? C b O with greater casualties and more dire consequences for the country. They still like to write about the fact that V.I. Ulyanov, of course, had shortcomings, but he was still a smart man. Without diminishing the negative role of Guchkov, Milyukov, Kerensky and others in those fateful events, I want to say that the one who is called the leader of the revolution is a fool, an evil fool. If he were really smart, he would have created an organization that, through evolutionary means, sought to rid Russia of its shortcomings, of which, of course, there were many. But if the organizers of the coup made sacrifices, to exterminate millions of people, then this can be called, at the very least, terrible stupidity, a gross historical mistake. The fact that this leader did not personally shoot a single person does not in any way justify him.

What do you think has happened to the appearance of our people over the past century? What did he lose, and what perhaps did he gain?

N.V.: I can only judge from literature what the people were like in the 19th century. Of course, he was different. And there were different levels of education and income, and different upbringings, but I think that his spirituality, even among the most poorly educated, was certainly higher than it is now. Perhaps religion was made too much of a state, and therefore its role was weakened. Perhaps some were not devoutly churchgoers, but the church had some kind of restraining influence on the forces of evil. The church was almost destroyed, and the people became spiritually impoverished. And I found fear. After what I personally experienced in 1937, learned and felt, fear settled in the depths of my soul forever. I’m talking to you, and at the same time I’m thinking: maybe we shouldn’t touch on some sensitive topics? But still I decided to conduct the conversation with complete frankness. My father lived his entire life in fear. I just recently learned that he, as a 1st year student at the Puteysky Institute, was arrested and sent to Moscow, to the Butyrka prison. And only the sister of my grandfather, the one who was shot in Feodosia, managed to somehow rescue him with the help of Peshkova. That’s why my father said: “I’ll never tell.” He was afraid to tell me about his ancestors because this knowledge could harm me in my life at that time. Even when we were sitting at a birthday party, let’s say, in 1987, and someone said: “You know, Brezhnev is doing something wrong there, why is he in Afghanistan...”. Immediately they heard: “Hush, hush, don’t say that, hush!” The generation that accepted and survived the repressions, that suffered from them, forever instilled fear in their souls, and it was reflected in the thoughts, behavior, relationships and education of the next generations.

Of those living today - those who know about that time only by hearsay, from stories and publications - a very small part properly understands the tragedy of what happened. Nowadays, we often read or hear: “Well, yes, then, of course, there were repressions, but in general this is all exaggerated and we need to remove 3 or 4 zeros from the number of victims, but we built the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station (I note – with prisoners!) and everything else.” There is only one way to understand what has been lost and whether it is possible to return something: only truthful education and upbringing, truthful education and upbringing, truthful education and upbringing. First of all, it means raising an honest person, raising a just person, raising a knowledgeable person. I’ll tell you what, in my opinion, is the main “achievement” of the October Revolution and everyone who made it: this is that they spiritually and morally corrupted the people, tamed their consciousness. Whenever the topic of education comes up in a conversation, I always remember a short essay published in the famous pre-revolutionary magazine Niva. Its author told how a boy, returning home from K. May’s gymnasium, heard an unexpected question from his father’s lips: “What is the punishment in your school for lying?” “My son looked up at me in surprise,” the author writes, “and said: “Dad, in our school it’s not customary to tell lies. After all, if the director finds out about this, he will be upset. Is it possible to upset your beloved director?’” This is how we were brought up and this is how we should be brought up! And when the school celebrated its 25th anniversary, the famous geographer and statesman Pyotr Petrovich Semyonov-Tien-Shansky, whose 8 descendants studied at this school, addressing those present, said: “After graduating from school, we all achieved different positions in life, awards , titles. What’s important is not this, but the fact that none of you has fallen morally.”

What is this moral strength? I will explain with this example. Diagonally from this building there is a house lined with Metlakh tiles; on the pediment there are numbers - 1909–1911 - the dates of the beginning and end of construction. The house survived the First World War and the Civil War, survived the blockade, after which 73 years have passed, and not a single (!) tile has fallen off. And from the walls of houses that were built in the post-war years and later, tiles fall off constantly and everywhere. Why, in particular? Because at that time a person, as a rule, was brought up in such a way that he could not do his job somehow. When I was asked during a live television appearance: “Do you agree, Nikita Vladimirovich, that our city is called the cultural capital?” I shuddered and said: “No, I don’t agree! Because in our city there really is a huge amount of cultural treasures: libraries, archives, theaters, museums, etc., but the behavior of the majority of residents does not give grounds for a positive answer... Our city is dirty, littered with cigarette butts and chewing gum residues. The good Russian language, not necessarily Pushkin's, not necessarily Turgenev's, not even necessarily St. Petersburg's, has disappeared! You hear, even the Prime Minister just recently said: “I’ll tell you this thing!” You can't express yourself that way. I can't "tell you a cucumber", I can't "tell you a glass", I can't "tell you a chair". I can describe the glass to you, hand you the chair. But one cannot say a thing. This is not the Russian language, this is a simplification, this is a sad part of the primitivization of the entire society! I can’t tell you that I saw a “cool performance”! I can say that I climbed some steep stairs. What's this? A long-running education system. Only this factor!

Of course, this is not the whole truth. There are still very good teachers. I know some. One of them is Dmitry Georgievich Efimov, director of the 209th Pavlovsk gymnasium, where I was yesterday. Imagine, a big school holiday, a meeting dedicated to the centenary of a fateful event - the abdication of the sovereign emperor. There, in a magnificent hall, the entire school was located. Those gathered saw a thoughtful script, a balanced assessment of the historical fact, interesting, talented performances - this historical fact was presented in such a dignified and correct manner. And how inspiredly Tatyana Nikolaevna Kochetkova, history teacher of school No. 323, carries out educational work in the Patriot club! So there are excellent teachers in our time... Not everything is hopeless.

Family photos on Nikita Vladimirovich’s desktop

Our next question is related to the question: do you have hope that our people, our country can be reborn? And if there is, then what is it based on, what does it rely on?

N.V.: Firstly, I really want to believe in revival, I want there to be hope! And it exists, of course, despite all the negative things that have happened in my life. I remember: this was back in pre-computer times... A girl, schoolgirl Tanya Martynova, is performing at a city local history competition. She talks about the results of studying the history of her ancestors, which she outlined in a notebook on 48 squared pages, where she provided information about 198 relatives! Moreover, among them, the greatest success in life was achieved by the foreman of livestock breeders on a collective farm located in one of the regions of the country. The speaker’s close and distant relatives were ordinary people, but she found them all, connected them all, and her search work even somehow inspired them, united them, and raised their self-awareness. Or, I remember, a girl speaks: pigtails, her voice is high, but at the same time quiet: “The first information about our family dates back to 1036...” We sit on the jury. I clarify: “Tell me, I didn’t hear: what year did the origins of your family date back to? By 1836? “No,” she says, “by 1036.” There are also such families. You know, there was a Renaissance era in history. I believe that we will have a new Stolypin. And also, forgive me for such simple flattery, but you are interested! You didn’t survive the blockade, the war, or the repressions. I hope you were not harmed in either the Afghan or the Chechen war.

And the last question: what do you think about national repentance? Is national repentance possible for our people? What could it be? Who can repent?

N.V.: It's a difficult question. To the first part – is it possible – I will answer in the negative. At the moment, serious repentance is hardly possible. Since our society is so different in its views on history... But still, thanks to Dmitry Sergeevich Likhachev B.N. Yeltsin repented for the execution of the royal family and publicly admitted it was a historical mistake, a disaster. Now we need to prepare society for the wisdom of moving the cemetery and Mausoleum from Red Square to another location, although you know that this opinion has many opponents. But perhaps it is even more important to admit that this whole path was wrong, the path to improving society through violence is not the road to a truly better future. We need to train as many educated people as possible, we need to train good teachers. Enlightenment is a very difficult process. And of course, the churching of the population, not only the Orthodox, should occur gradually, absolutely consciously and voluntarily. Spiritual education must be recognized as the most important.

Nikita Vladimirovich, but we need to understand whether we still have time and how much time is left for this upbringing and churching? If you now look at our people, at their knowledge of the Russian language, for example, what did you touch upon today: are these people Russian or not? To know the history, culture, geography of our country, are we Russian people or not? Will it not happen that we will cross that line, if we haven’t crossed it yet, when it will simply be useless and there is no need to repent, because we cannot be responsible for the mistakes of those with whom we are not connected in any way? This land, how long will it remain ours?

N.V.: I understand you, and there is a lot of truth in your words. Have we crossed that line? It is difficult to confidently answer this question; who knows, maybe we have overstepped. Gone are those generations who were the bearers of that spirituality, that culture. After 1990, for example, societies of descendants of nobles began to revive; I attended their meetings and events and have an idea about them. I’ll tell you completely honestly: if historically, even documented, someone is really a descendant of some kind of noble family, then, since he grew up in Soviet times, in his consciousness, in his upbringing, there is practically nothing left of the nobility, except for the rarest, to be maybe an exception. I won't say anything bad about them, but the point of return may have been passed. There once was a nobility, but it’s gone, and the communist partelite that existed will also go away, and even now it’s not at all the same as it was in ’17, not the same as it was in ’37, although modern communists still walk around and worship their god

The main thing, it seems to me, is to educate in the minds of future generations, as I have already said, the understanding that the revolutionary method of improving the life of society is unacceptable, erroneous, criminal, and anti-people. The word "repentance" means public confession. Note that now in our state it’s not that it’s forbidden to say this word, but I won’t say that they talk about it confidently and loudly. There is a memorial Solovetsky stone on Trinity Field, but a worthy monument to the repressed has never been erected anywhere, and it is unknown whether they will be erected. Every year on October 30, I come to Trinity Square and to Levashovskaya Heath, places where mourning rallies are held, but I don’t remember a case where any of the city leaders took part in these meetings. Authorities change, but no one has ever been to the Solovetsky Stone. This means that state policy does not imply public anathematization and recognition of that path, those repressions as a major historical mistake. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out painstaking work. Do your wonderful educational work, I bow deeply and thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak out, for the fact that we are like-minded people, I think, in all respects.

* Nikita Vladimirovich Blagovo, member of the Council of the Russian Genealogical Society, laureate of the International Prize named after. N.K. Roerich (2005), International Prize named after. Academician D.S. Likhacheva (2010), founder and director of the Museum of the History of the Karl May School. Among the many outstanding graduates of this school were artists A.N. Benoit, N.K. Roerich, V.A. Serov, K.A. Somov, academician D.S. Likhachev, Metropolitan John (Wendland), Archbishop Mikhail (Mudyugin), Archpriest B.G. Stark, cosmonauts G.M. Grechko, A.I. Borisenko

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On the site of house No. 39 on the 14th line of Vasilyevsky Island in 1844, a wooden house with a mezzanine was built. In 1907, it was acquired by the K. May gymnasium, which was then located in the premises of house No. 13 on the 10th line.

The school was founded in 1856 by teacher Karl Ivanovich May. A German born in St. Petersburg managed to create a men's gymnasium and a real school on its basis. By the end of the 19th century, this educational institution became one of the most popular in St. Petersburg. Artists V. A. Serov, A. N. Benois, N. K. Roerich, K. A. Somov, architects Yu. Yu. Benois, G. D. Grimm, F. F. von Postels, A. A. studied here Ol, scientist N. N. Kachalov, merchant G. G. Eliseev, psychiatrist A. E. Bari. There is a known case when a certain doorman won a large sum in the lottery - 100,000 rubles. With this money, he first bought the house in which he had previously served. Immediately after that, he sent his son to the K. May gymnasium. By the beginning of the 20th century, the growing authority and needs of the K. May school forced its director A.L. Lipsky to build a special building. For this purpose, a plot of land on line 14 was purchased.

In the same 1907, the architect G. D. Grim drew up a design for the building. Later, the building design was slightly changed and approved by the City Council on January 21, 1909. Construction was completed in the spring of next year. The grand opening of the building of the gymnasium and real school of K. May took place on October 31, 1910.

The first floor of the gymnasium was occupied by rooms for the director, teachers and a library. Classrooms are located on the second to fourth floors. They were located in the front part of the building; the windows of the dining room and gymnastics and assembly hall looked out onto the courtyard. In the courtyard outbuildings, classrooms for special subjects and auditoriums in the form of an amphitheater were installed.

A bas-relief was placed above the entrance to the school - an image of a cockchafer, a symbol of the gymnasium. The pupils of the gymnasium in the city were called nothing more than “May bugs”.

Equipment for the gymnasium was purchased to order, and special furniture was made for each age. The railings of the main staircase were decorated with brass balls, which prevented students from sliding down them while playing. Busts of famous scientists and writers were installed on the walls of the main staircase.

In 1912, according to the design of G.D. Grimm, an outbuilding with a sports hall was built in the courtyard.

After 1918, the K. May gymnasium was nationalized and merged with the E. P. Schaffe women's gymnasium. After these transformations, the Soviet Unified Labor School of I and II degrees No. 217 opened here, grades and certificates were canceled in the educational institution. Until 1929, the school maintained some of the traditions of the K. May gymnasium. However, after some publication in the Leningradskaya Pravda newspaper, the teaching staff was changed. The bas-relief of the cockchafer was knocked down (now restored). In 1937-1942 - 6th artillery special school. After the evacuation of students in 1942 to Tobolsk, the building was empty for 2 years.

School No. 5 was opened here in 1944, and girls began studying here again in 1954. The school occupied this house until 1976. Since 1977, the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences (now the St. Petersburg Institute of Informatics and Automation of the Russian Academy of Sciences) has been operating here.

In 1995, a memorial museum dedicated to the K. May gymnasium was opened in the building.

Biography

During the first ten years after graduating from the university, K. May taught history and German in various private and public schools in St. Petersburg, gaining teaching experience and testing his pedagogical ideas in practice. In the year K.I. May headed a private boys’ school, which later became known as the “May Gymnasium” or “Karl May’s St. Petersburg School.”

History of K. May Gymnasium

On the initiative of several German families who sought to give their children a good education in German, a private German boys' school was opened in the outbuilding of house No. 56 on the 1st line of Vasilyevsky Island.

It was headed by a talented practical teacher, a follower of advanced pedagogical views, Karl Ivanovich May (-).

In the first years, the school was primary, but then from that year on it received official status as a “Real School at the Gymnasium Degree,” which reflected the strengthened applied focus of education compared to state-owned educational institutions.

The main motto of the school was the saying of the founder of modern pedagogy, John Amos Komensky, “First to love, then to teach,” in accordance with which a team of teachers was created, consisting only of people with high moral and professional qualities.

School graduate of the year, writer Lev Uspensky, noted in his memoirs:

“May does not and cannot have obscurantist teachers, Black Hundred teachers, people “in cases,” officials in vice uniforms. Teachers, generation after generation, were selected from May on the basis of their scientific and pedagogical talent.”

All this, combined with the high quality of education, made it possible year after year to graduate highly moral, well-rounded young men from the school, ready to work useful for society. Thanks to the special atmosphere that arose in this educational institution, called the “May spirit,” the school of K. May, in the apt expression of its graduate of the year D. V. Filosofov, was “a state within a state, separated by an endless ocean from the government.”

The composition of the students, both by social status and by nationality, was very diverse, without any discrimination, the children of the porter and the sons of princes Gagarin, Golitsyn, Counts Olsufiev and Stenbock-Fermor, representatives of the families of entrepreneurs Vargunin, Durdin, Eliseev, Thorntons and descendants of the liberal intelligentsia Benois, Grimms, Dobuzhinskys, Roerichs, Rimsky-Korsakovs, Semyonovs-Tianshanskys, and in many cases this school educated several generations of the same family; The Benoit dynasty is a kind of record holder among these: 25 members of this family studied “with May.”

Young men more inclined towards the natural sciences were called non-Latinists: in the real department they received more knowledge in the exact sciences and prepared themselves for engineering activities.

There was also a small commercial department where English was studied instead of French. Thanks to this structure, the official name of this secondary educational institution became “K. May’s Gymnasium and Real School.”

For the first twenty-five years, the school was German, since lessons in all subjects, except for the Russian language, literature and history, as well as some disciplines of the real department, were conducted in the language of Goethe.

Since then, the school has been located in house No. 13 on the 10th line. The first graduation of the real department took place in the city, and the gymnasium - in the city. In the city, K.I. May handed over the reins to Vasily Aleksandrovich Krakau (-), a graduate of the year who taught history at his school. Under him, teaching methods were improved, a real department was developed, and classroom equipment was improved.

In the year, after the resignation of V. A. Krakau, Alexander Lavrentievich Lipovsky (-) was elected as the new director. During his leadership of the educational institution, two important events occurred. Firstly, the school celebrated its fiftieth anniversary by releasing a commemorative collection of memories of former students on this occasion. Secondly, due to the fact that, due to the growing popularity of the school, there was not enough premises, in 2009 plot No. 39 on the 14th line was acquired, where, according to the design of academician of architecture G. D. Grimm, a graduate of the year, a new building with a bas-relief was built chafer above the arch of the front door.

On October 31, with a large crowd of people, the consecration of the new school building took place by Bishop Veniamin of Gdov and Ladoga (in the future - Metropolitan of Petrograd).

On four floors of the school, in addition to classrooms for 600 students, there were 8 well-equipped subject rooms (three of them had auditoriums in the form of an amphitheater), as well as a carpentry workshop, a library with 12 thousand books in Russian, German, French, English, Latin and Greek, gym, dining room.

The Karl May School History Museum has been collecting information, documents, and exhibits related to the famous German St. Petersburg school, founded on the initiative of the German community in the mid-19th century, for more than twenty years. Address: St. Petersburg, Vasilievsky Island, 14 line, no. 39

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Details:

A private German boys' school opened in 1856 on the 1st line of Vasilyevsky Island in St. Petersburg in the apartment of the founder and first director of the school, the talented teacher Karl Ivanovich May (1820–1895). The main motto of the school was the saying of the founder of modern pedagogy, John Amos Comenius, “First to love, then to teach,” in accordance with which a team of teachers was created, consisting of people with high moral and professional qualities.

For sixty years, many German families sent their children to May, often two or three generations of boys studying at this school.

More details:

In the first years, the school was primary, but already in 1860 it received the official name “Real School at the Gymnasium Degree,” which reflected the strengthened applied focus of education compared to state-owned educational institutions. Teachers were selected from May based on their scientific and pedagogical talent. Created by K.I. Our system of upbringing and education provided for mutual respect and trust between teachers and students, constant interaction with the family, the desire of teachers to take into account and develop the individual abilities of each student, to teach them to think independently. All this, combined with the high quality of education, made it possible year after year to graduate highly moral, diversified young men from the school, ready for work useful for society. The composition of the students, both in terms of social status and nationality, was very diverse. Without any discrimination, the children of a peasant and a doorman, the sons of princes Gagarin, Golitsyn, counts Olsufiev and Stenbock-Fermor, barons Korf, Tiesenhausens and Stackelbergs, representatives of the families of entrepreneurs Schlisser, Bekkel, Durdin, Schitt, Eliseev, Thornton and descendants of the liberal intelligentsia studied here - Benois, Grimms, Dobuzhinskys, Roerichs, Rimsky-Korsakovs, Semenov-Tyan-Shanskys, and, in many cases, this school provided education to several generations of the same family.

For the first twenty-five years, the school was purely German, since lessons in all subjects, except for the Russian language, literature and history, as well as some real disciplines, were taught in Goethe's language.

During the period 1856 - 1918. About 3,800 St. Petersburg youth studied at the school, 1,300 of them received certificates. For excellent academic achievements, 15% of graduating high school students were awarded gold medals and 17% - silver.

In the fall of 1918, the private educational institution K.I. May was nationalized and transformed into the Soviet Unified Labor School of the 1st and 2nd stages. The museum's exposition also reflects the Soviet period of the school. Since the autumn of 1937, the building housed the 6th Special Artillery School, which in 1938-1941. At least 600 “specialists” graduated. Graduates of 6SASH fought valiantly on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, defended and liberated their native Leningrad.

Over the long history of the school, its graduates have achieved great success in various fields of science and culture. Over 160 graduates of the school became doctors of science, 41 were awarded academic titles. Among those who studied at the school were members of the State Council - Rector of the University D. D. Grimm, Governor of St. Petersburg A. D. Zinoviev and the Minister of Internal Affairs, later the Minister of Justice A.A. Makarov; Rector of the University E.D. Grimm, military leaders - generals and admirals N.A. Epanchin, P.N. Vagner, A.I. Varnek, N. Fogel I.V. Kossovich, P.V. Rimsky-Korsakov, cultural figures - members of the World of Art association, artists A.N. Benoit, N.K. Roerich, V.A. Serov, K.A. Somov, A.E. Yakovlev.

From 1978 to the present, the building of the former school has been occupied by the St. Petersburg Institute of Informatics and Automation of the Russian Academy of Sciences (SPIIRAN), whose leadership is represented by the director, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Honored Worker of Science and Technology of the Russian Federation, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Professor R .M. Yusupova, provides constant and selfless assistance to the museum.

The museum was opened on May 12, 1995 by the oldest student of the school, academician D.S. Likhachev. Since then, the permanent director of the museum and the main collector and custodian of the “May” history has been Nikita Vladimirovich Blagovo, through whose efforts over the twenty years of its existence the museum has turned into a significant phenomenon in the cultural landscape of St. Petersburg. In 2005 and 2009 A monograph by N.V. was published. Blagovo “School on Vasilyevsky Island” (in two parts).

In three halls of the museum, an exhibition has been created that reflects all the main stages of the 150-year history of the school. Visitors have the opportunity to get acquainted with school household items, textbooks, and personal belongings of former students and teachers of the school. Elements of the furnishings and equipment of the school classrooms have been preserved, and the atmosphere of the educational institution has been recreated. The stands provide information about the history of the school. In a separate room there is a special exhibition dedicated to academicians N.K. Roerich and D.S. Likhachev, pupils of the school, whose activities were aimed at preserving and developing national and world culture.

In 2006, the website “Society of Friends of the K. May School” and the group “ Society of Friends of the Karl May School" In addition, those interested can subscribe to the newsletter about the life of the museum and the website.