Larisa Starostina was born in 1922, in Anzhero-Sudzhensk. She completed nine grades at School No. 11 and worked as a kindergarten teacher. In 1942, when Starostina was 20 years old, she was called to the front. At first, she studied at Krasnoyarsk school of junior specialists as a gunsmith, and afterward, she graduated from the courses of parachutists at Kharkiv Bomber School.
Larisa Starostina got to the epicenter of military operations only in April 1943. She was sent to the town of Kinel, Kuybyshev region, where military pilots were trained. Starostina participated in training flights and helped the pilots.
Then, she was assigned to the Volkhov front, to the Tikhvin station. There, Larisa Starostina served in the 958th Air Assault Regiment of Riga: keeping parachutes in order and re-positioning them when necessary. She recollected that the flight schedule was very tight, and everyone was loaded to the limit. Mutual aid helped in the hard times: instrument makers, motorists, gunsmiths — everyone prepared the plane for flight.
‘We were not directly involved in the battles, did not fly on combat missions, but we also suffered: and shelling, and bombing, and the deaths of combat friends — we survived through everything’, Starostina said. During the war, she went to the Leningrad and 3rd Baltic fronts, in Estonia, Latvia, and reached Riga. Then, the regiment formation was transferred to Moscow: there was a lack of airplanes and flying staff. Larisa Starostina met Victory Day in the capital.
After the war, Larisa Starostina returned to Anzhero-Sudzhensk and went to work at a sewing factory: first as an apprentice, then as a foreman and fitter. Then, she worked at a sewing and shoe factory and as a sewing foreman in the artel ‘RKKA’. Since 1954, she worked as a seamstress on lightweight clothing at the garment factory.
In the 1960s, Starostina returned to work with children: she taught sewing at School № 11 and was head of the Sewing Class at the House of Culture of the mine № 9/15. Then, she worked as a fitter at the store #158, then at the store #140, from where she retired in 1977.
Larisa Starostina got to the epicenter of military operations only in April 1943. She was sent to the town of Kinel, Kuybyshev region, where military pilots were trained. Starostina participated in training flights and helped the pilots.
Then, she was assigned to the Volkhov front, to the Tikhvin station. There, Larisa Starostina served in the 958th Air Assault Regiment of Riga: keeping parachutes in order and re-positioning them when necessary. She recollected that the flight schedule was very tight, and everyone was loaded to the limit. Mutual aid helped in the hard times: instrument makers, motorists, gunsmiths — everyone prepared the plane for flight.
‘We were not directly involved in the battles, did not fly on combat missions, but we also suffered: and shelling, and bombing, and the deaths of combat friends — we survived through everything’, Starostina said. During the war, she went to the Leningrad and 3rd Baltic fronts, in Estonia, Latvia, and reached Riga. Then, the regiment formation was transferred to Moscow: there was a lack of airplanes and flying staff. Larisa Starostina met Victory Day in the capital.
After the war, Larisa Starostina returned to Anzhero-Sudzhensk and went to work at a sewing factory: first as an apprentice, then as a foreman and fitter. Then, she worked at a sewing and shoe factory and as a sewing foreman in the artel ‘RKKA’. Since 1954, she worked as a seamstress on lightweight clothing at the garment factory.
In the 1960s, Starostina returned to work with children: she taught sewing at School № 11 and was head of the Sewing Class at the House of Culture of the mine № 9/15. Then, she worked as a fitter at the store #158, then at the store #140, from where she retired in 1977.
