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ABSTRACT
The Slavic, Eurasian & East European Collections of the Columbia University Libraries are among the largest in North America and have served a diverse faculty and student body for more than a century. Yet the developmental history of this resource is as yet little-known. This essay provides a series of brief historical vignettes of collections, collectors, and influencers that have shaped the collection. We bring developments down to the present day, including the decade-old partnership with the venerable Cornell University Library Slavic collection, with origins dating back to 1884.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. The published literature on the history of the NYPL’s Slavic & East European collections is extensive. See for example, the following by the present author: Slavic and Baltic Library Resources of The New York Public Library: A First History and Practical Guide. With a Foreword by George F. Kennan. (New York, Los Angeles: The Library, and Charles Schlacks, Jr., Publishers, 1994); and my article, “The New York Public Library’s Émigré Readership and Collections: Past, Present, and Future,” Slavic & East European Information Resources 4, no. 2/3 (2003): 63–75, among other articles by many authors on this remarkable collection with a storied history.
2. Following the closure of the Slavic and Baltic Division in the fall of 2008, the breadth of language collecting at NYPL was scaled back, focusing on those languages for which endowed funds existed: Czech, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, and Latvian. Since the appointment in 2018 of my longtime colleague Bogdan Horbal, as full-time Curator of Slavic and East European Collections, NYPL collecting has broadened once again to include all the Baltic languages, as well as Belarusian.
3. On the linkages between NYPL and other prominent Slavic collections, see the essay in this compendium by Bogdan Horbal, “42nd and “The Heights’: A Century-long Romance.”
4. Jared Ingersoll, “Columbia University Libraries’ Slavic and East European Collections: A Preliminary History at 100 Years,” Slavic & East European Information Resources 4, no. 2/3 (2003): 77–87.
5. Mimeographed copies of the various annual reports (including for the Slavic and East European components of the Gifts & Exchanges unit) are held in the files of the current Librarian, in the Global Studies Division.
6. Past issues of Newsnotes are archived as PDFs from the Global Studies Department webpage: https://library.columbia.edu/libraries/global/slavic.html
7. On White, see: The Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White (New York: Century, 1905), which contains extensive discussion of his Russian experience – beginning with a seven-month stint as an Attaché with the St. Petersburg Legation in 1854–55, and, on subsequent stays, having private meetings with every Emperor, as well as cultural figures such as Tolstoy. It should also be noted that in 1857, his first public lecture, at Yale, concerned “Civilization in Russia,” which he subsequently reworked as an article in The Atlantic. He was bracketed in the public lecture series by Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the influential transcendentalist Unitarian Universalist minister, and ardent abolitionist Theodore Parker (1810–60). White writes that he was surprised to learn that Parker knew both Russian and Old Church Slavic (Autobiography, 80–83). Henry Steele Commager, in his work Theodore Parker (Boston: Little, Brown, 1936) commented on their encounter: “Parker astonished him [White] with his knowledge of slavery under the Tsars” (201).
8. On Fiske, see the Cornell Library website: “The Passionate Collector: Willard Fiske and his Libraries” at https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/collector/index.html.
9. “[Schuyler] has presented to the library a collection of about three hundred volumes, consisting mainly of the authorities used in preparation for his “Turkestan” and “Peter the Great”… Cornell Daily Sun, November 18, 1884, 1. “The largest addition to the library during the year is due to the liberality of the Hon. Eugene Schuyler, the recent minister of the United States to Greece and Rumania. Mr. Schuyler… has at various times made to the library valuable gifts of books relating to Russian and Rumanian literature. His latest gift, however, is of unusual extent and interest, consisting of no less than six hundred volumes…” See: “The University Library.” Cornell Daily Sun, January 25, 1885, 1. On Schuyler, see Patricia Herlihy, “Ab Oriente ad Ultiorem Orientem: Eugene Schuyler, Russia and Central Asia,” Space, Place and Power in Modern Russian History (DeKalb: Northern Illinois Press, June 2010), 119–141, and her “Eugene Schuyler and the Bulgarian Constitution of 1876,” Russia, Europe, and the Rule of Law (Leiden: Nijhoff/Brill, 2007), 165–184.
10. On exhibit were: “The Dante library of 2000 volumes, the gift of Professor Willard Fiske, and the Zarnke collection of 13,000 volumes composed of Germanic works were open for inspection. A collection of Russian historical works recently presented by President White were exposed upon the tables in the White library.” See: “The Opening Reception.” Cornell Daily Sun, October 9, 1892, 3.
11. On the Yudin Collection, see Babine’s own description, The Yudin library, Krasnoiarsk (Eastern Siberia) (Washington, D.C.: Press of Judd and Detweiler, 1905); Harold M. Leich’s, “’So Ample a Collection, So Well Balanced:’ The Yudin Collection at the Library of Congress,” Slavic & East European Information Resources 9, no. 2 (2008): 127–142; and Edward Kasinec’s “Yudin’s Books In America: A View from the 21st Century,” in the same issue of Slavic & East European Information Resources (115–126) devoted to the Yudin collection. For an overview of the formation of Russian holdings at The Library of Congress, see Angela Cannon, “The Origins of the Russian Collections at the Library of Congress (1800–1906),” Slavic & East European Information Resources 15 no. 1/2 (2014): 3–59. On Babine, see Donald J. Raleigh, editor, A Russian Civil War Diary: Alexis Babine in Saratov, 1917–1922 (Durham: Duke University Press, 1988), and, on his work in Washington, D.C., Eugene Pivovarov’s “Alexis V. Babine in the Library of Congress,” Slavic & East European Information Resources 3, no. 1 (2002): 59–68.
Following Babine’s death, many were aware of the Diary, including Cornell’s President Edmund Ezra Day (1883–1951). Librarian of Congress Emeritus Herbert Putnam, previously the de facto executor of Babine’s estate, wrote on February 20, 1941, in response to a query regarding the possibility of publishing the diary from the prominent Cornell-trained psychologist Dr. I. Madison Bentley (1870–1955), then residing in Palo Alto. Putnam stated that the diary was in a safe, where “it rests, and, I suppose, should rest. No steps have been taken towards publication and I doubt that publication, in extenso, or without extensive editing would be feasible.” Cornell Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Deceased Alumni File: Babine, Alexis – Class of 1892, Call No. 41–2–877.
Almost four decades would pass before Edward Kasinec, then-Curator of the Slavic collections at U.C. Berkeley brought the existence of the Diary to the attention of Don Raleigh, and it finally appeared in print. See: Edward Kasinec, “A.V. Babine (1866–1930): A Biographical Note,” in his Slavic Books and Bookmen: Papers and Essays (New York: Russica, 1984), 73–77.
12. “Instruction in Russian,” Cornell Daily Sun, March 9, 1892, 1. The instructor was Babine.
13. “The Academic Department,” Cornell Daily Sun, May 28, 1897, 5.
14. “Instruction in Russian Sponsored By Arts College,” Cornell Daily Sun, October 23, 1931, 2. Interested students were to visit with Professor C.L. Dunham of the Latin Department for further details.
15. On the history of the development of area studies in the United States, see David C. Engerman’s Know Your Enemy: The Rise and Fall of America’s Soviet Experts (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2009).
Edward Kasinec and the present author wrote successful proposals for and co-directed two National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Institutes on this topic: America Looks at Russia: Globalization and Interaction, ca. 1880–1930. (Grant period September 2008-July 2009), and America Engages Eurasia: Studies, Teaching & Resources. (Grant period September 2010-December 2011). These projects brought fifty scholars from across the country for three weeks of intensive work with campus collections, as well as those in the greater Metro area.
16. See: “Anarchist Library: Columbia College has Secured Large Collection of Red Literature – It is the most complete in the world,” Los Angeles Times, June 30, 1903, 6. The article (originally published in the New York Post), reports that the collection was acquired in London by “Vladimir G. Sienkhovitch” [i.e., Simkhovitch, see below] for £20 and that the entire collection will be placed “conspicuously on view in the university library.”
17. “Prince Serge Wolkonsky’s Lectures,” Harvard Crimson, February 15, 1896; “Columbia University Lectures,” New York Times, March 13, 1896, 2; “Modern Russian Poets,” Cornell Daily Sun, April 30, 1896, 1. It should be noted that Volkonsky lectured at Cornell even earlier, in 1893. See: “A Visit from Prince Wolkonsky,” Cornell Daily Sun, November 22, 1893, 4, and “Prince Wolkonsky,” Cornell Daily Sun, November 28, p. 1, where his topic was “The Higher Education of Women in Russia.”
18. “Mme. Andreieva Talks to Girls: Gorky’s Companion Describes Russian Conditions to Barnard Students,” Chicago Daily Tribune, May 5, 1906, 4.
19. Lyubov Ginzburg’s essay, “Revisiting a Visit: Count Sergei Witte and Russian Books at Columbia,” in the present publication, notes the key role played by historian and Columbia University Librarian James Hulme Canfield (1847–1909) in obtaining materials via the Witte gift on every possible subject – not just official governmental publications.
20. “Russian Envoys Deny Secret Treaty Report,” The New York Times, September 10, 1905. As his car crossed Central Park on the way to the Heights, the chauffeur “put on speed,” resulting in a chase by mounted policemen. Witte was received on the steps of Low by Trustee Francis S. Bangs (1855–1920) and met with Columbia’s beloved Dean J. Howard Van Amringe (1836–1915), as President Butler was in Europe at the time.
21. According to the Annual Reports of the President and Treasurer to the Trustees with Accompanying Documents for the Year Ending June 30, 1906 (New York: Columbia University, 1906), 246, the gift consisted of “800 Russian periodicals.”
22. Following his untimely death in 1917 – he was thrown from a horse – the New York Times reported the value of his estate at anywhere from $15–20,000,000. (“Seligman Estate Goes to Family,” October 17, 1917, 6). However, at the conclusion of probate in 1925, the New York Herald Tribune of May 25 (11) reported the actual net value was $2,470,811.
23. On Seligman, see: “E.R.A. Seligman, Economist, 78, Dies,” New York Times, July 19, 1939, 26. According to a piece in the Columbia Alumni News of December 19, 1930, 16, Ambedkar counted Seligman among “the best friends I have had in life.”
24. See Phyllis Dain, The New York Public Library: A History of Its Founding and Early Years (New York: The Library, 1972), 118–119.
25. “Private Economics Library Valued at $3,000,000 bought by University from Professor Seligman,” Columbia Daily Spectator, April 3, 1930, 1.
26. “Dr. Seligman Calls Marxism a Failure,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 28, 1922, 3.
27. “Visits Prof. Seligman: Member of the Russian Mission at Lake Placid,” New York Tribune, September 4, 1905, 1.
28. “Report of the Librarian for the Academic Year Ending June 30, 1907,” Librarian’s Report, p. 246. On Warburg’s financial support for the collection of such literature for Columbia, see Ginzburg, Op. cit., Note 32. It was evidently Warburg’s funding that supported the collecting by and on behalf of Simkhovitch (see below). See: “University Library Collections: Monumenta and Rariora,” Columbia University Quarterly XIII, no. 2 (March 1911): 180. Warburg, his familial connection with Jacob Schiff, and his activities and possible motivations for collecting and gifting these materials are discussed in Dr. Ginzburg’s essay in the present publication.
29. See Note 16, above. In the Annual Report of Slavic Acquisition for 1986–1987, Librarian Nina Lenček notes that, as a consequence of her multi-year review of materials in Lehman Library’s so-called “Slavic Cage,” it was discovered that “all the pamphlets from the 1905–1907 Russian revolutionary period were donated to Columbia University Libraries by the same benefactor as all the Pre-revolutionary newspapers, Mr. Felix Wurzburg [sic], a New York banker.… It would be interesting to find out how he obtained these rare materials” (p. 4). She later notes (p. 5) that while few of the items had ever been consulted, they were in poor condition because of the paper on which they were printed. “Columbia University Libraries. Annual Report. Slavic Acquisitions.1986–1987.” Global Studies Department files.
30. On the evolution of Schiff’s approach to the plight of Jews in Czarist Russia, see: Zosa Szajkowski, “Paul Nathan, Lucien Wolf, Jacob H. Schiff and the Jewish Revolutionary Movements in Eastern Europe 1903–1917,” Jewish Social Studies 29, no. 1 (January. 1967): 3–26, and 29, no. 2 (Apr. 1967): 75–91. On his funding of anti-Czarist propaganda, nota bene pp. 20–21. See also Steven Zipperstein, Pogrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History (New York, London: Liveright, 2018).
In a letter to Philip Cowen from Bar Harbor on August 7, 1905, Schiff wrote that while he had been approached about speaking with Baron Roman R. Rosen (1847–1921) and Witte (at that time in Portsmouth, NH for the peace conference) about the plight of Russia’s Jews, he stated that “There is only one thing we can do: To give as hard knocks to Russia as we can, whenever the opportunity offers…” See: Philip Cowen, Memories of an American Jew (New York: The International Press, 1932), 328. Cowen’s memoir also reports on the many activities of the Seligman Brothers on behalf of Russian-Jewish emigres.
31. “Russian Cartoons Shown: Scenes of the Revolution on Exhibition at Columbia,” New York Times, February 27, 1907, 3; and the illustrated “Russian Struggle for Liberation Told in Cartoon,” New York Times, March 3, 1907, SM7.
32. “Exhibition of Russian Cartoons,” Columbia Daily Spectator, February 27, 1907, 2.
33. “Professor Panaretoff’s Lecture,” Columbia Daily Spectator, November 13, 1903. The lecture was part of a series given by Panaretoff that month on “The National Awakening of the Slavs in the 19th Century.”
34. “Balkan Lecture Attracts Crowd,” Columbia Daily Spectator, January 28, 1916, 1.
35. Noted in Clarence A. Manning, A History of Slavic Studies in the United States (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1957), 30.
36. On the history of the Department founded by Prince, the most detailed account is that of Ernest J. Simmons, “The Department of Slavic Languages,” photostat from unsourced publication, Chapter X, pp. [236]-244.
37. “Slavic Students to Organize Club,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 13, 1920; “Professor M.I. Pupin Sponsors Slavic Club,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 15, 1920, 4. The purpose of the club was “to bring all members of the Slavic race together in that they may become acquainted with one another personally and learn the customs and the literature of each other’s people,” and “to give them a chance to study American culture.”
38. “Organize a Center of Russian Culture: Foreign Students Found ‘Russian Literary Society’,” Columbia Daily Spectator, April 26, 1927. Professor Manning was made honorary president of the Society.
39. A transcript of the entire interview, conducted January 13, 1954 by the Rockefeller Foundation, is available as a PDF at: https://rockfound.rockarch.org/digital-library-listing/-/asset_publisher/yYxpQfeI4W8N/content/interview-with-philip-e-mosley-regarding-the-russian-institute-of-columbia-university
40. In 1918, Yarmolinsky was providing Columbia students with “lectures on Russian literature including works and authors of the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries” in English translation, as well as separately offering instruction in Russian language with Professors Prince and Ivan S. Andreevskii “a former Russian official.” See: “Instruction in Slav Subjects: Columbia University Offers Timely Courses on Topics Connected with Interest of Day,” Christian Science Monitor, October 4, 1918, 14. The year also saw the teaching of Serbian for “the first time in the history of an American university.” Ibid., 14.
41. On his book buying trip, as prismed through the letters of NYPL’s Harry Miller Lydenberg (1874–1960), see: Robert A. Karlowich, “Stranger in a Far Land: Report of a Bookbuying Trip by Harry Miller Lydenberg in Eastern Europe and Russia in 1923–24,” Bulletin of Research in the Humanities 87, no. 2 (1986–87): 182–224.
Yarmolinsky’s partner in life and work was the writer and translator Babette Fisher Deutsch (1895–1982) who was educated at Barnard, later taught at Columbia, and was herself awarded a Columbia doctorate in letters, honoris causa.
A selection of her letters (along with one by Yarmolinsky) during the same book buying trip are found in Robert H. Davis, “Something Truly Revolutionary: The Correspondence of Babette Deutsch and Avrahm Yarmolinsky, November 1923-February 1924,” Biblion 2, no. 1 (Fall 1993): 140–176.
42. “Columbia to Start Near East Courses: Negotiating with Warsaw Government for Establishment of a Chair in Polish,” New York Times, October 5, 1919, 28.
43. “Columbia to Start Near East Courses, 28.
44. “Extension to Give Courses on Russia,” Columbia Daily Spectator, December 11, 1919, 3, and “Columbia Extension Work: Special Attention Paid to Russian Affairs and Language,” New York Times, January 25, 1920, 27. Offerings in both 1919 and 1920 included the economics, natural resources, and industries of Russia, taught by Nicholas Borodin (1861–1937) of the Russian-American Friendly Society of Petrograd, with D. Vinogradoff of Moscow, and mining engineer Theodore [Fedor Fedorovich] Foss (1874-ca. 1923?). In 1919, a series on Russian ethnography, poetry, art, music, and science featuring Yale professor Alexander I. Petrunkevitch (1875–1964), Borodin, and Andrey Avinoff (1884–1949, later in his career, Carnegie Museum Director). The music segment was conducted by none other than Sergei Rachmaninov (1873–1943). In 1920, comparative literatures of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (F. Vexler), the history of West Asia (Semitic languages instructor Frederick A. Vandenburgh, 1848–1924), Armenian language and literature, as well as folk life of the non-Russian peoples of the Empire (both taught by Columbia Law graduate Vahan Kalenderian, (1891–1950), among other course offerings.
45. “Slavonic Languages Gain: Columbia Developing World Influence, Report Shows,” New York Times, June 10, 1934, N3; “Prince Will Head New Department,” Columbia Daily Spectator, March 4, 1935, 4; “Finnish, Slovak, Ukrainian Taught Here for First Time,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 1, 1935, 1.
46. Florinsky first arrived as a Columbia student in 1926, received his doctorate from the University, and was made full professor in 1956. One historian who passed too quickly from the scene to have had much impact on teaching at Columbia was Baron Serge A. Korff (1876–1924), who had been hired in July 1923 to teach Russian history. See: “Dr. Korff Succumbs Suddenly to Stroke,” Columbia Daily Spectator, March 11, 1924, 1, 3.
47. On this collection, see Richard Wortman, “A.E. Presniakov (1870–1929): A Note on His Library at Columbia and His Contributions to the History of Russia,” in the present volume.
See also: “Columbia Fills Out Library On Russia: Acquisition of the Late Prof. Presniakov’s Collection Adds 3,600 Volumes. Also 2,200 Periodicals,” New York Times, March 9, 1931, 5; “Library Now Ranks in Three Richest on Russian History,” Columbia Daily Spectator, March 10, 1931, 1. The presence in the collection of some fifty-two volumes alone by the famed philologist Aleksei A. Shakhmatov ([d. l920]) attest to Shakhmatov’s influence in Presniakov’s groundbreaking work on early chronicles.
48. Dorothy was the sister of physician Jacob A. Maryson (1866–1941), whose wife Katherina Evseroff Maryson (d. 1928) was a general practitioner who came to America in 1888, and according to Physicians & Surgeons records, served as Samuel’s required preceptor during his medical training. Thanks to Jennifer D. Ulrich of Columbia University Medical Center for this information. Abel’s sister-in-law was also a Yiddish writer and anarchist. See: Tony Michaels. Jewish Radicals: A Documentary History (New York: NYU, 2012), 219–220.
49. Federal Census of 1920, New York, Manhattan Assembly District 17, District 1184.
50. On the Abel gift, see: “Donates Books to University. Widow of Alumnus Gives Extensive Collection of Russian Literature,” Columbia Daily Spectator, December 16, 1932, 3.
51. “3500 Volumes Added to Russia Shelves in Library to Augment Slavonic Collection,” Columbia Daily Spectator, January 19, 1933, 1. In the article, Manning is quoted as saying that the gift further ensures that Columbia’s collection “can compare favorably with any in the country,” while Robinson stated the addition “complements the shelves to such an extent that advanced study in Russian history will be greatly facilitated.”
52. “Polish Gift to Columbia: Republic Sends $1,200 for Work in Its Language and Literature,” New York Times, October 10, 1920, 40.
53. “Columbia Receives Bulgarian Volumes: Envoy Presents Literature and Scientific Documents,” New York Times, February 17, 1939, 14. See also: “Campus Notes,” Columbia Daily Spectator, February 16, 1939, 4.
54. Butler, Across the Busy Years… v. 2, 107.
55. “Dr. Butler Warns U.S. Must Meet Soviet Challenge,” New York Herald Tribune, July 17, 1930, 4.
56. “Authors Celebrate Russian Freedom: With Artists and Composers, Send Greetings to Writers Who Aided in Revolution,” New York Times, April 24, 1917, 10.
57. “Lvoff Predicts New Era in Russia: Prince Declares His Country, Struggling with Bolshevists, Will Rise Again,” New York Times, November 25, 1918, 13.
58. “New Russian Organ Here: Struggling Russia Will Present the Democratic Point of View,” New York Times, March 25, 1919, 3. Straus was the first Jewish cabinet secretary, appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt. J. Graham Phelps-Stokes was a millionaire social and political activist.
59. “Ban on Tolstoy Splits Faculty at Columbia,” New York Tribune, February 14, 1917, 9; “Tolstoy Incident Divides Columbia,” New York Times, February 14, 1917, 5.
60. Ibid., 9. See also: “Tolstoy Assails Pupin for His Views,” New York Tribune, February 16, 1917, 13; “Students Protest Tolstoy Muzzling: Columbia Mass Meeting Votes Resolutions Calling for Right of Uncurbed Speech,” New York Times, February 15, 1917, 11; “Columbia Censor,” New York Tribune, February 13, 1917, 12; “Tolstoy ‘Outraged’ By Critics, He Says,” New York Times, February 16, 1917; “Spectator Assails Butler: Columbia’s Head Criticised for Upholding Rule Which Barred Tolstoy,” New York Times, March 3, 1917, 8.
61. “Queen Marie of Rumania Visits the University This Afternoon,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 22, 1926, 1; Queen Bestows Kisses and Smiles During Her Visit to University,” Columbia Daily Spectator, October 25, 1926, 1, 4. She was the topic of a recent movie, “Queen Marie” (2019) by Italian director Alexis Sweet Cahill.
62. On the fundraising activities for the Institute of Rumanian Culture held at the Columbia Faculty Club, see: “Institute of Rumanian Culture,” Romanic Review 17, (1926): 383–384.
63. “Dr. Butler Warns U.S. Must Meet Soviet Challenge,” New York Herald Tribune, July 17, 1930, 4.
64. “Red Philosophy Merits Thought, Says Dr. Butler,” New York Herald Tribune, February 23, 1931, 17. One influential figure on campus (from 1927–1955) was the progressive educator George Sylvester Counts (1889–1974) of Columbia’s Teachers College. Counts, “impressed by the [Soviet] system of public instruction,” made two lengthy and wide-ranging visits to the U.S.S.R. in 1927 (three months), and 1929 (7 months, during which he clocked some 6,000 miles in a Ford Model A). This would draw later accusations of Communist sympathies from critics. On Counts, see: Ellen C. Langeman, “Prophecy or Profession? George S. Counts and the Social Study of Education,” American Journal of Education 100, no. 2 (February 1992): 137–165, especially pp. 146–147.
65. “Butler, Retiring, Looks to Future,” New York Times, September 23, 1945, 30.
66. “New Department Created for Polish, Church Slavic,” Cornell Daily Sun, September 29, 1942, 10. Two of the new hires were the translator Charles Malamuth (1899–1965), who translated Trotsky’s work on Stalin, and accompanied Eugene Lyons on his interview with Stalin in November 1930, and Peter A. Pertzoff (1908–67), the latter an interwar employee of the NYPL who worked with Nabokov on translations from his early Russian-language works. On Pertzoff, see Maxim D. Shrayer, “After Rapture and Recapture: Transformations in the Drafts of Nabokov’s Stories,” Russian Review 58 (October 1999): 548–564, especially 556–564.
On Ernest Simmons, see: Rufus Mathewson, “Ernest J. Simmons, 1903–1972,” Russian Review 31, no. 4 (October 1972): 437–439; and “Dr. Ernest Simmons Dies at 68; Backed Wider Russian Studies,” New York Times, May 5, 1972, 45.
67. M.S. Handler. “Slavic Scholars Assemble to Assess Gains Over 20 Years,” New York Times, April 3, 1964, 19, discusses the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies conference in New York, and praises Cornell’s role as an organizer of area studies.
68. “Cornell to Become Leading Center for Intensive Russian Instruction,” Cornell Daily Sun, May 15, 1943, 3. The effort was not without its critics, specifically those who felt it was more of an indoctrination program. Responding to such critics, Cornell’s President Edmund Ezra Day stated that “No subject is so dangerous that it may not wisely be included in the curriculum of a great university.” See: “Dr. Day Says Study of Russia is Vital,” New York Times, February 6, 1944, 30.
69. “Expansion to Continue In Russian Curriculum,” Cornell Daily Sun, January 4, 1949, 6.
70. “Russian Literature,” Cornell Daily Sun, May 2, 1961, 2.
71. Florence I. Faerstein, “Russian Study… Sputnik Heightens Awareness,” Cornell Daily Sun, October 30, 1958, 8.
72. On Robinson, see John Shelton Curtiss, “Geroid Tanquary Robinson,” Essays in Russian and Soviet History (Leiden: Brill, 1963), xi–xx; and his obituary “Dr. Geroid Robinson, 78, Dies; Began Russian Institute Here: Historian and Scholar Urged Columbia to Open Unit During World War II,” New York Times, March 31, 1971, 48.
73. His time in the Soviet Union included a visit to Central Asia at time when few other Americans did. Curtiss, Dr. Geroid Robinson, 78, Dies,” xv.
74. Ernest J. Simmons, “An American Institute for Slavic Studies,” New York Herald Tribune, December 30, 1944, 10. This was Part IV of a series of articles in the Herald Tribune entitled “The Study of Russia In the United States” by various specialists (including one by his good friend Bernard Pares).
75. “Russian Institute Announced by Columbia Following Rockefeller Gift of $250,000,” New York Times, June 20, 1945, 25; and “Russian Studies at Columbia,” New York Times, June 21, 1945, 18. On the Institute during its early history, see: “The Russian Institute, 1946–1959,” Columbia University Bulletin 59, no. 34 (August 22, 1959), especially the section on the Columbia University Libraries, 74–84.
76. Curtiss, “Geroid Tanquary Robinson,” xix.
77. Available as a mimeograph in the files of the Global Studies Division in Lehman Library.
78. Zolotarev served in the White Navy during the Russian Civil War and left in the 1920s. His papers are held by the Bakhmeteff Archive.
79. Bolan also prepared at least two exhibitions of Russian material during his time as Russian Bibliographer – “An Exhibition of Works By and About Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin 1799–1837,” Low Memorial Library, May 11-June 30, 1949, and “A Russian Theatrical Exhibition in Honor of Chekhov,” December 21, 1954-Febrary 15, 1955, based on the holdings of the Columbia Libraries, as well as those of his private collector clients from his days as an antiquarian bookseller – specifically Paul M. Fekula (1905–82), and Bayard L. Kilgour (1904–84).
Fekula’s collection was sold off over a period of years during the 1980s and 1990s, while Kilgour’s was given to Harvard’s Houghton Library beginning in 1952. On Kilgour, see Bradley L. Schaffner, “The Kilgour Collection of Russian Literature at Harvard College Library,” Slavic & East European Information Resources 12, no. 2/3 (2011): 113–119. On Bolan’s role in building this collection, see especially 114–117. On the Fekula Collection before its dispersal, see The Paul M. Fekula Collection (New York: The Estate, 1988). See also Irina Tarsis, “Cultural Record Keepers: Simeon J. Bolan, Dealer in Russian Books,” Libraries & The Cultural Record 42, no. 2 (2007): 192–195.
80. On the history of the Archives, see: Philip E. Mosely, “Columbia’s New Treasure-House of Russian History,” Columbia Library Columns 2, no. 2 (February 1953): 17–24; Russia in the Twentieth Century: The Catalog of the Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European History and Culture: The Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University. Preface by Kenneth A. Lohf. Introduction by Marc Raeff. (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1987), and Tanya Chebotarev, “Repatriation of the Bakhmeteff Archive: Russian Dreams and American Reality,” RBM: A Journal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Cultural Heritage 6, no. 1 (2005): 44–51.
81. See my colleague Tanya Chebotarev’s “The Path to ‘Non-Oblivion:’ A Brief History of the Bakhmeteff Archive,” in this issue of SEEIR. The Bakhmeteff was originally headed by Lev Florianovich Magerovsky (1896–1986) former Head of the Newspapers section of Prague’s famed Russkii zagranichnyi istoricheskii arkhiv, assisted by Xenia Vasil’evna Denikina (1892–1973), second wife of the of the White General Anton Denikin (1872–1947).
82. The letters had been part of the papers (acquired in six tranches between 1947 and 1968) of Social Democrat Grigorii Aleksinskii (1879–1967), who had broken with Lenin and resided in exile in Paris.
83. Patricia Kennedy Grimsted, “Russian Attitudes Towards Archival Rossica Abroad: Cultural Reintegration or Political Agenda?” Slavic & East European Information Resources 4, no. 3 (2003): 107–139. The exchange is described on pp. 109–113, passim.
84. See: Karol Maichel. “Annual Report of Slavic Acquisitions. Columbia University Libraries for the fiscal year 1957–1958,” 33–35. Mimeograph, Global Studies Department files.
85. See: Karol Maichel, “Annual Report of Slavic Acquisitions. Columbia University Libraries for the fiscal year 1956–1957,” 2. Mimeograph, Global Studies Department files.
86. Maichel, “Annual Report …1956–1957, 3.
87. Maichel, “Annual Report …1956–1957, 5–13.
88. Maichel, “Annual Report …1957–1958,” 24.
89. Karol Maichel, “Annual Report on Russian, East Central European and Finno-Ugrian Acquisitions. Columbia University Libraries for the fiscal years 1958–1959 and 1959–1960,” 4. Mimeograph, Global Studies Department files. The staff devoted to these activities grew as well, with one profession (Maichel), three paraprofessionals (Schatoff, George Lowy, and Wasyl Scecka, 1923–2011), and three part-time student staffers. 13.
90. Maichel, “Annual Report…1958–1959 and 1959–1960,” 4.
91. Maichel, “Annual Report…1958–1959 and 1959–1960,” 8.
92. See the Annual Reports for these years, passim.
93. On Allworth, see Bruce Pannier, “Edward Allworth: The Last of the Great Masters of Central Asian Studies,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, October 25, 2016, available online at https://www.rferl.org/a/qishloq-ovozi-scholar-wallworth-obituary-central-asia/28073914.html. See also the contribution on his collection-building activities by the present author: “The Allworths and Central Asian Library Resources at Columbia and Beyond: A Note,” in the present volume.
94. Robert A. Karlowich. “Report. Trip to the Soviet Union and Western Europe. October-December 1967.” 11. Global Studies Department Files. Karlowich visited seven cities and sixteen libraries in Central Asia alone. P. 1.
95. Gail Persky was appointed as a Slavic Cataloger in 1970, and subsequently became Director of Automated Services at NYU (see, for example, “Computer vs. Card Catalogue at NYU,” New York Times, October 9, 1983, 54, and library Director at The New School. According to an online obituary (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/66996168/leonarda-wielawski), Wielawski was a German labor camp survivor who learned English partly by watching movies at the Bedford (New York) Playhouse. She held two degrees from Columbia.
96. Maichel, “Annual Report…1958–1959 and 1959–1960,” 12. Dr. Lowy left Columbia in 1979 to become Director of Libraries at the Pratt Institute, later serving as Vice President and Chief Academic Officer. See: “Pratt Mourns Loss of Former Chief Academic Officer George Lowy,” Gateway: The Community Newsletter of Pratt Institute 24, no. 7 (May 2014): 1.
97. In a “Department of Gifts & Exchanges Report for Fiscal Year 1988–1989,” unit head Jack McNees noted that, while his department was generating more offering lists than ever, there were steep declines among “takers” for material, particularly among Soviet exchange partners – a drop of some 23%. He opined that there was a need to improve not only the quantity, but also the quality of offerings. As an experiment, the Department offered cheap U.S. paperbacks on topics of relevance – e.g., an English edition of Djilas on Stalin – that were eagerly snapped up by partners. Pp. 3–4. Global Studies Department files.
98. “News from the Field,” CRL News 30, no. 8 (1969): 296.
99. On New York’s various converging crises, see Martin Shefer, Political Crisis/Fiscal Crisis: The Collapse and Revival of New York City (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992).
100. Columbia University Interdepartmental Memorandum dated March 20, 1973, from George Lowy to University Librarian Warren Haas (1924–2016, served 1970–1978), suggested the transfer of the unit’s “accessionist” to Book Acquisitions, the East Central European searcher to Bibliographic Searching (joining her Russian searcher colleague), two technical assistants to Gifts and Exchanges, leaving the Librarian for Russian and East European Studies one staff member, a Bibliographic Assistant. Global Studies files.
Azamat Altay was already working in the Copy Cataloging Department in Butler, devoting only one day a week to Central Asian materials. (Annual Report for Slavic Acquisitions 1974–1975,” 3. Global Studies Files. In November of 1973, it was decided that the two Gifts & Exchanges designees would remain directly under Nina Lenček’s supervision. Columbia University Interdepartmental Memorandum dated November 9, 1973, from Jerome Yavarkovsky (later, University Librarian at Boston College) to J. Fall, N. Lenček, and G. Lowy. Global Studies files. The Slavic Acquisitions Section ceased to exist in March 1974.
101. See: Susan Cook Summer, “The Soviet Nationalities Collection at Columbia University,” Slavic Review 46, no. 2 (Summer 1987): 292–293. The grant was funded by the Department of Education Title II-C Program.
102. Nina Lenček. “Columbia University Libraries. Slavic Acquisitions. Annual Report 1979–1980,” 8. Global Studies Department files.
103. Lenček, “Annual Report 1979–1980,” 7.
104. After years of chipping away at microfilming or purchasing microfiche for embrittled holdings, Nina Lenček reported on a major grant-funded initiatives to support preservation of collections: a New York State Filming Project grant, which would be used in part for Slavic materials. See: Nina Lenček. “Columbia University Libraries. Slavic Acquisitions. Annual Report 1984–1985,” 2. Subsequent grants for the preservation of materials obtained by Jared Ingersoll via the National Endowment for the Humanities preserved on microfilm approximately 14,000 embrittled volumes. See Note 4 above: Ingersoll, “Columbia University Libraries’ Slavic and East European Collection…,” 85.
105. Not surprisingly, during this period Columbia was actively engaged with the broader Slavic & East European studies librarian community. The six-week 1970 Illinois Summer Institute for Slavic Librarians included Columbia Reference Department staff member Eleanor Buist (1916–2002) and Illinois’ own Larry Miller as instructors at the Department of Education-funded Institute, as well as Persky, Wielawski, and Cornell’s Slavic bibliographer Anna K. Stuliglowa (served 1968 to ca. 1986), and a then-Columbia work-study student Edward Kasinec.
Eleanor Buist was born in Brooklyn and a graduate of the Vassar Class of 1937, subsequently took graduate degrees for Middlebury and Columbia. She served as Research Secretary and Research Assistant in the Russian Institute from 1946–1954, and was a Senior Fellow in 1961, which included travel to the U.S.S.R. with Institute support. She later served as an Officer of the national Association of College and Research Libraries.
Kasinec was assigned to the Slavic Acquisition Section as a Russian Institute word-study student, based in Butler Library. A significant portion of his duties involved working through new receipts at the Four Continent Book Corporation, then headed by Harbin émigré Eda Isaakovna Glaser (1910–2003).
106. Nina Lenček, “Columbia University Libraries. Slavic Acquisitions. Annual Report. 1977–1978,” 5–6. Dated August 1, 1978. The meeting was attended by Victor Koressaar (1916–2002) of the NYPL, and Tatiana Rannit (of Yale. It was determined that all three would collect in depth for Russian, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Serbian, Croatian, Slovene, Bulgarian and Macedonian. Primary responsibility for Ukrainian, and the Baltics went to NYPL, Belarusian to Yale, and Columbia took Hungarian, Finnish, and Romanian.
107. Lenček, “Annual Report. 1977–1978,” 5.
108. Eugene Beshenkovsky, “Columbia University Libraries Slavic and East Central European Acquisitions Annual Report 1990–1991,” 4. Global Studies Department files. Some 11,220 items were received from all sources during the Fiscal Year. Ibid., 8.
109. Nina A. Lenček, “Columbia University Libraries Slavic Acquisitions. Annual Report 1979–1980. August 12, 1980,” 3.
110. A year-over-year growth of 11.4%, to be precise. Lenček, “Annual Report 1979–1980,” 4. Throughout Nina’s tenure, the Soviet Nationalities collection routinely grew in excess of 6% per year. Despite staff departures – most notably Azamat Altay, after fifteen years of service, in 1979 – Columbia was fortunate to have a talented pool of specialists from which to draw. Altay was replaced by Kenneth Nyirady, who went on to head the European Reading Room at the Library of Congress.
111. The émigré literary editor Roman Nicholas Grynberg was a close friend of the critic Edmund Wilson. See for example Lewis M. Dabney, Edmund Wilson: A Life in Literature (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005), 209.
112. Lenček, “Annual Report 1987–1988,” 5. Nina Lenček retired in January of 1989.
113. Eugene Beshenkovsky, “Columbia University Libraries. Slavic and East Central European Acquisitions Annual Report. 1990–1991,” 1. Global Studies Department files.
114. Beshenkovsky, “Annual Report. 1990–1991,” 2.
115. Beshenkovsky, “Annual Report. 1990–1991,” 4.
116. Thanks to Columbia’s Head of Collections Services Matthew K. Pavlick for this end date information.
117. I am proud to serve as the librarian for both collections. This has facilitated the development of collaborative approval plans with vendors, and slashing duplication across the two campuses, and I would like to acknowledge the efforts of former University Librarians Anne Kenney (Cornell), and Jim Neal (Columbia) for their conceptualization of the 2CUL partnership.
118. See the essay in the present volume by Professor Steven Mansbach, “Historical Collections for the Future: A Note on Modernist Books at Columbia and Cornell.”
119. Although many examples of Eastern European modernist acquisitions could be cited, from “the Baltics to the Balkans,” by way of example, consider the rare Bulgarian serials and monographs, circa 1919–1940 that were purchased for Columbia several years ago: complete run of Vezni. Literaturno-khudoshestveno spisanie [Scales. A Literary-Art Journal] (Sofia, 1919–1922) which introduced modernist art and literature to Bulgaria and was edited by Geo Milev (1895–1925) and richly illustrated, and the acquisition of an almost complete run of the Milev-edited journal Plamak [The Flame] (Sofia, 1924–25).
Another example of a project-driven series of purchases occurred in preparation for the 2019 exhibit “Ilia Zdanevich: The Tbilisi Years,” curated by Dr. Thomas Kitson, in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library’s Chang Octagon space. In the year prior to the opening of the exhibit, Columbia devoted considerable attention and treasure to expanding its holdings of materials related to the oeuvre of Zdanevich – better known by his pseudonym, Iliazd – as well as those produced by his circle in Tiflis/Tbilisi in the years immediately following World War I. Chronologically, the exhibition began before the First World War, with Zdanevich’s apprenticeship as a propagandist for the Mikhail Larionov group in competition with Futurist rivals, and proceeded through masterworks he designed and typeset as a founding member of 41°. Included were a selection of works by his brother and collaborator Kirill, and, finally, a display of interconnected items associated with other poets, composers, and visual artists who frequented the “Fantastic Cabaret,” which was the center of Tbilisi artistic life between 1917 and 1920. The exhibit opening coincided with an international workshop that examined Zdanevich as a transnational artist.
120. On the closing of Surma, see: Noah Remnick, “With Closing of East Village Shop, Little Ukraine Grows Smaller,” New York Times, June 5, 2016, A18; and Matthew Dubas, “After 98 Years, Surma Store in New York Set to Close in June,” Ukrainian Weekly, June 10, 2016, available online at https://www.ukrweekly.com/uwwp/after-98-years-surma-store-in-new-york-to-close-in-june/
121. Among the items donated were two titles on Western film: Charl’z Spenser Chaplin (M.: Goskinoizdat, 1945) and D.U. Griffit (Moscow: Goskinoizdat, 1944), as well as the antiquarian title Kartinnyia gallerei Evropy [Art Galleries of Europe] (St.Petersburg: Vol’f, 1862–1864), all rarities in North American collections. One curiosity – Brezhnev’s Malaia zemlia [A Small Land](M.: Politizdat, 1978) – was inscribed by Leonid Il’ich himself to Ambassador Harriman.
122. On Professor Sciacca’s collection, see his article “Amassing Russica and Ucrainica: Memoirs of a Collector and his Collecting,” in the present volume.
123. Gay Matthaei is also acknowledged in the Introduction to Karol Maichel’s “Annual Report …1958–1959 and 1959–1960,” (Note 89 above), as the “co-ordinator of activities between the Russian and Central East European Institutes and the Libraries. Much of the progress described in this report can be attributed to the Institutes’ and Mrs. Matthaei’s, efforts.”
124. I am grateful to my colleague Dr. Brendan Nieubuurt, now Librarian for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies at the University of Michigan, for his careful work matching video to diary information.
125. On Columbia’s available e-resources, see the 48-page guide by the present author: “Overview of Available Electronic Resources for Slavic, Eurasian, and East European Studies at the Columbia University Libraries,” Revised August 2020. On electronic resources available at Cornell see my: “Overview of Available Electronic Resources for Slavic and East European Studies at the Cornell University Library,” Revised August 2020. 39 p.
126. In the words of Jared Ingersoll, speaking about documentation of the period of the 1970s onward, “…it is from this point that documentary trail subsides from a modest flow to a trickle,” Ingersoll, “Columbia University Libraries’ Slavic…,” 83 (see Note 4). Nevertheless, for those with the time to pursue it, there is still much to delve into, from an institutional archival perspective.