The article examines the evolution of various forms of leisure for Saratov workers in the 1920s and 1930s. When the Bolsheviks came to power, they began to pay great attention to the education of the “new man.” The object of this policy was, first of all, workers, among whom the practices proclaimed by the new government as “remnants of the past” – drunkenness and religiosity – were widespread. The contradictory policy of the party and state authorities towards the alcohol problem has been revealed.