Vekselman, Max

Reference Code

P282 Vekselman, Max - Private Collection

Dates

1932-1996

Consists of

30 files.

Languages

Russian; Yiddish; Hebrew; English;

Description

The collection consists of records concerning the scholarly activity and life of Max Vekselman in Uzbekistan and Israel, Yiddish theater in the USSR, and the history of the Jews of Central Asia. Materials related to scientific activities in the field of history include: Vekselman’s publications and works; notebooks with extracts from archival documents from archives in Uzbekistan and Russia on the history of the Jews of Central Asia in Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union; notebooks with extracts from periodicals, archival documents and publications about the economic history of Central Asia in the late 19th-early 20th century and publications of various authors on the history of the Yiddish theater and Jewish actors in the USSR. Particularly important are the private archives of Jewish actors and their relatives. For example, the archive of Dora Zak (Pshepiurka), an actress in the Bialystok and Lvov State Jewish Theaters (GOSET), contain photographs and a collage of posters of performances with the participation of the actress in the 1940s. The collection of actor Albert Stolsky, who performed in the Vinitsa-Zhytomyr GOSET (1934-1941), in the Lvov Jewish Drama and Comedy Ensemble (1948-1949) and other theatrical collectables include: his memoirs, copies of posters; a copy from a program of a performance in 1948; and photos of the theaters’ actors. Another example is the archive of Moisei Belenkii, director of the theater school at the Moscow GOSET and professor of philosophy and his wife El’sha Bezverkhniaia, an actress in the Moscow GOSET. The archive includes their personal documents, the family’s correspondence and photographs. Vekselman’s collection also includes various publications and manuscripts belonging to M.Belenkii. The collection contains materials on the history of the Kiev GOSET, the Odessa-Kharkov GOSET, the Moscow GOSET, the Kishinev GOSET, and Anna Guzik's Music and Drama Ensemble. Especially notable are the audio interviews recorded by Max Vekelman with Jewish actors, their relatives, and with Jewish immigrants to Israel from Central Asia. There are, for example, interviews with Rabbi Sholom Dov Ber Gorelik and Rabbi Abe David Gurevich. Rabbi Sholom Dov Ber Gorelik described the organization of an underground minyan by Chabad activists in Samarkand in the 1940s, the underground organized efforts by Chabad activists in Lvov to escape from the Soviet Union to Eretz Israel in the late 1940s, the arrest of his father, moving to Tashkent and his studies, religious life in Tashkent, the “refusal” and repatriation to Israel in 1971. Rabbi Abe David Gurevich, who since the early 1990s was the Chief Rabbi of Central Asia and Tajikistan, also described his family, the arrest of his father in the late 1940s, moving to Tashkent, repatriation to Israel in 1971, and spoke about Jewish religious life in different cities of Central Asia: Samarkand, Tashkent, Bishkek (Frunze), Alma-Ata. Interviews with Jewish actors include, for example, audio recordings of Ethel Kovenskaia, Elsha Bezverkhniaia, Sofia Pemova, Dora Pshepiurka (Zak), and Lea Kenig. The collection contains Max Vekselman’s personal documents and materials for his biography.