In memory yet green: Images of Leningrad 1944 overlaid on modern St. Petersburg

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

The text is all in Russian but the images are obvious enough. Someone took pictures taken in Leningrad in 1944 (assuming “65 лет назад была снята блокада Ленинграда” means something like “65 years since the Siege of Leningrad”) and overlaid them onto modern images of St. Petersburg, what Leningrad is called now.

Which reminds me:

A questionnaire once sent out in the Soviet Union contained the questions:

  1. Where were you born ?
  2. Where did you go to school ?
  3. Where did you attain your majority ?
  4. Where do you wish to live ?

One return provided the following answers :

  1. St Petersburg
  2. Petrograd
  3. Leningrad
  4. St Petersburg
2

Thanks, those are great pictures!

3

Interesting. But what are these big sausage-shaped things carried around in several pictures?

4

Ghostly, lovely. An excellent idea, well executed. I love the first photo.

5

Apparently they’re for transporting gas to fill barrage balloons. (cite)

6

My first knee-jerk smart-ass answer was “Those are fnords”, but honestly, I dunno. They look like some sort of balloons. Maybe they are similar to the balloons the Brits would tether to ships with steel cables to give low-flying German pilots second thoughts lest they cut off a wing?

7

I read through 4 pages of comments, and apparently not one of the Russian-speakers was wondering about them. Maybe it’s common knowledge there? I have no idea, though.

It was really weird to see anti-aircraft guns parked facing the university campus where I had Russian classes in 1989.

8

Spot on. My guess would have been that they were transporting gas to us as a gasoline/diesel substitute (like this) but I’d have been wrong.