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Nikolai Shvernik

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Nikolai Mikhailovich Shvernik was a prominent Soviet politician. He held several high-ranking positions within the government of the Soviet Union. Most notably, he served as the second chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet. This role made him the head of state from 1946 until 1953. However, his actual authority was quite limited during this period. Joseph Stalin held the real power as the general secretary of the CPSU. Stalin was the de facto leader of the nation.

Шверник Николай Михайлович (почтовая карточка) (cropped)
Шверник Николай Михайлович (почтовая карточка) (cropped)

Shvernik's early life was rooted in the working class of St. Petersburg. He was born there in 1888 to a Russian family. His father was a retired sergeant major who worked in local factories. His mother earned a living as a weaver. As a young man, Shvernik worked in factories as a turner. In 1905, he joined the Bolsheviks, a political group. He later served as a chairman of a soviet in a Samara pipe factory. During the Russian Civil War, he acted as a political commissar in the Red Army.

Throughout the 1920s, Shvernik built a career through extreme loyalty to Joseph Stalin. In 1923, he joined the staff of Rabkrin, an organization headed by Stalin. During this time, Shvernik was tasked with combating gambling and the sale of cocaine and moonshine vodka. In November 1925, the Central Committee appointed him Secretary of the Leningrad provincial committee. This was a significant move because Leningrad was the power base of Grigory Zinoviev, a rival to Stalin. Shvernik remained a full member of the Central Committee from 1925 until his death 45 years later.

Shvernik held many influential roles in labor and party administration. In 1926, he joined the Secretariat, a team of four secretaries led by Stalin. He also worked in the Urals as a regional party secretary starting in 1927. This assignment occurred because peasants were holding back food supplies due to expected price rises. By 1930, Shvernik became the first secretary of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions. He held this position until March 1944. He also served as a member of the Orgburo, which was a body that managed party organization.

His political career involved participation in difficult and serious legal matters. In 1931, Shvernik presided over the Menshevik Trial involving fourteen Russian economists. In February 1937, he was part of a commission investigating Nikolai Bukharin and Alexei Rykov. These men were prominent former oppositionists. The commission voted that they should be arrested, expelled from the Central Committee, and shot. During the Second World War, Shvernik managed the evacuation of Soviet industry. This was necessary to protect factories from the advancing Wehrmacht. In 1942, he became the chairman of the Extraordinary State Commission. This group investigated crimes committed by German-Fascist invaders and their accomplices.

After Stalin died in March 1953, Shvernik's status changed rapidly. Although he was a prominent leader, he was demoted shortly after the funeral. On March 15, 1953, he was replaced as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet by Kliment Voroshilov. He returned to his previous work with the trade unions. Later that year, he served on a panel of judges. This panel sentenced Lavrentiy Beria and six others to death. Despite his past, Shvernik became a senior leader who supported Nikita Khrushchev. He supported Khrushchev after the "Secret Speech," which denounced the crimes of Stalin.

In his later years, Shvernik worked toward correcting past injustices. In 1956, he was appointed Chairman of the Central Control Commission. In this role, he oversaw the rehabilitation of many people. These were individuals who had been wrongly convicted during the Stalin era. This process helped restore the standing of those who were treated unfairly. In July 1957, he regained his status as a full member of the Presidium. He remained a member of this body until he retired in 1966. Shvernik died in Moscow on December 24, 1970, at the age of 82. His ashes were placed in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis.

Shvernik's family also made significant contributions to Soviet society. His only biological daughter was named Lyudmila. She was the first woman in the USSR to graduate from the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy. Lyudmila led a laboratory at the Moscow Scientific Research Television Institute. Under her leadership, the Ariston, the first Soviet domestic television projector, was invented. In 1942, Shvernik and his wife, Maria Feodorovna, adopted Ziba Ganiyeva. She became a hero of the Great Patriotic War and the first female Azerbaijani sniper.

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