The Shifting Tide; An American Family in the U.S.S.R. - Benjamin Baker

Marshall Baker is my grandfather, and traveled to the U.S.S.R. with his family in 1966, 1970, and 1974. He was a theoretical physicist, and decided to go with his family for a variety of reasons.

Interview of Marshall Baker
6/6/10

What years were you in the Soviet Union?

1966 for 6 months, 1970 for 6 months, and 1974 for 7 months

Why did you decide to go to the USSR at a time when tensions were high between America and Russia?

In 1957, when I was in Stanford and there was a conference being held, and for the first time there as a group of 4 physicists, and I got to know one of them, and I was 25 then and he was 27, and I remember we went to see an Elvis Presley movie in 1957, so I had a contact already. Then, in 1964, there was the International conference of Physics, so I went there, and spent a few days in Moscow and some in Leningrad. I met this professor and other people, and had a very good time. The conference was just horrible, and I learned nothing. The only thing I remember was that there was a cruise on the Volga. When I was a graduate student one summer I took an intensive Russian class, so I knew how to speak Russian. All of these experiences made us think it was an interesting place to go, and my wife Marcia had a family history there.

How hard was it to travel in and out of Russia at this time?

We didn’t have particularly any trouble traveling, there was a long wait, but not much As far as living inside, there were limited regions, like you could only go 40 km around the big cities, but there were no problems for us.

When you were in Russia, what was the general feeling of the Russian people towards Americans?

Well the ones we knew all had a positive feeling towards Americans.

Can you describe the way politics fit in to your daily life while you lived there?

Politics didn’t effect us… let’s see how would it effect our daily life? There were no evident tensions between us and Russians, and there was a lot of interest among Russians of Americans in Russia, we weren’t affected or made uncomfortable by any tensions.

How westernized did Russia seem compared to America?

Well, the scientific institutes were the buildings were not very nice, but the science was very strong and Landau was there while I was… he had just had a serious accident… the quality of the science was very good, but the practical things, there wasn’t enough produce, so the food products were not as plentiful. But all of this was interesting for us. The first time we lived in a hotel apartment. It was exciting; we had all sorts of special privileges. They had all sorts of cultural things around there, we went to the ballet and the theatre all the time, it was hard to get tickets for ordinary Russians, but we could always go. There were a lot of nice urban things, but there weren’t too many things available in shops.


Was there much suspicion of you, as Americans coming to Russia at a time when tensions were so high?

No, there was none that I noticed.


What was your job like in Russia?

I was a theoretical physicist so the facilities weren’t noticeably different to me; I learned an awful lot from the people who were there. In that way, it was stronger than the science in America. It was a famous place, more so than the UW.

Did the Russian people you interacted with seem happy to live in the USSR, or were they jealous of the American conveniences you had?

That’s difficult because some people were more frank than others. I wouldn’t say they were jealous, but they would complain about how terrible things are. There was a whole range of people. It wasn’t about being jealous, but about being angry that things weren’t available. Some people had more things due to their political leanings; the more active talkers would talk about how they were discriminated against.

Besides brand-name products and other Western conveniences, was the standard of living in Russia low?

Yes it was less, it probably depended on where you were, and in Moscow it was the best. There was a bigger difference in smaller places. There were 2 bedroom apartments for 4 person families.

Did you feel that many changes occurred between your first trip to Russia and your last trip?

There weren’t gigantic differences, but small things might have changed. Mainly it was the same, but there was probably a little less available in 1966 than in 1974.






Marcia Baker is my grandmother, and traveled to the U.S.S.R. with my grandfather. She was working on atmospheric problems, and gathering data while in the Soviet Union.

Interview of Marcia Baker
6/6/10

What years were you in the Soviet Union?

1966, 1970, and 1973-74.


Why did you decide to go to the USSR at a time when tensions were high between America and Russia?

Well that was part of the reason we went actually. Nobody we knew had been there in the recent past, and we both had scientific contacts there. They were not person-to-person, just through literature. I had a sentimental feeling about Russia because my grandfather was Russian and lived with us when I was a child. It was possible for us to go because the academies of science in the USSR and America had an exchange program, which no one ever wanted to go on, so it was pretty easy to go.

How hard was it to travel in and out of Russia at this time?

In and out… well you certainly had to have some particular reason for being there, like permission from the Academy.

When you were in Russia, what was the general feeling of the Russian people towards Americans?

Oh, well of course like anywhere else we just knew a very small group of people. There were two groups, our colleagues and their friends, and then the people we met, who were working, the staff people and grocery people. And the people we each met as colleagues were themselves in 2 categories. Some were very friendly, and we felt very similar to them; Russians weren’t formal like the Western Europeans. But then there were people that just stayed away from us. Among the staff and other people there was a lot of fascination. At that time there was no contact at all between Russia and America, so we were very exotic.


Can you describe the way politics fit in to your daily life while you lived there?

Yeah, for a number of our colleagues, not our closest friends, but other people who wanted to be friendly to us, having any contact with us meant that they had to have somebody that they called a “babysitter” there. So we would go to some of these people’s houses for dinner, and there would be somebody there who was invited just because he was monitoring the conversation. It was always perfectly pleasant, you know, but that was there. And I worked in an institute, well for both of us getting in and out of the institutes was limited, we had access to parts of the institutes but not others, and when you entered any kind of institution, even hotels, there was always an old lady sitting at the entrance, who monitored who went in and out, and if you were a foreigner you weren’t allowed to go to certain places at certain times. So there was that, and part of my institute and part of grandpa’s institute were outside of Moscow, and we weren’t allowed to go there.

How westernized did Russia seem compared to America?

Mainly it was poor, I mean that was the main impact, the housing was very poor. People our age had grown up in the communal apartments, and they had their own apartments for the first time, and the apartments were small and poorly made. Now that was Moscow, but we went also to Tashkent and Samarqand, and those places were most definitely not westernized, people walked around with kaftans and turbans on, which was very different from Moscow. In Moscow it was just very poor.

Was there much suspicion of you, as Americans coming to Russia at a time when tensions were so high?

One interesting thing that somebody told us… nobody had cars then so everyone went around by public transportation, and I went back-during that period we were in Western Europe-and we came back just for a visit, and we were treated royally and everyone wanted to entertain us, and treat us to dinner, and after each evening we would come back by subway. Once I was leaving at 1 AM, and I said ‘Coming from Western Europe this is a shock to me, a woman and child alone on a subway at 1 AM, that just wouldn’t happen there” and he made this comment “yeah I guess in the West you worry about each other, here in Russia we are suspicious of the government”, I think that was the difference, that people were very friendly to each other in ways that were just wonderful for us. For example, people would just stop in at our house at 11 PM, just informal and wonderful, but they didn’t trust that the government was on their side.

What was your job like in Russia?

So my job was, I was working at an Institute and we were trying to look at some atmospheric problems, and we wrote a paper while I was there, and it involved collecting data and talking to people. The place I worked was very shabby and old. On the other hand, when you went to a seminar there, there would be a tremendous amount of questions and interruptions, so a seminar that was scheduled for 45 minutes would go on for 2 or 3 hours, which doesn’t happen here, after an hour everyone has something else to do. So on the one hand, there were very poor facilities, but on the other, everyone was very excited about science.

Did the Russian people you interacted with seem happy to live in the USSR, or were they jealous of the American conveniences you had?

They were definitely having a hard time. There were lines in the street for different kinds of food. When oranges appeared in the winter, there were lines on the street a block long. That meant that people who were working had to leave their job, it was particularly hard for women, women who were working full time had to watch each others desks, while the other would run out to get food, so of course they were jealous, in a situation like that. One interesting thing they said, we had three kids with us, and there was no washing machine so we washed everything by hand, and once a Russian friend saw me hanging up their blue jeans and she said “only in a rich country would kids walk around out on the street in those shabby clothes.” And it’s true, they were very poor, and they wore uniforms to school, and when they got home they would change into their shabby clothes. They always had one pair of nice clothes that they would wear out on the street, which they cherished. Our kids were walking out on the street with shabby jeans because they wanted to, and they could have had brand new ones, it was a kind of mark of style, not that they had to wear them.

Besides brand-name products and other Western conveniences, was the standard of living in Russia low?

The housing was a terrible problem and food was very limited, the variety was very limited. On the other hand, it was a socialized country. Medicine was available to everybody, education was available to everybody, daycare was available to everybody, so those things which we took advantage of were advantages to us. Materially, no one had cars, no one lived spaciously. They would have two room apartments for families of 4, and that meant the living room was a living room by day and a bedroom by night.

Did you feel that many changes occurred between your first trip to Russia and your last trip?

Not so much between 66 and 73. I don’t remember thinking that things had changed very much. I don’t remember the easing of tensions.
One thing you didn’t ask me about, all three kids learned a lot. The schooling was excellent, and all three of them came back ahead.





David Baker is my father, and traveled to Russia with my grandparents. He provides the perspective of an American child in the U.S.S.R. Being a child in the U.S.S.R. he saw firsthand the way children there lived, and he realized how much your opinions are effected by the people who tell you what to think.

Interview of David Baker
6/6/10

How old were you when you traveled to Russia?

I was there three times. The last time I was in 6th grade, I was 12, the previous time I was in 2nd grade, I was 8, and the time before I was around 4

How was the schooling in Russia compared to that in America?

Well what was different was that all the grades were in the same school, and you had to wear these gray uniforms to school, everyone had to take the same classes, they had these parades every Friday for pioneer day

How did politics play a part in your daily life as an American child in the USSR?

It played a part because when I came home from school I would go out and play hockey with my friends from school, and we mainly played hockey but sometimes we would just talk, and they would say capitalism is bad, and I would say communism is bad, so all the kids, even if the parents may have been doubters, at the school there was pioneer day, with this red flag and it was very ra ra ra, and everyone felt very good about being communist. So it was really indoctrinated into people, that communism was the best thing. I don’t really remember them saying capitalism was evil, but they definitely heard that. And then there were these places, the most fun places to hang our, and they were called the Young Pioneer Centers, and there would be foosball and all of these games, it was this huge cavernous place. The communist party was putting it on.

Did you feel that the standards of living were lower in Russia than in America?

I guess they were, because everyone lived in apartments, everyone wore the same kind of clothes. I just remember these old women selling piroshkys, these greasy but delicious meat-filled pastries. They had no western products, so I would occasionally go to the American Embassy and get candy bars, and bring them into school, and it would be the most amazing thing to the kids. So I guess the standard of living was lower, there were certainly no American goods. The stuff they had, the chocolate, was all made in Eastern Europe.

Did the Russian children you interacted with seem happy to live in the USSR, or were they jealous of the American conveniences you had?

They were very very happy about living in the USSR, and I think at that time the only information that they got on the West was just that it was bad, corrupt, and the rich people controlled everything. They thought that it was extremely strong capitalism, and poor people and black people had nothing. They really had no idea about Western culture, so they had nothing to be jealous of. So I guess that’s a big difference before the Internet, they had no idea what the West was like. And I guess as a kid I didn’t really think the standard of living was bad, I never felt sorry for them. I think for a kid it doesn’t matter if you’re in a rich or poor country, as long as you have enough to eat and can go out and play it doesn’t really matter. They didn’t know what they were missing, but I don’t think they would have cared so much. Maybe if they were 15 or 16 and had seen all the things they didn’t have, but I guess I don’t know why 12 year olds would care.



Did you notice any changes in Russia between your first and last trips?

Well there were changes but they were more due to me than the place. I have different memories of what the places were like, but it was more due to me changing than the places changing.

Do you have any other comments about life in the USSR as a child?

One thing that really impressed me about it was how much what you are told about something determines who you are and what you believe. What really lasted for me was that people’s beliefs are totally determined by where they are. There were those crazy conversations where I would say capitalism is good and they would say communism is good and it just clearly had no basis in anything, just dependant on where people grew up. Very normal, reasonable people could have different beliefs based on where they grew up. Like, I remember, on the last week of school, I went to the American Embassy and got a whole bunch of 3 musketeers and snickers bars, for everyone in the class. I gave them out, and it was such an exotic thing for everybody. But then everyone brought me gifts, and they were way more amazing, these strange Russian things that I had never seen before. Maybe it was a difference between America and Russia at this time, in America there was so much mass production that they could produce zillions of snickers bars. There was a little less mass production in Russia, so what people had to give away were not mass produced goods.

The politics was everywhere, it was always “this is good, this is brought to you by the pioneers.” Everyone was a pioneer, on pioneer day you would get a red scarf and you would march in these big parades, and I remember the older, high school age people would come up to me and show off their English. I think at that age they were a little more cynical of the whole thing. But at 12 years old, everyone totally bought into it. The indoctrination system definitely worked for kids up till 12. I think that’s a really powerful thing about a totalitarian government, the ability to completely convince kids that anything is good. So I guess what made it work was that there was no exposure to American TV, movies or anything else. There was no way you could learn anything about America. You didn’t know anything except what you were told. On the other hand, people were happy and led good lives. You could get good food at the store, there were long lines but I didn’t see them, and you would go out and play after school. I wouldn’t say the quality of life was any worse for a kid in Russia than in America. I mean there it was kind of nice because everything was so central. There everyone had small houses no one hung out in their house, so all the kids went out to play, and people would congregate in the pioneer centers. So I think for a kid the quality of life was a little better there than here. It’s just once you get a little older, and find things you want to do but can’t do, that’s where the limitations would really come in. So there were some things about the system that made life fun for kids.