Demichev, Peter Nilovich

Born on December 21, 1917 ( January 3, 1918 ) in the village of Pesochnya in the Kaluga province (now Kaluga region ) in a working class family.

In 1937 - 1944 he served in the Red Army .

Education

He graduated from the Moscow Institute of Chemical Technology. D. I. Mendeleev (1944) ^[1] . In 1944-1945 he was engaged in scientific and pedagogical activities at the Moscow Institute of Chemical Technology

In 1953 he graduated from the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the CPSU (in absentia) ^[2] . In the Higher School of Economics, P. N. Demichev worked on a dissertation on European philosophy of the 19th century ^[3] .

Party career

• 1945 - 1950 - Head of Department, Secretary of the Soviet District Committee of the CPSU (B.) Of Moscow.
• 1950-1956 - in the apparatus of the Moscow city committee of the CPSU (b) and the Central Committee of the CPSU.
• 1956-1958 - Secretary of the Moscow Regional Committee of the CPSU.
• 1959 - 1960 - First Secretary of the Moscow Regional Committee of the CPSU.
• 1959-1961 - member of the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU for the RSFSR .
• 1960-1962 - First Secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU. He was one of the main initiators of the removal of the body of I.V. Stalin from the mausoleum , and reburial. The famous phrase of Demichev himself, which he said at the Bureau of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU: “Leaving Stalin's body in the mausoleum would be blasphemy.”
• 1961-1974 - Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Since 1963 he oversaw the chemical industry. In 1965 he was replaced by L. F. Ilyichev as Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, in charge of ideology, history and culture. In this post, by the beginning of the 1970s, he had gradually removed from the propaganda department of the Central Committee practically all “hidden Stalinists” ^[4] . Sharing some of the views of the "soil workers" , he patronized Ilya Glazunov and Vladimir Soloukhin ^[5] . December 16, 1974 relieved of his duties as Secretary of the Central Committee in connection with the appointment of the Minister of Culture of the USSR ^[6] . He was replaced by M. V. Zimyanin, who was elected at the XXV Party Congress in 1976 ^[7] .
• 1964 - 1988 - candidate for membership in the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee, set a record for being in that capacity .

Member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (1961-1989).

Civil Service, Recent Years

• 1958 - 1959 - Manager of the Council of Ministers of the USSR .
• It is alleged that after the death of Marshal R. Y. Malinovsky in 1967, A. N. Shelepin proposed to appoint Demichev as Minister of Defense ^[3] .
• 1974 - 1986 - Minister of Culture of the USSR .
• 1986-1998 - First Deputy Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR .

Since 1988 - a personal pensioner of national importance .

Member of the Council of the Union of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of the 6–11th convocations from the Moscow Region (6th and 9th – 11th convocation, 1962–1966, 1974–1989) ^{[8] [9] [10] [11]} and Moscow (7–8 convocation , 1966-1974) ^{[12] [13]} .

After the collapse of the USSR during the time of Boris N. Yeltsin , whom he considered a “random person,” Demichev lived in a dacha in the Moscow Region, renting out his Moscow apartment ^[14] .

He died on August 10, 2010 in the village of Zhavoronki, Odintsovo district, Moscow region . He was buried at the Znamensky cemetery (Moscow region, Odintsovo district, the rural settlement of Znamenskoye ).

• “He had three higher educations and was very delicate and clever ... he was unrestrained - a wonderful, wonderful man with a clear conscience” ( Elena Obraztsova ) ^[15] .
• Yuri Lyubimov called him “Chemist” and “Nilovna,” and in his published letters to his son he did not hide his contempt for Demichev: “Our ideologist wears smoky glasses, he has a gray-haired permanent with a light wave and his face gleams with night cream, he speaks very quietly, to everyone you have to listen; occasionally, muttering something, pretend to write down, but when necessary, he even yelled and screamed at your dad, and once, when dad after a hard conversation, where, straining and listening to the severely quiet instructions, half I did not understand what would happen to him, leaving after the audit The scientist, already holding the door handle, heard the chemist's distinctive loud voice: “So, no Demons, no Vysotsky and no Bulgakovs.” Apparently, Nilovna expected that Dad would faint on the other side of the office. what to do with dad. " ^[sixteen]

On November 20, 1970, I. A. Efremov sent a letter to P. N. Demichev in order to protect the publishing house “Young Guard”, which printed I. E. Efremov’s novel “Hour of the Bull”. The letter, in particular, said:

The magazine "Young Guard" ... is subjected to severe criticism (in my opinion exaggerated). Among the mistakes of the editors ... consider the publication of my novel. Some people saw in the novel the defamation of our system. ... Of course, “Bull Hour” is a very complex novel, and one of its main goals was to criticize Maoism, which, as you know, uses the experience of communist construction in our country, distorting and twisting it for its own purposes. And it is very bad for criticism, if the image of the future system modeled on Maoist China plus the gangster monopoly capitalism, it takes for some image of our system!

It is possible that I may meet inaccurate individual places, but how can a fantastic novel claim the absolute infallibility of predictions of the future or descriptions of such? ..

Naturally, I appeal to the supreme organ of the party of our country with a request either to indicate my mistakes or to clarify that the publication of my novel “Bull Hour” is not an ideological error of the editorial board of the magazine “Young Guard” or, accordingly, of the publishing house. ^[17]

In March 1971, P. N. Demichev and I. A. Efremov met in the Central Committee building. According to the recollections of the widow of the writer T. I. Efremova, I. A. Efremov “surprised that the Secretary of the Central Committee is well acquainted with his works and is based not only on materials prepared by referents. Regarding the novel “Bull Hour”, Demichev advised focusing on issues of autocracy, rather than collegiality, on which the party-state system of the USSR is built. In conclusion, he said that the impressions of the books are identical to the appearance of the writer ... He proposed to send him manuscripts of future books. This wish was fulfilled and the manuscript of the last novel “Thais of Athens” was sent to him ” ^[18] .

In 2002, M. S. Listov, the author of the film “The Revelation of Ivan Efremov”, in a personal conversation with A. I. Konstantinov, spoke about his recent telephone conversation with P. N. Demichev. According to M. S. Listov, P. N. Demichev said: “Efremov was a great man. If it had not been banned, but studied, many troubles could have been avoided in the future. ”

From a memo from P. Demichev to the Central Committee of the CPSU of November 10, 1981: “ Vysotsky’s creative fate, behavior and mentality were adversely affected by his ideological immaturity, as well as personal moments, like marriage to the French actress M. Vladi , his commitment to alcoholism , which exacerbated his spiritual drama and duality, led to a spiritual and creative crisis. ” “The popularity of Vysotsky, especially after his death, clearly shows an element of unhealthy sensationalism, intensified by hostile circles abroad, interested in ranking Vysotsky as a dissident ...” ^[19]

P. N. Demichev had three brothers and two sisters. His elder sister worked all her life as a milkmaid on the collective farm, the second sister Marfa Nilovna - an apprentice seamstress. Nephews were machine operators, one of them, Alexei Petrovich Demichev (1943–2015), was a deputy of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation from the Kaluga Region.

Wife - Maria Nikolaevna Demicheva (born 1919), singer, worked in the chorus of A.V. Sveshnikov . Daughter - Elena Petrovna Shkolnikova (born 1952) - singer, soloist of the Moscow Philharmonic, People's Artist of Russia ^[20] . Grandson - Peter Borisovich Shkolnikov (born 1972).

Son-in-law - Komsomol and economic activist Boris Shkolnikov (1952–2013); matchmaker - A. M. Shkolnikov (1914-2003), chairman of the USSR National Control Committee in 1974-1987.

• Four Orders of Lenin (06/21/1963, 02/02/1968, 12/02/1971, 02/02/1988)
• Order of the October Revolution (01/02/1978)
• Order of the Patriotic War I degree (04/23/1985)
• Order of the Red Banner of Labor (01/30/1957)
• medal "For Labor Valor" (12/25/1959)
• anniversary medal “Forty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945” (04/23/1985)
• medal "For the strengthening of the military community" (02/02/1980)

• Gathered a large collection of Leninist busts ^[21] .

• State power of the USSR. The supreme bodies of power and administration and their leaders. 1923-1991 Historical and Biographical Handbook / Comp. V.I. Ivkin. - M., 1999. - ISBN 5-8243-0014-3

• Biography.