RUSSIAN EMPIRE, 1914
…And while Komrad Hu Weng slept, images of my father’s past flashed before my eyes like in a movie. Winter of 1914. A pipe factory in Russian town Samara. In two huge halls with tall windows covering the entire walls and glass ceilings, fitters and
pattern makers work in the sixth tool shop, while in the spacious workshop, on brand new made in Great Britain machines, turners, pattern makers, and millers work hard.
My Father was literate so he read the news to the workers. They were concerned about stories about revolutionaries who had escaped from European exile, and arrests in the city. The head of the tool shop, Staff Captain Vysotsky, pretended not to be
interested in the mood of the workers, and only the senior foreman, Lyman, who did not like my Father, passing by the animated workers, muttered under his heavy breath:
“Don’t forget yourselves! This isn’t France.”