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Vtoroe rozhdenie: Trudovaia kommuna im. F.E. Dzerzhinskogo [i.e. The Second Birth: Dzerzhinsky’s Working Commune]

Khar’kov: 1932. Item #260

124, [4] pp.: ill. 22x15 cm. In original publisher’s wrappers. Very good, slightly rubbed, small tears and losses of small pieces of spine, Soviet bookshop’s stamp on the recto of the rear wrapper, front wrapper is partly detached from the block.

The first and only edition. One of 3000 copies. Extremely rare. Constructivist styled book design.
This edition is a detailed report of the 5 year work of the Dzerzhinsky’s children’s working commune with statistical data and richly illustrated by photographs of children and young people, produce, working process. A very interesting section of the book includes children's life stories. The last pages of the book contain notes and lyrics of Dzerzhinsky’s commune’s march.
By the beginning of the 1920s there were about 6 million homeless children in Russia as a result of the World War I and Russian Civil War. In 1921 Felix Dzerzhinsky (1877-1926) announced the idea of a working commune for children that will reduce the level of homelessness. The first commune appeared near Poltava that year. In 1927 it moved to Khar’kov commune named after Felix Dzerzhinsky and contained 60 children. During the first year a new commune organized agricultural production to feed themselves and next year it was decided to produce goods that are not available in the Soviet market. This production allowed the communards to master complex professions. As a result the Dzerzhinsky’s commune built the first Soviet factory of electric drills and a little later they created the production of cameras. In 1930s they published several guides to these products.

Worldcat locates no copies.

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