Moisey Plotkin with his second wife Marianna

This photo was taken in Leningrad in 1948. This is me with my second wife, Marianna Meyerovich, soon after our wedding. My cousin Vera, the daughter of my mother's sister Musia, was married to Abram Meyerovich. She got me acquainted with her husband's Jewish relative, Marianna Abramovna Meyerovich. We got married soon. It happened on 28th August 1948. When Marianna and I got married, we didn't know each other well enough. We liked each other when we met. She promised to be a faithful and devoted wife, but there was no time for the mutual feeling to grow stronger. I wanted to put my personal life in order as quickly as possible and to bring up my daughter in a normal family environment. Marianna was a 5th-year student of the Medical Institute at that time and her marriage allowed her to stay in Leningrad when it came to getting an assignment. Otherwise she should have been sent to work in some far-away countryside district of the country with hard conditions. Nevertheless, our marriage became a really happy one. We matched each other very well and got closer and closer every year. Marianna appeared to be a real Jewish wife, totally living in the interests of the family. She brought up Genrietta as if she were her own daughter. She supported me in all my life struggles. In 1949 our son was born. Jews have a tradition to name their children with traditional family names, in honor of their grandfathers. But in 1949 it would have been cruel to give the name of Abram or Simcha to a child. Anti-Semitism increased in the country. So the children were given Russian names, but at least the first letter matched. We gave our son the name of Konstantin in honor of his great-great-grandfather Kusiel. We lived with my wife's parents, the six of us in two rooms. I always appreciated the kind and benevolent atmosphere in our home. Even some tiffs with my mother-in-law, inevitable in every married man's life, didn't prevent me from feeling our family and our home as a reliable and strong rear.