The State Scientific Technical and Economic Library of the RSFSR Supreme Council of National Economy Sci-tech Department: The beginnings (1918–1919)

Abstract

The  author  reviews  the  history  of  Russian  central   sci-tech  library  in 1918-1919. During this  period, the  library was called  The State  Scientific Technical and  Economic Library (SSTEL) and  was part  of the  Sci-tech  Department of the  Supreme  Council of National  Economy of the  Russian  Soviet Federative  Socialist  Republic.  Further,  in  1927-1958,  this  largest   library  organization  was called  The State  Scientific Library. It became  the  foundation to the  Russian  National  Public  Library for Science  and  Technology  and  State  Public  Scientific  & Technological  Library of the Russian Academy of Sciences Siberian Branch.The author  analyzes  the pool of the government and departmental solutions that  laid the  basis for the  Library; he also describes  organization process, and reviews  personal  contributions of librarians  to  the  initial  library organization and collection  development.  He characterizes the  first  SSTEL leaders  and  librarians (M.L. Milshtein, Karl F. Gessel, Nikolay N. Orlov). In particular, he emphasizes the outstanding contribution by Nikolay P. Gorbunov  (former  assistant to  Vladimir Lenin, later an academic).At the  initial  stages,  two  well-stocked public  libraries  were  merged  into SSTEL, namely  the  Society for Advancement of Experimental  Sciences  and Their Practical Applications named  by H.S. Ledentsov  (and its specialized  library building) and Moscow Technical Library of the Polytechnic Society.The author  concludes  that  the  efforts  of librarians  and  scholars  in the  Supreme  Council of National  Economy made  it possible  to establish the  central  national  sci-tech  library and  get  it off the  ground  during  the  hardest  years  of the Civil War.