Why Poddubny. Ivan Poddubny - Russian hero

- (1871 1949) Russian athlete, Honored Artist of Russia (1939), Honored Master of Sports (1945). In 1905 08 world champion in classical wrestling among professionals. In 40 years of performances, he has not lost a single competition. Since 1962 they have been held... ... Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

Russian professional wrestler, athlete, Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1939), Honored Master of Sports (1945). In 1893-96 he worked as a port loader... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Poddubny, Ivan Maksimovich- Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny (1871 1949), world champion in classical wrestling among professionals (1905 1908). For 40 years of performing in Russia and on the international stage, he has not lost a single competition. Poddubny memorials have been held since 1962. ... Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary

- (1871 1949), athlete (classical wrestling), circus performer, Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1939), Honored Master of Sports (1945). In 1899 he joined E. Truzzi's troupe. He worked in various circuses in Russia and toured abroad. In 1905 08 world champion... encyclopedic Dictionary

Genus. 1871, d. 1949. Athlete (Greco-Roman wrestling). World champion in classical wrestling among professionals (1905 08). In all the years of performances (more than 40 years), he has never been defeated. Honored Artist of Russia (1939). Honored Master... ... Large biographical encyclopedia

Ivan Poddubny Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny on a postage stamp of Ukraine Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny (Ukrainian Ivan Maksimovich Piddubny) (September 26 (October 8) 1871 village of Krasenovka in Cherkassy region now Ukraine August 8 ... Wikipedia

Wikipedia has articles about other people with the same surname, see Poddubny. Ivan Poddubny: Poddubny, Ivan Vladimirovich (born 1986) Russian football player, mini football player. Poddubny, Ivan Maksimovich (1871 1949) Russian and... ... Wikipedia

Poddubny, Ivan Vladimirovich (born 1986) Russian football player, mini football player. Poddubny, Ivan Maksimovich (1871 1949) athlete, professional wrestler of the Russian Empire ... Wikipedia

Ivan Maksimovich (1871 1949), world champion in classical wrestling among professionals (1905 1908). For 40 years of performing in Russia and on the international stage, he has not lost a single competition. Since 1962, memorials to Poddubny have been held... Modern encyclopedia

Russian and Soviet wrestler, strongman, circus performer and athlete Ivan Poddubny is a prominent figure in the history of sports around the world. Before the XXXI Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Russian athletes were stimulated with stories of the best athletes, including the life and career of I.M. Poddubny.

short biography

Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny was born September 26, 1871 in a populated area Bogodukhovka Poltava province (now Cherkasy region in Ukraine) of the Russian Empire. He belonged to the family of Zaporozhye Cossacks.

Ivan inherited considerable strength and endurance from his father. He inherited a good ear for music from his mother. As a child, he sang in the church choir.

Job

From 12 years old Ivan Poddubny worked: first on a peasant farm, then as a loader in the port of Sevastopol and Feodosia. For about 1 year (1896-1897) he was a clerk.

Wrestling career

In 1896 Ivan entered the big arena for the first time and began to defeat famous wrestlers at that time: Lurikha, Razumova, Borodanova, Pappy. Thus began Poddubny’s career as a wrestler who became famous throughout the world - a six-time “Champion of Champions.”

First fight with Le Boucher

One of Poddubny’s most famous fights was 2 fights with a French wrestler Raoul Le Boucher. Their first fight ended in victory for the Frenchman: Le Boucher used the dishonest technique of escaping Poddubny’s captures by smearing himself with oil. At the end of the match, the judges gave him primacy with the wording “for beautiful and skillful avoidance of acute techniques”.

Revenge

At a tournament in St. Petersburg, Ivan took revenge on Le Boucher, forced the French wrestler to 20 minutes stay in a knee-elbow position until the judges took pity on the French wrestler and gave the victory to Poddubny.

In November 1939, in the Kremlin, for his outstanding services “in the development of Soviet sports,” he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor and awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR. Poddubny left the carpet in 1941 at 70 years of age!

Circus athlete and weightlifter

In 1897, Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny began performing in the circus as a weightlifter, athlete, and wrestler. With a circus troupe he traveled to many countries, visited 4 continents.

The period of war - the story of Poddubny's godson

The godson of Ivan Mikhailovich lives in the city of Yeisk, Krasnodar Territory - Yuri Petrovich Korotkov. Poddubny lived there during the war. There are many incredible stories and legends surrounding the period of the Great Patriotic War around the personality of the famous wrestler.

Stories and legends

Yuri Korotkov confirms some of them, as he witnessed what was happening. For example, what Ivan Mikhailovich walked openly during the occupation of Yeysk by the Germans with the Order of the Red Banner of Labor on his chest. To all the objections of those around him and the fear that he might be shot, he responded like this:

“They won’t shoot me, they respect me”

And indeed, the Germans respected the elderly fighter. When our people returned to the city, he was summoned several times for questioning by the NKVD. Poddubny did not understand what he had done wrong and said that they were asking him ridiculous questions and could not understand that he was a true patriot of his country.

"Saint" Poddubny

Another nickname for Ivan Poddubny is "Saint". Despite the fact that religion was practically banned in the USSR, many of his acquaintances called him a saint.

The reason for this was simple, although it was not without some mysticism: Poddubny simply always helped others. And it was when he was nearby that “miracles” happened. Once, by laying on of hands, he cured an acquaintance’s arrhythmia, another time, a neighbor’s chronic headaches...

last years of life

There is an opinion that after the war Ivan Maksimovich was starving. However, his godson refutes this:

“Poddubny received a good ration. I myself followed him to the meat processing plant and to the warehouse where rations were distributed to the military. Poddubny had a roomy bag for this, which he called a “gut.”

Until the last day, the “Russian hero” did not lose his strength and endurance: he worked tirelessly around the house, carried water in a 4-bucket container.

Ivan Poddubny died of a heart attack August 8, 1949. His body was buried in Yeisk in a park that is now named after him. Also in the park there is a monument to him and nearby there is a museum and a sports school named after. Poddubny.

Poddubny Ivan Maksimovich (1871-1949) - Russian athlete, five-time world champion in classical wrestling among professionals in 1905-1909, Honored Master of Sports (1945). In 40 years of performances he has not lost a single fight.

Poddubny was born on October 9, 1871 in the Poltava region, in the village of Krasenovka. At the age of seven, his working life began: first he herded geese, then cows, and at the age of twelve he began working as a farm laborer for rich neighbors and relatives.

At the age of 22, Ivan left his native village and went wandering. He worked in the port, where he first demonstrated his enormous strength.

Soon the young man met the sailor Preobrazhensky, who became his first sports mentor. Daily long-term training turned Ivan Poddubny into a real athlete; his mighty strength was supplemented by cat-like agility. He was only waiting for an opportunity to measure his strength against worthy opponents.

In the spring of 1896, the young strongman made his first debut in Feodosia, in the Beskorovainy circus. At first he performed unsuccessfully, but his second attempt brought a long-awaited victory over the professional wrestler. Having felt the taste of fame, Poddubny decided to devote his life to sports.

In 1897, he left for Sevastopol, where he began performing in the Truzzi Circus as an amateur wrestler. A few months later, Ivan Maksimovich turned professional, setting himself the goal of always being the first and having learned one rule - there can be no equality in strength and art.

Having moved to Kyiv, the young man worked at the Russian Circus of the Nikitin Brothers, where he also won victories over famous strongmen. Meanwhile, the Russian Athletic Society closely monitored the athlete’s successes. It was on his initiative that Ivan Poddubny was sent to the World Wrestling Championship held in Paris in 1903 together with Alexander Aberg.

The Russian weightlifter won his first victory at the championship over the German champion, contender for the prize, Ernest Siegfried, the second was the Frenchman Favouer. And then eleven victories followed one after another. However, the twelfth meeting with the French athlete Raoul de Boucher did not bring the long-awaited success, and Poddubny dropped out of further competition. Being a strong man not only physically, but also mentally, the Russian strongman continued his hard training, improving his skills.

Participation in the big Moscow championship is a turning point in the life of the famous wrestler. His achievements, which later led him to the pinnacle of world fame, became known outside the city. However, many continued to believe that Poddubny wins only thanks to natural strength, and not skill.

The tournament held in St. Petersburg (1904) refuted the opinion of the majority. From the fight with the same Frenchman Raoul, Ivan Maksimovich emerged victorious. A successful fight with the two-meter giant Paul Pons brought the Russian professional wrestler the title of champion and worldwide fame.

In 1905, Poddubny again went to Paris, where he took part in the championship for the title of world champion. The dexterous and strong athlete from Russia quickly won the love of the audience. In the final match with the famous Dane Jesse Pedersen, Ivan Maksimovich rose to the occasion. Having successfully applied his own combined Tatar wrestling technique, he won the fight and received the world champion ribbon and a cash prize. This was a triumph for Poddubny, and with him for the Russian Empire.

Since 1905, the Russian strongman participated in all European championships, from where he always brought prizes and championship titles, thereby increasing the glory of Russian professional sports. In 1906-1907 Poddubny successfully competed in competitions in Bucharest, London, Brussels, Amsterdam, Aachen, and at the end of 1907 in Paris he again won the title of world champion.

In February 1908, on the initiative of the German weightlifter Jacob Koch, the next world championship was organized in Berlin, in which such stars as Pedersen, Siegfried, Pengal, Poddubny and others took part. Koch, who claimed first place, was afraid of meeting with the Russian heavyweight and offered him 2 thousand marks for losing in the final. Poddubny agreed, but during his performance on the Wintergarten stage he easily put his opponent on both shoulder blades. Everyone soon became aware of Ivan Maksimovich’s trick, and the German wrestler became the talk of the town.

Numerous victories made Poddubny a hero of European newspapers, and journalists dubbed him the “champion of champions.” In 1909, having defeated the German Weber, the forty-year-old Russian weightlifter thought about leaving professional sports. He was still full of strength, but he understood perfectly well that his time was running out and it was better to leave the stage undefeated. Having bought land in the Poltava region and proposed to the capital’s beauty Antonina Nikolaevna Kvitko-Fomenko in 1910, Poddubny left with her for his homeland.

But three years later he returned to the sport, and again one victory followed another. On January 27, 1915, at the championship held at the Salamonsky Circus on Tsvetnoy Boulevard in Moscow, Poddubny finished in a draw with the young wrestler Ivan Shemyakin, which lasted 1 hour and 20 minutes. This happened for the first time. In subsequent years, the aging strongman increasingly fought to a draw with young athletes who were gaining experience.

In 1924, Ivan Poddubny suffered defeat for the first time and again started talking about leaving the professionals. But circumstances turned out differently.

Marriage to Maria Semyonovna Mashoshina (mother of the young wrestler Ivan Mashoshin) and the need for money to start a household forced Ivan Maksimovich to go abroad, first to Germany and then to the USA, where he had to learn freestyle wrestling techniques. However, he was more attracted to the classic fight, so in the fight with the American champion Joe Stecher, nicknamed the Nebraska Scissors, Poddubny failed to achieve a decisive advantage.

Having earned money, the Russian weightlifter returned to his homeland. In the resort town of Yeisk, he bought a small house, but could not sit in one place for a long time. Every year Maria Semyonovna accompanied her husband on a tour of Russian cities. In 1937, sixty-six-year-old Poddubny’s victories were forty years old, but he still continued to perform. In 1945, for outstanding achievements in the field of sports, Ivan Maksimovich received the title of Honored Master of Sports.

On the evening of August 7, 1949, the famous wrestler died at the age of seventy-eight. This man left a noticeable mark on the history of sports, paving the way for Russian weightlifters to European and world tournaments.

Brief biographical dictionary

"Poddubny Ivan" and other articles from the section

Ivan Poddubny was born in the village of Krasionovka, Zolotonosha district, Poltava province (now Chernobaevsky district, Cherkasy region of Ukraine) on October 8, 1871 in the family of a hereditary Zaporozhye Cossack Maxim Ivanovich Poddubny. The Podubbny family was famous for its remarkable strength: Ivan was also no exception, having adopted from his ancestors his great height, heroic strength and amazing endurance. In the prime of his strength, the famous wrestler weighed about 120 kilograms: in 1903, when Poddubny was 32 years old, at the French wrestling championship in Paris, he was given a medical card: height 184 cm, weight 118 kg, biceps 46 cm, chest 134 cm at exhalation , hip 70 cm, neck 50 cm.
From childhood, Poddubny was involved by his parents in hard peasant work, and from the age of 12 he worked as a farm laborer. Ivan’s father, Maxim Ivanovich, himself was of outstanding height and phenomenal strength; many years later, Poddubny stated that the only person who was stronger than him was his father.
In 1893-1896, Ivan worked as a port loader in Sevastopol and Feodosia, then for a year he served as a clerk at the Livas company. In 1896, in the Feodosia circus of Beskaravayny, Ivan Poddubny won his first victories over the famous athletes of that time - Lurich, Borodanov, Razumov, and the Italian Pappy. A year later, Poddubny began performing in circus arenas as a weight lifter and wrestler (he started with Russian belt wrestling, and in 1903 switched to classical (French) wrestling). Sometimes Poddubny lost some fights, but over 40 years of numerous performances, the Russian hero did not lose a single competition or tournament.
The wrestler repeatedly performed on tours in Russian cities and abroad, and in total visited about 50 cities in 14 countries, repeatedly won “world championships” in classical wrestling among professionals, including the most authoritative of them - in Paris.
Poddubny spent three years (from 1924 to 1927) on tour in Germany and the USA, and on February 23, 1926, all telegraphs and newspapers in the world “trumpeted” about him: “The other day, Ivan Poddubny defeated the best wrestlers of the new world in New York, having won the title of “American Champion”…” By that time, Ivan Poddubny was a six-time World Champion among professionals, but everyone was amazed not only by the fabulous strength and skill of the athlete, but by Ivan’s age: Poddubny won his triumphant American victory at the age of 55!
In November 1939, in the Kremlin, for his outstanding services “in the development of Soviet sports,” he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor and awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR.
Ivan left wrestling in 1941 at the age of 70 (!). In the post-war years, the great athlete lived in terrible poverty and deprivation; for the sake of food, he even had to sell all his won awards. Ivan Poddubny died on August 8, 1949 in Yeisk, a small resort town on the shores of the Azov Sea, from a heart attack.

A proud inscription is carved on Poddubny’s grave: “Here lies the Russian hero.”

Ivan the Terrible, Ivan the Terrible, Ivan the Bolshoi, Ivan the Invincible. He is Old Man, Russian Bear. He is also a port loader, champion of champions in classical wrestling among professionals Ivan Poddubny. Height 184 cm, weight 118 kg, chest volume 134 cm, biceps - 44, neck - 50... “If he doesn’t throw it, he’ll break it,” his opponents said about him. In 40 years of performances, he has not lost a single competition. And he fought until he was seventy! And no one over the years managed to pin Poddubny to the carpet with spatulas.

Many books have been written about the eminent wrestler - carefully edited and censored. They describe in detail the wrestler's sports career - and not a line about his life during the Civil War. About the fact that in 1919 Poddubny was almost shot by anarchists in the Zhytomyr circus. In Kerch, he was miraculously not killed by a drunken officer who hit him in the shoulder.

Nowhere is it described in detail about the personal life of Ivan Poddubny. About the fact that his first love, the gymnast Mariyka, crashed in the circus arena. His wife, actress Kvitko-Fomenko, ran away with a White Guard officer, taking with her all his medals. And the second wife, a bagel seller, kept the mighty Poddubny at bay all her life, often shouting: “You can’t have fun with French women...” Behind this phrase hid the secret of why the wrestler could not have children. For refusing to continue the tour, the American impresario slipped him a beauty sick with syphilis.

During the Great Patriotic War, in the first days of the occupation, Ivan Poddubny ended up in the Gestapo. Under the Germans, in order to feed himself, he began working as a bouncer in a billiard room. After the war, Poddubny’s case was handled by the NKVD. They spared the old man, but did not forgive him. In the last years before his death, he was constantly malnourished. The famous wrestler died practically penniless...

Years later, the archivists of the seaside city of Yeisk, where the wrestler lived for the last 22 years, decided to reveal the truth about Poddubny to us. Several generations of enthusiasts collected priceless documents, certificates, extracts, and most importantly, truthful, previously unpublished memoirs of Poddubny’s contemporaries.

“Artist, circus performer, Ivanushka the Fool”

Curtains embroidered with yellow sunflowers. There are huge pumpkins in the entryway. On the shelves there are pots with grips, on the table there are dumplings, lard, dumplings with garlic. “Eat cabbage soup!” - the black-browed hostess offers us in a sing-song voice. From the slightly open window a quiet chant can be heard: “There’s a cherry orchard there...”

In Poddubny’s family nest - the village of Krasenovka, in the Poltava region, every second resident can call himself a distant relative of Ivan Maksimovich.

On the farm they speak with respect about the strength of their eminent fellow countryman: “He could easily carry three men on his back.” When Ivan Poddubny was asked if he had met people stronger than himself, he answered with his characteristic frankness: “On the carpet, no. But in life... my father was much stronger than me!”

“Ivan’s father, a mighty Zaporozhye Cossack, used to take a loaded cart by the shafts and drag it up the mountain, while the horse just walked, rearranging its legs,” Trofim Krivonos, a resident of the village of Krasenovka, recalled at one time.

Yes, the Poddubnys’ entire family was made up of heroes,” confirms 83-year-old grandmother Alena. - Ivan’s brother, Mitrofan, served in the imperial troops, where only heroes were selected. The younger sister, Evdokia, was second to no one at the gulna. It used to be that he would take off the guy’s hat, run up to a barn made of logs, or, in our opinion, a chest of drawers, lift a corner from the stones, put that hat on him and stand there laughing. The guys then push, pull out the hat together, but all in vain!

In the village they told us that as a boy, Ivan Poddubny fell in love with his second cousin Olenka Vityachka. She was married to a man named Nikitchenko, who said “it looks like this” after every word. And the corresponding nickname stuck to his wife. So that the boy “wouldn’t be foolish,” his father sent Ivan to his grandfather in Bogodukhovka. And soon the seventeen-year-old hero left his native place, went to work, became a loader in the Sevastopol port, where his sports career began.

“I gave birth to a joke! - Poddubny’s father raged in front of his wife. “Admire how your son has become,” he shook a newspaper sheet where his son Ivan was depicted in tights. “An artist, a circus performer, Ivanushka the fool...” Maxim Ivanovich will never come to terms with his son’s choice. Even when he helped the family financially, even when he became the world champion! Even then, from his native Krasenovka, Ivan received letters from his brothers: “I don’t even want to hear that, Ivan, having become a fighter... The stinks are rotting so much and it seems like I’ll break the shaft on your neck.”

The villagers remember how Ivan once came to the village with a small, “three times smaller than himself,” pretty girl - the acrobat Mariyka. The young people wanted to get married. But in Voronezh, during her performance, Mariyka was unable to perform a difficult somersault and crashed in the arena. After burying the girl, Ivan decided to leave the circus.

“Sports Heart”

Doctors who examined Poddubny’s cardiac activity after training never ceased to be amazed: the wrestler did not even notice slight fatigue of the heart muscle. “Ivan Zhelezny has a “sports heart,” experts stated. Poddubny was able to develop energy like an explosion at the right moments and not lose courage in the most difficult and dangerous moments of the struggle.

Having received an offer from the St. Petersburg Athletic Society to take part in the international championship, he went to Paris. Having won 11 victories, he stumbled against the French champion Raoul le Boucher. Experienced in behind-the-scenes fighting, the Frenchman used the Turkish method to treat the body with olive oil, which was absorbed into the dry skin and then released along with sweat, making the body imperceptibly slippery. No matter how hard Poddubny tried, he could not catch the Frenchman escaping from his powerful grasp. Boucher then won on points against Ivan Poddubny. But the very next year, Ivan Zhelezny took revenge, winning the title of world champion in French wrestling and receiving the main prize - 10 thousand francs. And then the vengeful Raoul le Boucher hired bandits. Poddubny miraculously survived. Hiding from killers, the wrestler was forced to abandon his tour of Italy and hastily move to Africa.

Championships were replaced by tours. Poddubny fought in sports arenas, in circus arenas, and on the stages of summer theaters. Tired of fraudulent paid competitions, where everything was based on deception, collusion, and bribery, at the age of forty Poddubny decided to leave the arena. He arrived in his native Krasenovka with a two-pound chest of gold medals and a dazzling beauty - his young wife, actress Antonina Kvitko-Fomenko.

In the vicinity of the village, Ivan the Invincible bought 120 acres of black soil, at the same time allocated considerable plots of land to all his relatives, built an estate, started two excellent mills, an apiary, and a fashionable stroller. But his father Maxim Ivanovich did not rejoice for long that “the dissolute eldest son had finally returned to peasant labor.” A couple of years later, Ivan Poddubny went bankrupt. One of his mills was burned out of spite by his younger brother; the second, like the estate, he sold to pay off a debt to his competitors, the owners of the surrounding mills. Rural life bored Ivan Bolshoy, who was accustomed to the light of the stage and the filled circus hall. Exclaiming: “Let him put it down if he can!” - He stepped onto the carpet again. And his wanderings began throughout Russia and abroad, where people flocked to see the world-famous wrestler.

Residents of the village recall the story of Poddubny himself, when “his performances began at the moment when the Reds were the owners of the city, and ended after the arrival of the Whites.” In 1919, Poddubny was almost shot by drunken anarchists in the Zhytomyr circus. He fled, leaving his things behind, wandering around without money. And a little later, in Kerch, a drunken officer shot at him. Then in Berdyansk he had an unpleasant meeting with Makhno. In 1920, he visited the dungeons of the Odessa Cheka, where every second person who did not take the side of the revolutionary proletariat was shot. Fortunately, Poddubny was recognized and released in peace.

The bullets did not take Ivan the Great - he received a blow in the back from his own wife.

Grandmother Alena recalls that Panna Antonina did not like rural life - changing clothes several times a day, she rushed around the house, not knowing where to go. When Denikin’s men ruled the village, she, taking with her all her husband’s sports medals, fled from Krasenovka with a white officer. Later she repented and wrote to Ivan: “Forgive me, Vanechka, I’ll crawl all the way to you on my knees.” But where is it? Cut off.

“Under the Germans, at the Poddubny meat processing plant they began to give out 5 kg of meat”

Having traveled to 14 countries, Ivan Poddubny settled in the quiet seaside Yeisk with his second wife, Maria Semyonovna. I met my betrothed while on tour in Rostov-on-Don. She was the mother of the young wrestler Ivan Mashoshin. The no longer young woman worked in the bakery. She was friendly and homely. When a 40-year-old wrestler proposed marriage to a simple Russian woman, she put forward the condition: “We must get married.” And completely indifferent to religion, Poddubny went to the altar.

Why Ivan Bolshoi settled in provincial Yeisk, archivist Natalya Ginkul explains:

The wrestler's contemporaries recalled that, having traveled extensively around the world, Poddubny remained essentially a village peasant. He wrote with difficulty and neglected punctuation marks, except periods. He was not a delicate person either - he could “in a lordly manner” give a person unequal to himself two fingers to shake. It was easier for him to kill a dozen grenadier officers than to learn how to use a knife and fork. Only among the peasants and artisans did he feel comfortable. Green, quiet, provincial Yeisk reminded him of his native village in the Poltava region, where he spent his childhood and youth. Hearing a saying dear to his heart - “backing” of local residents who mixed Ukrainian words with Russian ones, Poddubny decided to buy a house in a seaside town. I chose a place - on the very side of the road, near the estuary, above the cliff.

The war found the seventy-year-old fighter in Yeisk. In August 1942, the city was occupied by the Germans. Ivan Bolshoi did not evacuate - when they asked why, he waved it off: “Where to run? Dying soon." During those years, his heart began to ache. Poddubny did not trust medicines - he made friends with Shcherbinovsky Cossack healer, paramedic of the First World War Kharchenko, and was treated with tinctures from Kuban steppe herbs.

Poddubny never hid the fact that in the first days of the occupation he was detained by the Krauts from the Sonderkommando “10-s”, which in the city was called the Gestapo. The fighter walked around the occupied city with the Order of the Red Banner of Labor attached to his shirt. Local residents recalled that there were two people in Yeisk who received such an award. The Germans killed the female drummer in a gas chamber. But Ivan Bolshoi was not touched. Moreover, Poddubny soon began working as a marker - a bouncer in the city billiard room.

My uncle, shoemaker Lukich Zozulya, with whom I was raised, helped Ivan Maksimovich manage the billiard room during the occupation,” recalls Poddubny’s godson, artist Yuri Korotkov. - It was arranged in a sailor’s club, opposite the Yeisk sanatorium. There were three tables there. Poddubny went to work to feed his loved ones. His powerful body required a huge amount of calories.

Ivan Maksimovich could take a loaf of bread, cut it in half, spread half a kilo of butter and eat it in one sitting, like an ordinary sandwich, recalls Evgeniy Kotenko, whose father, a photographer, was a friend of Poddubny. - During the war, we all ate whatever God sent us: carrots, beets, corn...

Under the Germans, at the meat processing plant, Poddubny began to be given 5 kilograms of meat per month,” Yuri Korotkov continues to recall.

Local old men often came to Poddubny’s billiard room to listen to the radio quietly. They recalled: when the Germans, having drunk heavily in the nearby buffet, fell into the billiard room and began to make a fuss, Ivan Maksimovich threw them out the door like kittens.

The rowdy Fritzes were very proud that Ivan the Great himself was putting them out on the street with his own hands, recalls Evgeniy Kotenko. - One day a representative of the German command came to Poddubny and offered to go to Germany to train German wrestlers. Ivan Maksimovich was categorical: “I am a Russian wrestler. I will remain that way.” And Poddubny got away with this statement. The Germans worshiped the strength and glory of the world famous wrestler.

Under the hood of the NKVD

When our troops returned to Yeysk in February 1943, there were hotheads among the army SMERSH - they wanted to convict the old man and send him to prison, recalls Evgeniy Kotenko.

Local residents recalled how denunciations rained down on Poddubny: “He worked for the Germans!”; “Served the Nazis!”

The authorities took up Poddubny’s case. In the archive we found a memorandum from the head of the Yeisk city department of the NKGB, Alexei Ivanovich Porfentyev, to whom, due to the nature of his service, he received information about the activities of the punitive intelligence agencies located in Yeisk and its region during the occupation. After conducting a series of checks, he wrote in a sweeping hand: “Nothing compromising in Poddubny’s hostile behavior in the occupied territory was established.” No evidence of collaboration with the Nazis was discovered by the authorities. It was officially established that the notorious billiard room existed as a purely commercial establishment.

After the liberation of Yeisk, Ivan Poddubny began traveling to nearby military units and hospitals, promoting sports, and speaking with memoirs. In a separate large folder we found a stack of thanks from various military officials.

After the liberation of the city, a card system was in effect in Yeysk. From a shabby archival folder we take out a yellow piece of paper on which is written in chemical pencil: “To the Yeisk City Council of Working Workers' Deputies from Maksimovich. Honored Artist of the Republic, Order Bearer Ivan Poddubny. According to the book I get 500 grams. bread, which I lack. I ask you to add another 200 grams so that I can exist. October 15, 1943.”

Poddubny became so hungry that his broad nature became invisible, he became terribly tight-fisted, recalls Yuri Korotkov. - Having poured flour into a box, he put fingerprints on it so that no one could take even the crumbs.

The City Executive Committee issued Poddubny food vouchers in the canteen and cards for receiving dry rations according to the letter “B,” recalls Evgeniy Kotenko, whose father was friends with the famous wrestler. - In those years, such cards were given only to very necessary specialists.

Old-timer Vartkes Adamyants, who in those years was the chairman of the Yeisk sports society “Spartak”, in turn, recalled:

Poddubny was a member of our society. Both he and I were sent monthly additional sugar rations from Krasnodar. I used to get a teaspoon of pleasure and stretch it out for a month. And he eats it in one day and says to me with a laugh: “There is no more sugar...” And he swears loudly: “They brought me to poverty, I sold all the medals.” Of course, his body was not like everyone else’s. To maintain such a powerful body, it was necessary to eat well. But which of us ate well then? Ivan Maksimovich loved pilaf, dairy foods, eggs, potatoes “in skins” and especially the ordinary Russian radish.

Old-timers recall that Poddubny often came to the director of the Yeisk bakery. He never refused the elderly athlete a piece of bread.

After the war, it turned out that Poddubny was not forgiven for the billiard room.

He was still active, performed with the program “50 years in the circus arena,” corresponded, made appeals, signed himself like this: “Russian Bogatyr Ivan Poddubny.”

“In the post-war years, we saw a different Poddubny,” recalled old-timer Pyotr Kryukov. - Ivan Maksimovich’s shoulders sank, resentment froze on his face. He has aged a lot and has become haggard. He wore an untucked gray shirt. The Order of the Red Banner of Labor invariably hung on his chest. On his head is a straw hat. The city knew that he was ill during the war from malnutrition. To survive, he removed one gold medal after another from his ribbon and sold them off.

The oldest residents of Yeisk recalled that after the war Poddubny was no longer advertised anywhere. Those who held high positions in the city tried to avoid him. In 1947, he had a particularly hard time. Yeychan residents had difficulty recognizing the haggard old man on crutches as a former hero. Maksimovich weakened. His legs literally couldn't support him. While returning home from the market one day, he slipped and fell. Doctors diagnosed him with a closed femoral neck fracture.

Maksimych’s bone did not heal for a long time, recalls Sergei Akhapkov. - Until his old age, he exercised with weights. And here, encased in a cast, he did not get out of bed for a long time. The wrestler’s heart began to play havoc. As boys, we often saw Poddubny at the gates of his house. Baba Masha pulled out a bench for him, he hobbled towards her on crutches and sat down heavily. Everyone passing by bowed to him and asked about his health. Satisfied, he happily communicated. This is what I have lived for the last two years.

House on the roadside

A crooked road, flooded with water, leads us to house No. 153 on Sovetov Street, where Ivan Poddubny lived for more than 20 years. The once solid two-story house has now fallen into disrepair. The windows of the first floor were half buried in the ground and became a basement. The legendary house is run by two families who came from the Urals. They did not know Ivan Maksimovich.

Former tenants of Poddubny live in a nearby house. In the post-war years, he offered part of his plot to a young couple - the artist Imma Sirota and her husband, a military doctor - to build their own house.

Ivan Maksimovich and his wife Maria Semyonovna were already sick people in those years,” says Imma Georgievna. - To write a statement or letter, being both illiterate, they called me or my sister Yulia. While dictating the message, Poddubny continually swore and straightened his reddish mustache. They say that on the mat he was sharp and swift, but at home we saw him sedate and slow. Until his death, he did not take alcohol into his mouth, and could not tolerate the smell of tobacco.

“Goats grazed on Poddubny’s grave”

In 1949, in the seventy-eighth year of his life, Poddubny’s “sports heart” failed.

Early in the morning of August 8, my grandfather began to light the kerosene stove, leaned over and suddenly became covered in sweat and began to choke, recalls Poddubny’s grandson Roman. - With difficulty he called his grandmother and began to say goodbye. Until his last minutes he remained fully conscious.

Ivan Zhelezny, like his friend, Kazakh wrestler Hadji-Mukan, died of a heart attack.

Local authorities did not know how to bury Poddubny - with or without honors. When his famous fighter friends came to say goodbye to Ivan the Invincible in God-forgotten Yeisk, they gave the order from Moscow: “Bury as it should be.” The coffin with Poddubny’s body was installed in the building of the sports school, where there was a German church before the revolution.

They interred the eminent fighter in the city park, where dead pilots were buried during the war. They put up a simple fence and wrote in red lead: “Ivan Poddubny.” And soon the entire surrounding area was overgrown with grass.

After his death, the wrestler’s grave was abandoned, literally wiped off the face of the earth, goats and cows grazed there,” recalls Vartkes Adamyants, the oldest resident of Yeisk. “And then the BBC broadcast: “In the city of Yeisk, in desolation, is the grave of Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny, whom no one in the world could lay down.” And when requests from abroad began to be sent to look for Poddubny’s burial place, the authorities erected a granite monument on the wrestler’s grave.

Later, the building of a typical swimming pool was given over to the Poddubny Museum, which now drags out a miserable existence: the halls are not heated, the roof is leaking. A huge amount of materials is stored in storerooms, but there is no money for the design of exhibitions.

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In the Azov region we often heard the name Poddubnykh. All of them were only the namesakes of the wrestler. Ivan Maksimovich had no direct heirs. His adopted son Ivan left the fight. After graduating from a technical university, he worked for many years as the chief engineer of the Rostov automobile assembly plant. During the war, during a raid by German bombers, Ivan died. Grandson Roman also tried his hand at wrestling, but never became a professional. In the navy, during the war, he was seriously wounded. In 1953, after the death of Maria Semyonovna, Roman sold his grandfather’s house and settled in Rostov-on-Don.

Everyone and everyone is trying to cash in on being associated with Poddubny’s name. In the archives of Yeisk, we found many requests from distant relatives of the wrestler, who are still hoping to find Poddubny’s accounts in foreign banks. It is known that the millions earned by the wrestler during two years of touring America were never awarded to the athlete. The wrestler’s relatives are sure that in 1927 the American embassy transferred them in the name of Ivan Poddubny to one of the banks in Switzerland.

Among professional wrestlers, the concepts of “chic” and “bur” existed. The first meant working for the viewer - an artistic demonstration of spectacular techniques. The “chic” ending was known to the wrestlers in advance. In the “drilling” fight, the strongest was determined. Here they could already fight “ugly”... Poddubny never lay down on his shoulder blades by order of the championship organizer.

For this alone, we, who spend most of our lives in “chic,” are obliged to remember Poddubny.