Komsomol Kindergarten PMK-169

This is the Komsomol Kindergarten in ПМК-169, a district of the village Novoshepelichi situated just outside the city border of Pripyat. The people living in this district were Komsomol workers. The preschool is in a bad state. Thieves and neglect has destroyed most of the building.

The Komsomol, also known as the ‘All-Union Leninist Young Communist League’ was the youth organization of the Communist Party. The name comes from the first syllables of three Russian words meaning Communist Union of Youth. In Russian: ‘Kommunisticheskiy Soyuz Molodyozhi’. Basically, every teenager from the age of 14 in the USSR was a Komsomol member or komsomolets. Only those who studied poorly or were sent to juvenile prisons did not receive this rank. For many teenagers, Komsomol membership was not interpreted as propaganda, it was simply a stage in their development and most still maintain fond memories today.

PMK-169, or in Russian ПМК-169, was a settlement of Komsomol members. The village was created before the construction of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. People who lived here worked on drainage of swamps to create space for the power plant and Pripyat. Eventually, the PMK-169 became a small village with its own kindergarten.

Residents of this village were evacuated only a week after the evacuation of Pripyat.