This year marks the 100th anniversary of Mr Gedaliy Safyan, a veteran of the Great Patriotic War, an outstanding specialist who devoted more than thirty years of his professional life to the National Library of Belarus.
Mr Gedaliy Safyan was born in 1920 in the city of Mozyr. In 1938, he began his studies at the Faculty of History of the Belarusian State University, but the Great Patriotic War interrupted all the plans.
Mr Gedaliy Safyan defended his homeland from the very first days of the war. He reached Germany in his soldier's greatcoat. Records from personal files testify: June – November 1941 he served as a private; November 1941 – May 1942: in the hospital for treatment; July 1942 – November 1945 he was squad leader.
Hard times of war claimed the lives of those closest to him: his father died in the Trostenets camp in the middle of the war, and his mother died during the first pogrom of the Minsk ghetto on November 7–8, 1941. But Gedaliy found out about this much later and marched the entire soldier's road with the hope of meeting his relatives.
Mr Safyan was awarded two medals "For Courage" (1944, 1945) and a medal "For Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945" (1945) for bravery and great contribution to the overall victory.
After demobilization, he returned to Minsk, resumed his studies at the university and in 1946 received a diploma in history.
From 1946 to 1947, he worked as a researcher at the State Archives of the BSSR. From 1947 to 1949, he studied at the graduate school of the Academy of Sciences of the BSSR, and in 1948 he got a job at the State Library of the BSSR named after V.I. Lenin (today - the National Library of Belarus), and devoted almost half of his life to the institution.
He worked first as Senior Librarian (1948–1949), then served as Academic Secretary (1949–1950), and then for thirty years was Head of the Acquisition Department.
The post-war period was not easy for the library. A small team of employees had to make every effort to restore the collections and get back to serving readers.
During the war, a significant number of documents were destroyed or taken away: only 320 thousand remained out of the two million copies of the pre-war collections.
In the first post-war five-year plan, largely due to the exchange with other libraries of the USSR, the collections reached the pre-war level. The problem of accounting and placement immediately arose due to such rapid growth. The library building was packed with books, and unaccounted copies lay everywhere.
It is in such difficult circumstances that Mr Gedaliy Safyan began his career. The difficulties were not only in the large amount of work and in the insufficient number of experienced employees. Sometimes there were certain contradictions with the administration of the library on book exchange issues. From the memoirs of Ms Rimma Kulagina: “... Mr Safyan was Head of the Acquisition Department ... He sometimes had clashes with Mr Simanowski over book exchange. Mr Simanowski was simply "sitting" on a pile of books and was against the exchange, and Gedaliy was more modern... There were very interesting people. We, young specialists, have learned a lot from them. "
Mr Gedaliy Safyan resigned from the managing positions for health reasons at the beginning of 1980 and worked as Chief Librarian, and later as Librarian of the Acquisition Department.
Over the years of his career, he has repeatedly received awards, including the badge "For Excellent Work" (1962); Certificate of Honour of the Ministry of Culture of the BSSR and the Belarusian Republican Committee of the Trade Union of Cultural Workers (1967); medal “For Valiant Labour. In commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of Vladimir Lenin "(1970); Certificate of honour of the Ministry of Culture of the BSSR and the Belarusian Republican Committee of Cultural Workers (1970); Certificate of honour of the Supreme Soviet of the BSSR (1972).
Companions of Mr Gedaliy Safyan remember him as a very knowledgeable person, disciplined, proactive and diligent worker who enjoyed authority among colleagues. He could defend his point of view, knew foreign languages, had a great sense of humour, skilfully led subordinates and took an active part in the staff community activities.
Unfortunately, his life path was not long. He died in 1985 and was buried at the Northern Cemetery in Minsk.
Bibliology Research Department
Read about the veterans and employees of the National Library of Belarus in the news section “Our History: a Portrait Gallery.”
