ABOUT THE REAL AND FAKE PUBLISHERS-EDITORS OF THE FIRST CHUVASH NEWSPAPER «KHYPAR»
Authors: Leontiev Alexey P. 
Published: November 2024

The relevance of the research is due to the fact that in published works on the history of the first Chuvash newspaper «Khypar» and coverage of its founder’s biography, insufficient attention was paid to the study of archival documents. As a result, distorted conclusions about the activities of publishers-editors in one or another period of the newspaper’s functioning took root in historiography. For example, all researchers considered N.V. Nikolsky to be the publisher-editor of 22 issues, while he, being the owner, published 33 issues; the second editor of the newspaper, S.K. Kirillov, was only «a responsible editor», and N.V. Nikolsky remained the publisher. The legally full-fledged publisher-editor P.A. Alekseyev was the prison editor, when he worked, the editorial policy was actually directed by the Chuvash Socialist Revolutionaries (the SRs) headed by T.N. Nikolaev (Khuri); the creative process was headed by V.I. Ivanov – the unofficial editor of 6 issues, and the official publisher -editor, after purchasing the newspaper from P.A. Alekseev, of the last 16 issues of the newspaper.

The purpose of the study is to eliminate false information on publishers-editors of the first Chuvash newspaper.

Materials and methods. The research materials were published works on the newspaper «Khypar», as well as recently found sources. The principles of historicism, objectivity and consistency were used, as well as research methods: historical-genetic, analytical, problem-chronological, factual ones.

Research results. Dozens of works have been published on creation, development and evolvement of the first Chuvash newspaper. Most of the information provided in them is reliable, as they are based on authentic documents. It is known that in 1906–1907 the «Khypar» in different periods was edited by N.V. Nikolsky, S.K. Kirillov, S.I. Ignatiev, P.A. Alekseev, V.I. Ivanov, which is confirmed by the output data of subsequent issues, and the certificates issued to each publisher-editor by the Kazan governor. Meanwhile, due to inattention of the researchers, some mistakes were made. For example, S.K. Kirillov was not a publisher-editor, he was the responsible editor of 11 issues during N.V. Nikolsky’s regular vacation and the latter remained the publisher, that is, an economic entity; N.V. Nikolsky did not voluntarily refuse to publish «Khypar», but was forced to retire from publishing because of the «onslaught of the Simbirsk people» – the Chuvash organization of the Socialist Revolutionary Party headed by T.N. Nikolaev (Khuri); P.A. Alekseev was a front editor, in fact the editorial office was headed by V.I. Ivanov; A.A. Nikolaeva, the sixth publisher-editor, was also a prison-editor, but she was unable to publish any issues, when she was occupying this post , «Khypar» was closed by the authorities as a politically unreliable publication.

Conclusions. Monographs and articles published to date admitted inaccuracies in covering the history of the Chuvash periodical press, the ancestor of which was the newspaper «Khypar». Moreover, the authors often freely interpreted archival documents and memoirs of active participants in events directly related to publishing the newspaper. The author of this article analyzed a large array of literature and archival documents about «Khypar», some of the sources were introduced into scientific circulation for the first time. As a result, adjustments were made to the establishment of the periodical’s periodization, objective data on the activities of publishers-editors are provided.