In 1930 May took virtually his entire New Frankfurt-team to the USSR. "May's Brigade" amounted to a task force of 17 people, including Lihotzky, her husband Wilhelm Schuette, Arthur Korn, the Hungarian-born Fred Forbat, the Swiss Hans Schmidt, the Austrian-born Erich Mauthner and the Dutch Mart Stam. The promise of the "Socialist paradise" was still fresh, and May's Brigade and other groups of western planners had the hope of constructing entire cities. The first was to be Magnitogorsk. Although May's group is indeed credited with building 20 cities in three years, the reality was that May found Magnitogorsk already under construction and the town site dominated by the mine and blast furnaces under construction. Officials were indecisive, then distrustful, corruption and delay frustrated their efforts, and May himself made misjudgements about the climate. May's contract expired in 1933, and he left for British East Africa (Kenya). Some of his architects found themselves unwanted by Russia, and stateless.