The Jewish Elementary School of Tartu (School no. 17)

Collection description

Collection

Country:: Estonia

Holding institution:: Historical Archives of Estonia

Holding institution (official language):: Eesti Ajalooarhiiv

Postal address:: Tartu, J. Liivi 4, 50409

Phone number:: (+372) 738 7500

Web address:: https://www.ra.ee/et/kes-me-oleme-2/

Email:: rahvusarhiiv@ra.ee

Reference number:: f. 2037

Title:: The Jewish Elementary School of Tartu (School no. 17)

Title (official language):: Tartu linna 17. (juudi) algkool

Creator/accumulator:: Jewish Elementary School of Tartu (School no. 17)

Date(s):: 1877/1941

Language:: Russian; German; Yiddish; Estonian; Hebrew

Extent:: 443 files

Type of material:: Textual material; Photographic images

Physical condition:: good

Scope and content:: The Jewish elementary school of Tartu functioned between 1875 or 1876 and 1941. Its archive includes administrative paperwork along with data on educational activities and the school’s teachers and pupils.

The administrative materials of the school from the Russian period include various regulations and correspondence with the regional supervisor of elementary education and the board of the Society for the Spread of Enlightenment among the Jews of Russia (OPE). Materials from the period of post-World War I Estonian independence include reports, regulations and correspondence with the Estonian educational authorities. Account books from the interwar period can be also found in the archive.

Another part of the archive includes data on the educational activities at the school: reviews and regulations (1882-91), lesson schedules (1916-40), minutes of meetings of the school board (1925-40), pedagogical council (1917-40) and parents’ committee (1926-40). The materials also include data on the school library with lists of its holdings (1910-41), reviews of the school’s history and materials on literary and science circles (1937-41), Jewish youth movements (1933) and the union of Estonian teachers and artists (1940-41).

The archive also includes data on the school’s pupils, including name and grade lists (1893-1941), graduation certificates (1903-05, 1926-41), medical records (1914-21, 1926-41) and several personal notebooks and minutes of examinations, mostly from the interwar period. Data on certain teachers, mostly from the interwar period, can also be found in the archive.

Photographs of the staff and the pupils from the late 1930s are also part of the archive.

Archival history:: The school archive was created after the school’s closing in 1941. In 1947 it was acquired by the State Historical Archives of Estonia, predecessor of the current Estonian Historical Archives.

Administrative/biographical history:: The Jewish elementary school of Tartu was established in 1876 (certain sources give 1875) and existed as a communal school until 1925. Jewish students from the University of Tartu took an active part in the functioning of the school. In 1925 it was reorganised into a city Jewish school of Tartu (City School 17). It was closed in 1941.

Access points: locations:: Tartu

Subject terms:: Education; Education--Schools and universities; Education--Students; Libraries; Photographs; Statistics

System of arrangement:: The collection consists of one inventory in Estonian and Russian.

Access, restrictions:: The collection is open for reference at the Historical Arсhives of Estonia, Tartu.

Finding aids:: Finding aids in Russian and Estonian are available at the Estonian Historical Archives.

Basic data on the collection is available at the web portal of the National Archives of Estonia: http://ais.ra.ee, Detailotsing – Leidandmed – EAA.2037.

For further data on the school see the following collections at the National Archives of Estonia: ERA.1108 (Ministry of Education of Estonia); ERA.1107 (The Jewish Cultural Self-Government of Estonia) and ERA.2284 (The Jewish Community of Tartu; see the Yerusha description of this collection). See also the list of Jewish-related materials at the digital access system of the Estonian Archives.

For a memoir about the school, see the website of the Jewish Museum of Estonia.

Links to finding aids:: http://ais.ra.ee

Yerusha Network member:: Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People

Author of the description:: Tatjana Schor, Historical Archives of Estonia, and Alex Valdman, Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, 2015

fullscreen: The Jewish Elementary School of Tartu (School no. 17)

Collection

Downloads

Full record

Image fragment

Formats and links

Formats