The article presents the research of the working norms and practices of the Soviet elite in
the 1945-1950. The main attention is paid to the political biographies of the chairmen of
Leningrad local government (Soviets). The research is based on methods of the oral history
and the history of emotions; its source base includes documents from the archives of St.
Petersburg, Moscow, and Crimea. The studied generation of Leningrad leading cadres came
to government positions in the late 1930s, after the repressions of the “Great Terror”. The
members of the Soviet elite passed the testing of their professional skills during World War II
and the Blockade of Leningrad, and directed the forced postwar reconstruction of the national
economy. In the late 1940s, they became victims of the so-called “Leningrad affair”.