The State public historical library of the RSFSR opened in Moscow

On December 20, 1938 the State public historical library of the RSFSR (SPHL) opened.

The basis for the collections of SPHL became a private library of the famous Moscow public figure and collector A.D. Chertkov that he intended as a “general library of Russia”. In 1863 it was opened for public as a free library for general use and in 1875 its collections served the basis for the Emperor Russian historical museum library. In 1921-1922 the library acquired the status of the State historical one under the Historical museum and from that time received a legal deposit of the national publications that belonged of its subject area.

In 1938 due to the reforms in the field of social science teaching it was decided to form an information center that would accumulate materials on historical disciplines. For this purpose the Historical library was united with the libraries of the Red professors Institutes, Communist university of East workers and other institutions and under the decree of the Peoples’ Committee Council of the RSFSR was named the State public historical library of the RSFSR. A separate building was allocated for the new library where it has been located until today.

From 1991 the library is officially name the State public historical library of Russia.

SPHL is a state repository of literature on history, historical disciplines and related disciplines. It is also a large methodological center for the work with historical subject area materials. The library’s collections, which number about 4 million units in 47 languages of the ex-USSR peoples and in 65 foreign languages, represents a great scientific and cultural value.

Lit.: Государственная публичная историческая библиотека России (ГПИБ России) // Федеральные библиотеки. М., 2007; История библиотеки [Электронный ресурс] // Государственная публичная историческая библиотека. 2019. URL: http://www.shpl.ru/about_library/history_library/.