Figure 1.--These Soviet youths were at a Young Pioneers camp in 1932. They came from Ushakovka a village near Volgograd and went for the camp to the Volga River.

The Young Pioneers in the Soviet Union built a nation-wide systems of youth camps. Our information on the early camp program is very limited. I'm not sure when the first camps were built or what the early camps were like. We note that the "Artek" camp was opened in 1925. We see more camps in the 1930s, but except for Artek the camps sem very basic. Nor do we know who was selected to go to the early camps. A massive expansion of the summer camp program occurred after World war II in the 1950s. We do know that large numbers were operating by the 1960s. The Pioneer camp system operated more than 5,000 camps throughout the Soviet Union. [Kondorsky] Millions of children were involved in these Young Pioneer camps. There was no charge to participate. The Soviet Young Pioneer summer camp program is the most largest and most extensive program that HBC know about.