The biography of Kalashnikov Mikhail Timofeevich in many respects personifies the characteristic image of the Soviet dream. His whole life's journey was the path of a man who came from a poor peasant family, but managed to create a big name for himself all over the world at the cost of his own labor and talent.
Childhood and youth
Biography of Kalashnikov Mikhail Timofeevich begins in a small village in
Altai Territory. Here he was born on November 10, 1919, being the seventeenth child in a peasant family. Misha was barely ten years old, the family was dispossessed and was exiled to the Tomsk region. Here the boy went to school. Already from school, Misha was passionate about technology, geometry, physics. In his teens, he first became acquainted with weapons when, out of curiosity, he dismantled the American Browning pistol.
Army service and years of war
After leaving school, the young man worked for some time in the railway depot, and when he was nineteen years old (this happened in 1938), he was drafted into the army. There he completed a training course, having received the title and specialty of a tank mechanic driver. By the way, as any biography of Mikhail Kalashnikov attests, it was during this period that he began to show extraordinary design abilities. For example, in the army he invented an inertial counter that counted the number of shots of a tank gun. The very popular TT pistol was improved by his efforts . By chance, the young officer was one of those soldiers who were destined to perform military service at the very initial moment of the German invasion.
Kalashnikov Mikhail Timofeevich (the date of death of many of these guys fell on the first days and months of the war, since they were the first to contain Blitzkrieg in difficult conditions) at the beginning of the war he was a member of the
tank division. But during the defense of Bryansk in the fall he received severe wounds and was shell-shocked. And yet, while in the hospital, he found ways to help free the country. At this time, a new design of the submachine gun was conceived and implemented. However, the sample never entered service with the troops, although it was made. Since 1942, Mikhail served at the Central Range for Small Arms Research, which was subordinate to the Main Artillery Directorate. Actually, in 1944, a self-loading carbine was developed here, which later will form the basis of a machine known throughout the world.
Postwar biography of Kalashnikov Mikhail Timofeevich
The first version of the machine known today appeared in 1947. And immediately he becomes the best in field competitive trials among similar projects. The design was finalized by 1949 and entered service. Very soon, his brainchild gained crazy popularity on all continents, becoming a symbol of struggle. Kalashnikov Mikhail Timofeevich, whose photo was now familiar to every person in the USSR, was awarded the Stalin Prize. The inventor continued to improve and optimize small arms. In particular, the machine itself was repeatedly subjected to subsequent modernization. And its creator and later more than once received high awards.