Vorob'ev, Oleg Mikhailovich
Born in Moscow on 6 August 1930. After his parents' arrest in 1937, he and his two-year-old sister Natasha were taken in by their grandparents. Some neighbours of theirs helped to hide Oleg and Natasha when NKVD agents came to get the two children. Their grandparents then housed them in their dacha before sending them to live with their godmother in Tula Oblast. In all, this ploy to elude the authorities lasted for about a year. In 1938, Oleg started going to school. In September 1941, he was evacuated together with his mother, first to Tambov, then to the city of Engels in Saratov Oblast, from which they did not return to Moscow until 4 April 1943. During this period of evacuation, Oleg had hardly any opportunity to study (because of the long journeys and constant hunger); he spent most of his time helping his mother to wash soldiers' 'telogreiki' [quilted jackets which provide effective protection against the winter cold], which was how they earned their living. After returning to Moscow, he was readmitted into the 5th form and finished school in 1948. However, his application to the Architectural Institute was rejected because at that time his father hadn't been rehabilitated. Oleg enrolled at a vocational architecture school, completing his course in 1956. He then worked for a year in a design institute before switching to a construction trust providing infrastructure services to the gas industry: he stayed with this company for all his working life, simultaneously studying at the I. M. Gubkin Institute of Oil and Gas, from which he eventually graduated as an engineer.

Father: Vorob'ev, Mikhail Nikolaevich (1906-2001). Born in Tbilisi (Tiflis), he was a civil engineer by profession. At the time of his arrest, he was working as a production manager at construction area No.3 of the Building Commission for the Moscow Military District. He was arrested on 20 April 1937 and sentenced, under Article 58-7,8,11, to 10 years in a labour camp and 5 years without civil rights after that by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR. He was sent first to the Solovetskii Camp of Special Significance, and then to the Noril'sk camps. On 21 January 1941, he was released because the charges against him had been dropped (by a resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court on 25 July 1940, the original sentence was revoked and his case referred for re-examination: it was subsequently closed). During the Great Patriotic War, he was sent to construct front-line aerodromes and served in the army until 1944. He died in Moscow on 6 February 2001.

Mother: Vorob'eva, Valentina Aleksandrovna (1906-1986). Born in Moscow, she received a secondary education. In the years preceding her arrest, she was a housewife. She was arrested in Moscow on 20 September 1937 and sentenced by an NKVD Special Commission to 5 years in a labour camp as a 'family member of a traitor to the Motherland.' She was sent to the Temlag camp (the Pot'ma women's camp) in Mordovia. By a resolution of an NKVD Special Commission on 14 February 1940, this sentence of imprisonment was revoked and her case dropped: she was released later that year. During the Great Patriotic War, she was evacuated together with her son, first to Tambov, then to the city of Engels in Saratov Oblast. On 4 April 1943, she returned to Moscow and found work in a chemical and bacteriological laboratory. She died in Moscow on 25 February 1986.