Studies in the field of automatic control in Russia have a long history, starting from the seminal paper by I.Vyshnegradski (1876) and work of the famous mathematician P.Chebyshev (1871). The fundamental contribution to the theory is due to V.Lyapunov (1892), who developed the basic approach to the analysis of stability of nonlinear systems. Perhaps the first textbook on automatic regulators was the lecture course by the great Russian expert in mechanics N.Jukovski (1909). In the Soviet period automatic regulation attracted a lot of attention due its role in industrialization of the country. In 1934, the commission on remote control and automation was founded, later it was transformed into the Institute of Automation and Remote Control of the Soviet Academy of Sciences (1939) the journal “Automation and Remote Control” was established in 1936. Some textbooks on automation in specific areas were published, e.g. for power machines, thermal processes, electrical devices, heating equipment, construction of automatic regulators. After the war, numerous Western books on control have been translated into Russian at the same time, original Russian textbooks have appeared. Below, we describe three textbooks of early 1950th which played the fundamental role in teaching and research, being the stimulating examples for imitation for many years.