Tolyatti today

The newspaper's output indicated that the newspaper had been published since February 1918. However, this is not quite true. In 1918, the newspaper “Stavropol Poor” was published, which was the official newspaper of the city’s authorities. It did not exist for long, but, apparently, its existence allowed another official city newspaper to consider itself a successor.

The first issue of the newspaper “For Communism” appeared in 1953. The newspaper as a whole continued the traditions of the official publications of the city and the district, which appeared earlier. Initially, the newspaper had several competitors in the form of large runs that appeared on the construction of the Volzhskaya Hydroelectric Power Station, but gradually, with the completion of construction and an increase in the population of the city, the public significance of the city newspaper grew. The newspaper was published 5 times a week, in A3 format on 8 pages.

In 1966, the Togliatti City Committee of the CPSU and the city Council of Workers' Deputies became the founder of the newspaper. (since 1985 - the city Council of People's Deputies).

The editors defined the type of their publication as "socio-political." A significant amount of material was presented by news from plenums and congresses of the CPSU Central Committee .

By the beginning of the 1980s, the circulation of the newspaper was 70 thousand copies. The structure of the issue did not differ from that of other political newspapers of that time:

• 22% of the area was allocated for coverage of political events and party life
• 15% of the newspaper space was devoted to the topic of industry and social competitions
• 8% were articles on society
• 7% - advertising, TV program, ads
• 5% was allocated for sports coverage
• 3.6% - cultural subjects
• 3.2 - Housing and utilities issues.

About 2% was allotted to reading correspondence, historical and local history materials, and issues of nature conservation and ecology.

In 1983, the newspaper changed the format from A3 to A2 . This made it possible to slightly change the distribution of areas by topic. The economy and industry were equal to politics and party life (20% each), and urban economy and society began to account for 10% each. Culture, sports, health, and ecology occupied 4-5% of the total area. Reader correspondence accounted for 3%, and advertising and announcements occupied approximately 10% of the newspaper area. New headings appeared: coverage of international life, the page "Creativity", where the works of local authors were published.

The newspaper staff often participated in regional and All-Russian competitions of city, district and large-circulation newspapers, where they won at least 6 times. True, the nominees at that time were evaluated not by the quality of the material presented, but by the quality of design and printing performance. Although the newspaper did not go unnoticed in thematic contests. For the constant heading “Take care of Mother Nature”, the newspaper “For Communism” has repeatedly received awards from the regional council of the Nature Conservation Society.

The style of presentation in the materials corresponded to the appearance of the party newspaper - ceremoniality, solemnity, officiality, careful weathering and thoughtfulness of formulations, which led to the appearance of numerous stamps. Typical, impersonal headings of headings, the same headings that say nothing about the contents of the article - “Overcoming difficulties”, “Competition workshops compete”, “It is worthy to complete the five-year plan”, “We approve and support!”, “Strengthen discipline”, etc. The editorials were usually peppy, optimistic and enthusiastic, with reports of new labor achievements on the road to communism. Critical materials, however, were presented mostly impersonally, from reproaches to “some comrades”, sometimes through their unconscious behavior hindering the onset of a brighter future. Serious problems in the city and at its enterprises were not reflected in the pages of the newspaper. Coverage of international events in capitalist countries almost inevitably led to the conclusion that the authorities in them are incompetent and untenable.

The existing regular column “On Atheistic Topics” demonstrated the newspaper’s focus on combating religious errors. The rubric “New ceremonies - to life” tried to create new socialist ceremonies and traditions as opposed to the old ones that accompanied events in human life: birth, wedding, death. So instead of baptism, they tried to instill the ceremony of solemn delivery of a birth certificate.

The newspaper actively participated in the anti-alcohol campaign by all genres: interviews , essays , feuilletons , letters from readers and even caricatures - everything was directed to the fight against vice. Similar mechanisms and with the same final effect were used to combat less visible “negative phenomena in society” - discos .

Up to 40% of the material in the newspaper was not written by full-time employees, but by work correspondents and freelance correspondents. At large enterprises in Togliatti, there were special offices where workers and employees could inform the townspeople about their labor news. For publications, special sections worked, for example, “In the footsteps of the letter is a work correspondent.” And to increase the level of such materials, the newspaper constantly ran a public two-year school of working correspondents. For admission to the school, the recommendation of the party committee or the Komsomol organization and the trade union was required.

But ordinary readers, too, did not leave the newspaper without material. Despite the relatively small amount of space allocated for feedback, the townspeople actively wrote letters to the editor. So, in June 1984, 703 letters came to the newspaper. Of these, 197 are answers to letters sent by the editorial office to various organizations and institutions, 187 letters were used in reviews or published, 208 letters were sent to enterprises for “consideration and adoption of measures,” and only 36 letters were written to the archive. Sometimes specially prepared actions were held, analogues of modern “direct lines” with various specialists. The availability of telephones to the townspeople was not high, so it was possible to send questions to the editorial office on a previously announced topic.

Another way of communicating with the reader was the public reception - one of the non-staff departments of the newspaper, which attracted respected employees of the city’s enterprises.

After the proclamation of perestroika by M. Gorbachev , in addition to the mass of materials devoted to perestroika itself and acceleration, the newspaper occasionally began to display materials on previously unthinkable topics: drug addiction , prostitution . The attitude to religious issues has changed, the newspaper “remembered” that “Soviet people have the right to profess any religion and worship”

The political events of 1990-1991 seriously affected the newspaper. In 1990, a new city newspaper appeared - Freedom Square . If the publisher of the newspaper “For Communism” continued to be a party committee, then “Freedom Square” stated that it represents the city Council of People’s Deputies - another branch of government.

Many of the employees moved to the new edition, which proclaimed the following program:

speak only the truth, do not adapt to the opinions of parties, publish a variety of materials, including about church life, hobbies, eccentricities, new parties and their leaders, youth subcultures, opinions, criticisms and suggestions from readers.

As a result, the newspaper “For Communism” lost in the competition, losing popularity and readers. In 1991, the newspaper was renamed the newspaper New Day. The publication acquired a radically left orientation, openly supported the Emergency Committee , but after its defeat it was forced to change its image. According to the results of the competition held in September 1991, the newspaper was published with a new edition and under a new name: “Tolyatti Today,” emphasizing its non-involvement in the now banned Communist Party .

The chief editor was Andrei Ulanov. In the first issue of the updated newspaper, the whole band was devoted to the events of August 19-21. The editorial explained the closure of New Day. The newspaper has developed a new policy "Opinions of the editorial board may not coincide with the views of the authors." The publication was aimed at a wide range of readers. The newspaper published economic materials, news of various spheres of life, a criminal chronicle, and a special application for motorists, “Clunker”, appeared.

The newspaper actively tried to restore its former popularity, to find new readers and advertisers. To do this, even radically changed color: in August 1994, the newspaper Togliatti Today, the first daily newspaper in Russia, began to appear in color.

On October 13, 1995, at the entrance of the Togliatti criminal war, unidentified criminals shoot Andrei Ulanov, editor-in-chief of the newspaper Togliatti Today. After 3 weeks, he died on November 2. This dealt a serious blow to the newspaper. She was left without control, quickly gaining debts. The city administration took the newspaper under its foundation, one of the oldest journalists of the city, Yevgeny Zhaplov, became the editor-in-chief. Multimillion-dollar budget injections helped pay off debts, but no efforts helped to regain former authority and popularity.

In 1997, after a series of political scandals by court order, the newspaper ceased to exist.

• Lyudmila Ivanova. From the history of the press of the city of Togliatti // relga: magazine. - 2003-04-12. - Vol. 12 (90) . - ISSN 1814-0149 .
• L. N. Lyuboslavova. The last steps to communism. (City newspaper "For Communism" in the period from 1980 to 1989.) // Small Museum Encyclopedia: a collection of scientific and popular science articles. - Togliatti: Togliatti Museum of Local Lore, 2009. - Vol. 3 . - S. 58-68 .