The Presidential Library marking the 120th anniversary of Hero of the Soviet Union Valery Chkalov

February 2, 2024 marks the 120th birthday anniversary of the Soviet test pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union Valery Pavlovich Chkalov. The Presidential Library's collections feature Nikolai Bobrov’s book Chkalov (1940). The preface to the publication, published two years after the tragic death of the pilot, was written by his widow Olga Erasmovna Chkalova.

Nikolai Bobrov talks in detail about how a boy from a large family from the village of Vasilevo (now Chkalovsk) in Nizhny Novgorod Region walked towards his goal. About a free childhood in the open spaces of the Volga, about life from hand to mouth, about hard work as a fireman on a stone shovel. And how at the age of 16 Valery Chkalov began working as a parts assembler in the 4th Kanavinsky Aviation Park. He got pilots to take him on flights. Rising into the sky, he felt that he could not have another life.

In the summer of 1924, a graduate of the Serpukhov Air Combat School, military fighter pilot Valery Chkalov came to serve in Leningrad in the 1st Leningrad Red Banner Fighter Squadron named after P. N. Nesterov.

One day, the squadron commander, walking around Leningrad, suddenly heard the intermittent hum of an engine among the city noise. He stopped at an intersection and began to look in the direction where the rumble was coming from. After a few seconds, it was easy to determine that the plane was approaching from the direction of Aptekarsky Island. The fighter flew in loops, that is, it continuously made one loop after another, moving along Bolshoy Prospekt. At the airport it turned out that it was Chkalov’s plane.

Every day Chkalov honed his skills. He flew the plane with mathematical precision. No one could surpass him in the art of aerobatics. It’s impossible to convey what it looked like from the ground. What secret was hidden in Chkalov's car? In his hands, the car, overcoming gravity and inertia, turned into a fabulous firebird.

In his free time from flying, Chkalov loved to listen to Russian songs. Once, on New Year’s Eve, many smart girls gathered at the club of the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute. Olga Orekhova was among them. Guys she knew surrounded her and asked her to sing something. Suddenly a stranger in a leather flight jacket and high boots approached Olga. He extended his wide palm and said: “Chkalov. Fighter. From the squadron. Let's get to know each other". He admitted that he had been going to the club for four months to listen to her sing. Valery and Olga left the club together and never parted again. A year later they got married. Chkalov's attachment to his family was touching; he felt the separation acutely. This was especially felt during preparations for his famous flight over the North Pole to America. Olga Erasmovna rarely saw her husband, who spent all his time in Shchelkovo at the airfield. He had no time to come to Moscow, she did not dare to visit him: she did not want to take him away from work. Sometimes they talked on the phone.

The crew consisting of Valery Chkalov, Alexander Belyakov and Georgy Baidukov accomplished the impossible at that time - the first non-stop flight over the North Pole from Moscow to Vancouver, Washington (USA). This happened in 1937. “Sit down. Earth”: – Chkalov pronounced these two words quietly, but barely containing his joy. “Here it is, America...”

The Presidential Library's portal features the navigator's logbook of the legendary aircraft N025, in which the crew kept notes and calculations throughout the entire route of the historic flight from Moscow to the United States of America. As they said about the pilot abroad, “Chkalov flew from Moscow as a hero of the Soviet Union, and arrived as a hero of the world”. On June 18, 1937, at 1:04 a.m., the first page of the flight log reads “takeoff” and on June 20, at 4:20 p.m., “landing in Vancouver”. In total, the crew was in the air for 63 hours and 16 minutes. In the preface to the publication of the in-flight magazine, Valery Chkalov is called “the great pilot of our time”.

Chkalov often spoke about this flight during his numerous meetings with Soviet residents.

The webinar Wings of the Motherland, which is available on the Presidential Library's portal, tells more about the history of the development of aviation in Russia, about hero pilots, including Valery Chkalov. One can also learn about a digitized selection of newspapers Chkalovskaya Commune from 1939 to 1958, historical photographs of streets and memorable places associated with the name of the pilot, postcards and cinema posters about him.