2-years-old Valentina with her father on the airplane.
Career
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1938
The crew of the ANT- 37 "Rodina"
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1938
The crew of the "Rodina" airplane, which made the non-stop flight Moscow-Far East at breakfast. From left to right: Valentina Grizodubova, Marina Raskova, Polina Osipenko. Photo by Alexander Ustinov
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1938
The commander of the crew of the "Rodina" Valentina Grizodubova takes a place in the front cockpit.
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1938
Polina Osipenko, Marina Raskova, and Valentina Grizodubova (from left to right) on the train on the way from Khabarovsk to Moscow. At each station, pilots were met by thousands of people admiring their feat.
Hero of the Soviet Union, Valentina Grizodubova and Hero of Socialist Labor, Lieutenant General Andrei Tupolev during the celebration of the USSR Air Fleet Day at the Tuchino airfield.
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1938
Valentina Grizodubova
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
Valentina Grizodubova
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
Valentina Stepanovna at the helm of the Li-2 aircraft.
Gallery of Valentina Grizodubova
1980
Valentina Grizodubova
Achievements
Grizodubova on a Russian stamp from 2010.
Membership
Awards
Hero of the Soviet Union
Hero of the Soviet Union (2 November 1938)
Hero of Socialist Labour
Hero of Socialist Labour (6 January 1986)
Order of Lenin
Order of the October Revolution
Order of the Patriotic War 1st Class
Order of the Patriotic War 1st Class (12 March 1943)
Order of the Red Banner of Labour
Order of the Red Banner of Labour (25 December 1936)
Order of the Red Star
Order of the Red Star (19 December 1937)
Medal "To a Partisan of the Patriotic War"
Medal "To a Partisan of the Patriotic War"
Medal "For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Thirty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Thirty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Forty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
Jubilee Medal "Forty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
The crew of the "Rodina" airplane, which made the non-stop flight Moscow-Far East at breakfast. From left to right: Valentina Grizodubova, Marina Raskova, Polina Osipenko. Photo by Alexander Ustinov
Polina Osipenko, Marina Raskova, and Valentina Grizodubova (from left to right) on the train on the way from Khabarovsk to Moscow. At each station, pilots were met by thousands of people admiring their feat.
Hero of the Soviet Union, Valentina Grizodubova and Hero of Socialist Labor, Lieutenant General Andrei Tupolev during the celebration of the USSR Air Fleet Day at the Tuchino airfield.
Valentina Stepanovna Grizodubova was one of the first female pilots in the Soviet Union. She also was the first female awarded the titles of Hero of the Soviet Union and Hero of Socialist Labour.
Background
Valentina Grizodubova was born on January 31, 1910, in Kharkiv, the Kharkiv Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine). She was the daughter of Stepan Grizodubov and Nadezhda Komarenko Grizodubova. Her father was a self-taught pioneer aircraft designer and Valentina inherited his enthusiasm for flying. When Valentina was 2 years old, she made her first flight on her father's airplane from the Kharkiv airfield, tied to her father with belts. At fourteen she flew a glider solo.
Education
After graduating from high school, Valentina entered the Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute. In parallel, she graduated from a music school in the piano class and was enrolled in the conservatory. While in the institute, she also attended Kharkiv Flying School.
In 1929, Valentina graduated from the Penza Flying Club and Advanced Flying School in Tula in 1933. She owed her admission to flying training to Sergo Ordzhonikidze, an old Georgian Bolshevik and Stalin's ally.
From 1934 to 1938, Valentina Grizodubova flew in a "Propaganda" Squadron named after Maxim Gorky. As an instructor pilot, she trained to eighty-six male pilots before the war and flew many types of aircraft.
During the Second World War Grizodubova avoided service in Raskova's "women's regiments" like the 125th Guards Bomber Aviation Regiment. Instead, she was appointed commander of the all-male 101st Long-Range Aviation Regiment, the only Soviet woman to command an all-male aviation unit. Soon after assuming command in May 1942, Grizodubova flew a successful group mission to demonstrate that its Li-2 aircraft (a modified DC-3 with a crew of six) were suitable for use as night bombers. In June 1942, ordered to fly supplies to blockaded Leningrad, Grizodubova again carried out her mission successfully. She led her regiment into battle herself. At times she flew as copilot to monitor her pilots' performance, and she was noted for flying more than male regimental commanders did.
In September 1942 Grizodubova's regiment was placed at the disposal of the central headquarters of the partisan movement. Overcoming dense enemy flak and engaging enemy fighters, her aircrews flew more than 1,850 supply missions to partisan areas and on the way back evacuated wounded partisans and homeless children. In 1943 Grizodubova resisted her superiors' orders to decrease these flights. Hence grateful leaders of the Ukrainian and Belorussian partisans supported the application of her division to grant Guards status to her regiment. Eight of Grizodubova's subordinates earned the Hero of the Soviet Union, and on 17 May 1944, her regiment was awarded the honorific of Krasnoselsky for its participation in the lifting of the blockade of Leningrad. This unit was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on 30 August and was subsequently redesignated the 31st Krasnoselsky Guards Bomber Aviation Regiment. During the war, she had about 200 operational missions to her personal credit. Overall, Grizodubova spent 18,000 hours in the air.
In June 1944 Grizodubova was recalled to Moscow to take up a senior post in civil aviation as deputy head of the Institute of Instrument Engineering. In her postwar post, she assisted the future astronaut Savitskaia in becoming a test pilot. In 1963, Grizodubova headed Research and Flight Test Center at the Solntsevo airfield. In 1972, she returned to the Institute of Instrument Engineering as a deputy head, where she worked until 1993.
Grizodubova also served on the Executive of the Soviet War Veterans Committee and was a member of the Veterans' Council of Long-Range Aviation and chairperson of her regiment's Veterans' Council.
Quotations:
"A true pilot must love his profession, his plane, and most importantly - the sky."
"I joined the army only because of the war. And not a single day after the war will I be in the army."
Personality
Grizodubova did not brook incompetence, even in senior officers; due to her intervention, a troublesome Soviet general, her superior, was removed from his post. Though strict, she was caring and compassionate toward her subordinates.
Quotes from others about the person
"Grisodubova often spoke about the outfits of women who came to brag about their new clothes. If she thought that the dress didn't fit the lady, she said that without hesitation. Until the last days, she was watching herself. And even when she invited people to her home, she periodically took the lipstick and a mirror from the reticule. She had a very beautiful lip contour and stunning gray eyes." - Mstislav Listov
Interests
Music, piano
Sport & Clubs
Flying
Music & Bands
Irina Arkhipova, Ivan Kozlovsky
Connections
Valentina was married to Victor Sokolov. Their only child was Valery Sokolov.