Petro Shelest

Who was Petro Shelest?

Petro Yukhymovych Shelest was the First Secretary of the Communist party in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and a deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of the Ukrainian SSR.

Petro Shelest was born in a peasant Ukrainian family in a village near Kharkiv in 1908. In 1928 he joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and in 1935 graduated from Mariupol' Metallurgical Institute.

Between 1943 and 1954 Shelest was a chief manager of several large factories in Leningrad and Kiev. Between 1954 and 1962 he was the Mayor of Kiev in addition to becoming the secretary of the Ukrainian Communist party. Soon he was promoted to the top position of first secretary of the Communist party of Ukrainian SSR and led it between 1963 and 1972. During his tenure and due to his cautious encouragement, there was a brief yet noticeable resurgence of the Ukrainian regional culture. In 1972 he became deputy chairman of the Sovmin. Awarded Hero of Socialist Labor honorary title in 1968. In 1973 Petro Shelest was forced into retirement by Leonid Brezhnev.