Mikhail Kalashnikov was born in a big and close-knit family where he was the seventeenth child. His mother, Alexandra Frolovna Kalashnikova, nee Kaverina (1884–1957), was a daughter of a priest. His father, Timofei Alexandrovich Kalashnikov (1883–1930), is a peasant’s son.
The families of the future designer were settlers. Mikhail Kalashnikov’s parents got acquainted in the Kuban region, celebrated a wedding and settled down in their own house and several years later moved to the village of Kuria in the Altai region under Stolypin’s agrarian reform. The household was well-to-do and in 1930 the family was dispossessed as kulaks and then deported to the village of Nizhnyaya Mokhovaya of the Tomsk region where Timofei Kalashnikov died a few months later. His widow remarried a neighbour, the same dispossessed peasant Efrem Nikitovich Kosach. This union was not based on love, rather, it was a marriage of convenience since the widower neighbour had three children of his own who had to be raised. By that time Alexandra Kalashnikova had lost many daughters and sons, only eight children survived. She needed to feed and provide for the children and she could not do without strong support of a man. The family created practically by chance proved to be remarkably strong.
Mikhail Kalashnikov was jealous of his mother over the stepfather and even kept an axe under the pillow intending to kill Efrem Kosach one night. But the widower neighbour born in Ukraine proved to be a calm, domesticated and hard-working man. He took care about Alexandra Kalashnikova’s children as well as about his own. He called Mikhail Kalashnikov “Mysha the big one” because there was one more Misha in the family, his own son. Later Kalashnikov recalled that this simple and fair man did not make an allowance for age — tools; he liked working with his hands, and soon wanted to create something by himself.
The mother also treated her own and adopted children equally, but still picked out Mikhail. Probably, because he was a thin and sickly child. Having lost other children Alexandra Frolovna tried to give “Mysha the big one” best pieces of meat, turn the frying pan so that more porridge was in front of him. Mikhail noticed all this and often left the table without eating anything. He was angry with his mother, while the latter, in her turn, worried that she could not take care of her son properly.
The families of the future designer were settlers. Mikhail Kalashnikov’s parents got acquainted in the Kuban region, celebrated a wedding and settled down in their own house and several years later moved to the village of Kuria in the Altai region under Stolypin’s agrarian reform. The household was well-to-do and in 1930 the family was dispossessed as kulaks and then deported to the village of Nizhnyaya Mokhovaya of the Tomsk region where Timofei Kalashnikov died a few months later. His widow remarried a neighbour, the same dispossessed peasant Efrem Nikitovich Kosach. This union was not based on love, rather, it was a marriage of convenience since the widower neighbour had three children of his own who had to be raised. By that time Alexandra Kalashnikova had lost many daughters and sons, only eight children survived. She needed to feed and provide for the children and she could not do without strong support of a man. The family created practically by chance proved to be remarkably strong.
Mikhail Kalashnikov was jealous of his mother over the stepfather and even kept an axe under the pillow intending to kill Efrem Kosach one night. But the widower neighbour born in Ukraine proved to be a calm, domesticated and hard-working man. He took care about Alexandra Kalashnikova’s children as well as about his own. He called Mikhail Kalashnikov “Mysha the big one” because there was one more Misha in the family, his own son. Later Kalashnikov recalled that this simple and fair man did not make an allowance for age — tools; he liked working with his hands, and soon wanted to create something by himself.
The mother also treated her own and adopted children equally, but still picked out Mikhail. Probably, because he was a thin and sickly child. Having lost other children Alexandra Frolovna tried to give “Mysha the big one” best pieces of meat, turn the frying pan so that more porridge was in front of him. Mikhail noticed all this and often left the table without eating anything. He was angry with his mother, while the latter, in her turn, worried that she could not take care of her son properly.
