Metadata: M. R. Bel’skii
Collection
- Country:
- Ukraine
- Holding institution:
- State Archive of the Odessa Region
- Holding institution (official language):
- Державний архів Одеської області
- Postal address:
- 18, Zhukovskogo str., Оdessa, 65026, Ukraine
- Phone number:
- 380 (48) 722-9365
- Web address:
- http://archive.odessa.gov.ua/en/
- Email:
- archive@odessa.gov.ua
- Reference number:
- F. R-8193
- Title:
- M. R. Bel’skii
- Title (official language):
- Бєльський М. Р.
- Creator/accumulator:
- M. R. Bel’skii
- Date(s):
- 1927/2006
- Language:
- Russian
- Ukrainian
- Extent:
- 49 files
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Graphic material
- Scope and content:
- Documents housed in the fonds (op. 1) include preparatory materials for M. R. Bel’skii’s book The Book-Publishing House of M. S. Kozman in Odessa (part 1 of the Odessa and the Jews series; Odessa, 2002); manuscripts of his periodical articles and publications, including in the newspaper Odesskii vestnik (“Odessa and the Jews” [12 November 1996], on Jewish emigration from Odessa, including a reprint of M. Rafalovich’s 1841 feuilleton “The Jewish Community of Odessa”; etc.); in the newspaper Or sameach (“An Old Photograph” [4 July 2000] and “Coming Back to an Old Photograph” [4 October 2000] on Jewish secondary school no. 33 and its teachers and graduates in 1928-29; “A Patriarch of Jewish Journalism” [7 March 2001], on I. I. Linetskii; “The Crown Rabbi Abo Dykhno” [7 August 2002], on a Volhynia rabbi and printer; “Little Known Facts from the Life of Lev Pinsker” [11 September 2002]; “Two Nearly Century-Old Documents” [8 January 2003], on the 1904 ban on M. Osipovich’s story “For What?”, and on a letter that contains a narrative of Odessa’s 1905 pogrom; “From the History of Evreiskaia mysl’” [5 March 2003], on the journal of that name [Jewish Thought] that was published in Odessa in 1906-07 and 1917; “The Poet of the Odessa Poor” [21 April and 5 May 2003], on the Jewish poet and writer B. Shafir (1876-1922); “The ‘Bibliomania’ of Mishel’ Al’bert” [28 May 2003], on a book by one of Odessa’s first Jewish booksellers and antiquarians; etc.; in the newspaper Tikva (“For the Poorest Jewish Children” [22 March 2005], on the Jewish women’s vocational school of B. M. Gol’dshtein and M. B. Shpigner, which was in operation in Odessa from 1891; “The Short Life of the Uchitel’ [Teacher] Book Store” [6 April 2005), on the activities of the Society to Aid Jewish Teachers and its bookstore; etc.; and in the almanac Moriia (“Naum Gal’perin, A Printer of Old Odessa” [no. 2, 2004]). There are also illustrated materials, newspaper clippings, cover letters submitted to editorial offices and publishers, etc.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The collector, bibliophile, local history researcher, and writer Miron Romanovich Bel’skii (1927-2009) was born in Odessa. Upon the outbreak of war in 1941, he was evacuated along with his family to the Tashkent region, where he would work at a fruit processing plant. From 1944 through 1951, he served in the Soviet Army. Upon returning to Odessa, he worked at the P. Starostin Heavy Weighing-machine Factory, graduated from night school and the Odessa Polytechnic Institute with a specialty in mechanical engineering (1957), and subsequently worked at the Odessa Press Factory (later the Pressmash company). He retired in 1987 (at which point his position was foundry director), and subsequently worked at other Odessa enterprises. His career in labour earned him several orders and medals. In the early 1970s, Bel’skii took an interest in book-collecting, specialising in particular in miniature editions; at the same time, he studied the history of bookmaking, first and foremost its history in Odessa. He was the organiser and permanent chair of the Odessa Scholars’ House miniature-book lovers’ club (1979-2004); a board member of the All-Russian Bibliophiles’ Association; and took part in bibliophilic exhibitions and conferences. In the late 1990s, he also began to study the history of Jews in the Novorossiia territory. He authored and edited several books, catalogues, and bibliographic indexes, including The Joys of Rare Book Finds: Tales of a Bibliophile (1996), The Book-Publishing House of M. S. Kozman in Odessa (2002), Jewish Printing Presses of Old Odessa (2005), The Book Trade in Prerevolutionary Odessa (2007), and over 500 periodical publications (including in the foreign press). He died in Odessa.
- Access points: persons/families:
- Al’bert, Mishel’
- Bel’skii, M. R.
- Gal’perin, Naum
- Gol’dshtein, B. M.
- Kozman, M. S.
- Linetskii, I. I.
- Osipovich, M.
- Pinsker, L. S.
- Rafalovich, M.
- Shafir, B.
- Shpigner, M. B.
- System of arrangement:
- The fonds includes three inventories systematised according to the thematic-chronological principle.
- Finding aids:
- Inventories are available.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Theological Seminary