Kuz'mina A.V. The use of material from private possession for the study of industrial enterprises in Sevastopol

Abstract: The article exposes the particularities of using material from private papers and oral history in filling the gaps of the sources on the history of industrial enterprises in Sevastopol, based on the example of food industry production enterprises. The article presents the results from interviews conducted by the author with employees, veterans, and enterprise managers; analyses the possibilities in using private archives for the restoration of the losses in the source base for the history of the Soviet industry in Sevastopol; reviews the methodology of searching for interviewees, working with materials from personal possession and oral history; assesses the significance of such data for the studied period. The author affirms that only a comprehensive review of all the source groups – archival data and record documentation, representative material, sources in private possession – permits to reconstruct the picture of an enterprise’s functioning. A scholar studying the Soviet industry in Sevastopol often faces the problem of the enormous losses in the source base, of fragmentary, badly preserved archival funds. In such cases, resorting to the material from oral history, private collections, and individuals–eyewitnesses of events becomes indispensable. The period in question provides a unique possibility not only to study, but also to actually create new historical sources for future generations of researchers, to preserve the memory of the industrial tradition and of the at times difficult, heroic pages in the city’s history.

Keywords: