Ask the Scholar
Document scope · 1 page
Scholar
Ask about this object, its catalog metadata, its source description, or the page inventory.
For page-specific OCR and visual context, open one of the page chats.
Source Description
A 66-page letter, in Yiddish, written by Mary Antin in 1894 in Boston and sent to her uncle, Moshe Hayyim Weltman, in Polotsk (present day Belarus). The letter details the emigration of Antin and her family from Polotsk to the United States.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
9w034s530
label
From Plotzk to Boston
core
obj
dtoType
document
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
9w034s530
contentType
document
stage
normalized
title
From Plotzk to Boston
description
A 66-page letter, in Yiddish, written by Mary Antin in 1894 in Boston and sent to her uncle, Moshe Hayyim Weltman, in Polotsk (present day Belarus). The letter details the emigration of Antin and her family from Polotsk to the United States.
date
["1894"]
year
1894
rights
No known copyright restrictions.
rightsUri
No known restrictions on use.
reuseAllowed
no restrictions
language
Yiddish
identifierLocal
06_01_016828
creators
Antin, Mary, 1881-1949
Antin, Rosemary
Grabau, John F., 1878-1948
Weltman, Berl
Weltman, Moshe
institution
Boston Public Library
collections
Selections from the Boston Public Library Rare Books and Manuscripts Department
subjects
Antin, Mary, 1881-1949--Biography
Jews--Massachusetts--Boston--Biography
Jews--Belarus--Biography
Boston (Mass.)--Emigration and immigration--Biography
Belarus--Emigration and immigration--Biography
subjectsGeographic
Boston
Massachusetts
North and Central America
Suffolk (county)
United States
genreBasic
Manuscripts
Books
genreSpecific
Manuscripts, Yiddish
Signed bindings
typeOfResource
Text
country
United States
state
Massachusetts
county
Suffolk
city
Boston
thumbnailUrl
largeImageUrl
pageCount
1
source
import
extent
1 volume (1 unnumbered leaf, 5 leaves, 68 (i.e. 66) pages) ; 21 x 14 cm
hasTranscription
no
Source extras
institutionArkId
sf268508b
collectionArkId
1n79hc782
schema:latitude
42.35
schema:longitude
-71.05
notes
Title from hand-written English title page.
First numbered sequence (5 leaves) comprised of a 1914 English introduction, in Mary Antin's hand, titled "History of this manuscript." The introduction describes the circumstances of the letter's original composition in 1894, its rediscovery in 1910, and its relationship to an original draft destroyed by Antin just after publication. The main body of the Yiddish letter begins on page 1 (second count) and is 66 pages long.
Sent to Moshe Hayyim Weltman in 1894, thence passed to various family members in Russia. Recovered by Mary Antin during a visit to the Polotsk region in 1910, when it was found in the possession of her uncle Berl Weltman in Vilnius. Apparently bound for Antin by her brother-in-law, John Grabau.
A pencil inscription in a different Yiddish hand, roughly translated as "Send to Schloyme [i.e. Solomon Weltman?] right away" follows the final line of Antin's letter.
An adapted version of this letter, apparently based on the original draft from which the present copy is primarily derived, was published in 1899 in English under the title "From Plotzk to Boston."
pubPlace
Boston
dcId
9w034s530
type
document
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
9a368c77004a3eba