Sonia Melnikova-Raich papers, 1920-2011

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Summary

Creators:
Melnikova-Raich, Sonia
Abstract:
The collection comprises thousands of copies of documents from Russian state archives, related to the history of Soviet foreign concessions of the 1920s to the early 1930s.
Extent:
10 manuscript boxes, digital media (4.17 Linear Feet)
Language:
In Russian and English
Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Sonia Melnikova-Raich papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Background

Scope and content:

The collection comprises thousands of copies of documents from Russian state archives, relating to the history of Soviet foreign concessions of the 1920s to the early 1930s. The collection was amassed in the course of 25 years when Sonia Melnikova-Raich acted as a consultant, translator and assistant researcher for renowned British jurist and legal scholar, leading arbitrator Van Vechten Veeder QC (1948-2020).

In addition, this collection includes copies of material from the NKVD records relating to the prosecution, arrest, and rehabilitation of Stefan Sebők, an architect who had disappeared in the Soviet Union during the Second World War. These materials were collected by his niece Lilly Dubowitz (née Sebők) and published in her book In Search of a Forgotten Architect. The documents are in Russian and most of them are accompanied by an English translation.

Lilly Dubowitz shared these papers with Sonia Melnikova-Raich in anticipation of future collaboration on the project shortly before she died in 2016.

Biographical / historical:

Sonia Melnikova-Raich was born in Moscow. She immigrated to the USA in 1987 and lives in San Francisco, where she works as a translator and independent researcher. She is an acknowledged expert on the subject of American roots of accelerated Soviet industrialization during the First Five-Year Plan. and an author of The Soviet Problem with Two "Unknowns": How an American Architect and a Soviet Negotiator Jump-Started the Industrialization of Russia, which can be found in two issues of The Journal of the Society for Industrial Archeology included in her papers.

Acquisition information:
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library Archives in 2022.
Physical location:
Hoover Institution Library & Archives
Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Access and use

Restrictions:

The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.

Terms of access:

For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Sonia Melnikova-Raich papers, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

Location of this collection:
Hoover Institution Library & Archives, Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-6003, US
Contact:
(650) 723-3563
hooverarchives@stanford.edu
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