Frank A. Golder

Frank Alfred Golder (August 11, 1877 – January 7, 1929) was an American historian and archivist specializing in the history of Russia. Golder is best remembered for his work in the early 1920s building the seminal collection of Slavic language materials residing today at the Hoover Institution Library and Archives at Stanford University in California.

Biography

Early years Golder spent two years teaching school on remote Unga Island, largest of Alaska's Shumagin Islands.

Golder was born August 11, 1877, near Odessa, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire. His family, who were ethnic Jews, emigrated to the United States during Golder's early boyhood years, probably in the immediate aftermath of the Odessa Pogrom of 1881.

Golder subsequently converted to Unitarianism, a theological departure which caused a strain between him and his parents, who remained adherents of Judaism.

Following graduation Golder moved to Philadelphia, to which his parents had recently located. Although he had sufficient academic qualification to teach school in the city, Golder did not find life in Philadelphia to his liking, so in July 1899 he applied through the U.S. Department of the Interior for a teaching position in Alaska.

Golder left Alaska to enroll at Harvard University, from which he received a second bachelor's degree in 1903 before beginning doctoral studies in history at that same institution.

Golder arrived in St. Petersburg in February 1914 and remained there until November, an interval which placed him at ground zero to witness firsthand the declaration of World War I that summer. Despite the massive distraction and the wartime disorganization of Russian society, Golder nevertheless managed to complete his research mission, producing a bibliographic guide which eventually saw print in 1917 as Guide to Materials for American History in Russian Archives.

Coincidentally, Golder would again find himself at the center of the world-historical tornado during his second research trip to Russia, conducted in 1917. This time, Golder traveled on behalf of the American Geographic Society, which commissioned him to translate and edit the journals of the Danish-born Russian explorer Vitus Bering for publication. Golder arrived to peruse the Bering papers in Petrograd (the past and future St. Petersburg) on March 4, 1917 — mere days before the eruption of the February Revolution which would rapidly bring an end to the Romanov dynasty and usher in the rise of a short-lived constitutional democracy. The committee, known as "The Inquiry" and headed by Wilson's close personal advisor Colonel Edward M. House, would remain active for two years, and Golder authored reports on Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland, and two regions of Russia. A second smaller collection is housed at Green Library on the Stanford campus.

Footnotes

Works

Tales from Kodiak Island. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1903. Russian Expansion on the Pacific, 1641–1850. Cleveland, OH: Arthur H. Clark Co., 1914. "Catherine II and the American Revolution," American Historical Review, vol. 21, no. 1 (1915), pp. 92–96. Guide to Materials for American History in Russian Archives. New York: Carnegie Institution, 1917. Bering's Voyages: An Account of the Efforts of the Russians to Determine the Relation of Asia and America. In two volumes, with Leonhard Stejneger. New York: American Geographical Society, 1922–1925. Documents of Russian history, 1914–1917. (Editor.) Gloucester, MA: Smith, 1927. The March of the Mormon battalion from Council Bluffs to California: Taken from the Journal of Henry Standage. New York: The Century Co., 1928.