Naum Kravets and his family

This is my family. The picture was taken for the family album. From left to right: my father Solomon Kravets, my mother Shifra Kravets, my younger sister Rena Kravets and me.

The picture was taken in Moscow in 1940.

My parents got married in 1921. I was born on 4th January 1925, and in 1933 my sister was born. She was named Rena after our great-grandmother.

I wasn't a very good student. To begin with, I was lazy, besides my health was poor. I got sick pretty often in childhood, I was a bad trencherman and Mother suffered a lot because of that. I missed classes because when I got sick, then I had to catch up. In spite of that I wasn't a poor student, medium I would say.

I was a young Octobrist, then a pioneer, and then a Komsomol member. Like most children back in that time I was very politically motivated. Political classes were held on a regular basis as well as lectures on international events.

Father didn't take part in our upbringing. Our mother took care of our nutrition and health as well as our patriotic upbringing. We grew up firmly believing that we had the happiest childhood thanks to Stalin and the Party.

We knew that the Soviet regime was the most impartial, the Soviet army was the strongest and invincible and everybody ought to be strong, brave and loyal to the communist ideas, even ready to sacrifice life if needed.

At that time there were a lot of militarized circles and organizations. At school I joined the society OSOAVIACHIMA. I finished cavalry school. It was really hard for me, because I was feeble and sallow.

I went in for sport, poured cold water on my body trying to get stronger. We boys weren't even allowed to approach the horses. One of the pass-fail tests at school was vine cutting. If such a guy like I was to ride a horse - he would either fall and injure himself or injure the horse with the cavalry sword.

That's why there was a merry-go-round in the cavalry school surrounded by the vine. We were sitting on the wooden horses of the merry-go-round and cut the vine. It was hilarious.