Moscow, September 17, 2010
On September 17, 2010, as part of the 90th anniversary celebrations of the State Archives of the Russian Federation [GARF—Gosudarstvenniy arkhiv Rossijskoj Federatsii], copies of documents were exchanged between GARF and Holy Trinity Seminary of Jordanville, NY.
Participating in the anniversary ceremonies were eminent political and academic figures, representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church and their colleagues from the “near abroad.”
Mr. S.V. Mironenko, Director of GARF, opened the event with a speech. “On this day, 90 years ago, a directive of the Chief Administration of Archives of the Narkompros [Narodniy komitet prosveshcheniya—the People’s Committee on Education] of the RSFSR was signed, and at that moment, our archives were founded,” said Mironenko. He noted that the history of GARF was a difficult one. A book was published to mark the anniversary, in which “details are given on the whole history of our archive, with copies of documents, and probably most interesting, the memoirs of its employees.”
Mr. A.E. Busygin, Deputy Minister of Culture, read a greeting from Russian President Dmitry Medvedev addressed to GARF’s staff. The missive pointed out that the State Archive of the Russian Federation “is considered a national treasure by law and is one of the biggest repositories in the country… You are entrusted with invaluable documents without which it is impossible to study the history of our state, the development of science, culture, education… It is important that you not only secure the preservation of the historical and cultural legacy of Russia, but popularize it.” The President also hailed the podvig and high competency of the archive’s employees.
Protopriest Nikolai Balashov, Vice President of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, read a greeting from His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia.
Congratulatory letters were also read by Mr. A. N. Artizov, Administrator of the Federal Archival Agency; Mr. N. A. Sakharov, Advisor to the President of the State Duma; Mr. S. M. Shakhrai, Head of the Accounting Bureau of the Russian Federation; Academician AA Chubarian, Director of the Institute of General History of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Mr. M. S. Gusman, First Deputy of the General Director of ITAR-TASS News Service, and others.
Mr Mironenko and Protopriest Vladimir Tsurikov, Dean of Holy Trinity Seminary, then exchanged copies of a series of documents. Among those give to the Seminary were copies of the GARF archives on the Russian Church Abroad (1921-1945), in exchange for a collection of documents in the Seminary’s archives: The VK Abdank-Kossovsky Collection (1885-1962), those of PN Krasnov (1869-1962), SV Denisov and others.
The anniversary celebrations included the opening of an exhibition titled “For Preservation in the State Archives,” and the new official website of GARF, which includes some 3 million titles from its collection. This exhibition, which will continue until November 28, was organized based on archival materials covering 23 subjects on the history of Russia from the 19th-20th centuries, including “The Prophecies of St Seraphim of Sarov in the Documents of the Secret Police,” “The Conspiracy of the Grand Dukes, 1916,” and “The Testament of Patriarch Tikhon.”
