Town hall of Petroşani

Collection

Holding institution:: National Archives of Romania, Hunedoara county directorate

Holding institution (official language):: Serviciul judeţean Hunedoara al Arhivelor Naţionale Române

Scope and content:: The fonds comprises the files of the Town Hall of Petroşani from 1880 to 1990. It includes the records of the local administration, economy (especially the coal mining industry, crafts and commerce), agricultural and forestry activities, financial issues, education and cultural institutions of the town and budget sheets. The fonds also contains documents from the Second World War, when the local mining industry made an important contribution to the country’s war effort. From the period of after 1945 are documented the difficulties of ensuring the supply of basic necessities to local population and measures taken to help the war widows and orphans. The fonds also includes details of the agrarian reform of 1945 and its implementation. In 1930 the local Jewish population represented almost 7% of the total inhabitants, files in all areas covered by these fonds include Jewish references. A census of the population appears in File 1/1943.

Archival history:: The fonds was preserved by the Popular Council of Petroşani, being transferred after 1989 to the Hunedoara county directorate of the Romanian National Archives where it was inventoried and made available to researchers.

Administrative/biographical history:: The locality of Petroşani does not appear in historical documents before the first half of the 19th century, but developed rapidly after 1865 when coal mining significantly evolved and the railway network, which included Petroşani, ensured the value of this resource. In the years before the First World War over 5,400 miners were registered in Petroşani. After 1920 the Romanian administration recognised Petroşani as an urban locality whose population grew steadily, the census of 1930 registering 15,405 inhabitants, including 1,071 Jews. During the Second World War the importance of the town and its area increased alongside Romania’s war effort, but but at the same time the antisemitic policy of the Antonescu dictatorship was implemented in this strategic area with particular insistence. After 1948 the Communist regime also focused on coal mining and developed the area of Petroşani, where in 1948 an Institute of Coal Mining Engineering was established. After the fall of Communism in 1989 the miners were involved in the political conflicts and in the last decades coal mining was mostly abandoned in this area.s

System of arrangement:: The fonds is organised in thematic files, within which the records are arranged in chronological order.

Finding aids:: Inventory no. 129, held by the Hunedoara county directorate of the Romanian National Archives.

Yerusha Network member:: Romanian Institute for the Research of National Minorities

Author of the description:: Attila Gidó, researcher, Institute for Study of National Minorities Cluj-Napoca - 2019; Ladislau Gyémánt, emeritus professor - 2019