The
Feleky Collection, acquired by the
Library of CongressThe Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
in 1953, consisted of more than 10,000 books and 15,000 periodical issues, including biographical files, newspaper clippings, questionnaires and other materials on approximately 920 Hungarian Americans, plus photographs, prints, music scores,
mapsMaps is the plural of map, a visual representation of an area.As an acronym, MAPS may refer to:* Mail Abuse Prevention System, an organisation that provides anti-spam support...
, broadsides and posters, recordings, and manuscripts.
History
The collection was started by Charles Feleky as an effort to collect everything published in the English
languageLanguage may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...
about Hungary. Feleky was born in Budapest in 1863, but came to the United States in 1885 as a musician. Later, he conducted the music for plays, especially an itinerant production of
Ben Hur. Feleky's fascination with Hungary and Hungarian history began after he purchased a book about
Lajos KossuthLajos Kossuth de Udvard et Kossuthfalva was a Hungarian lawyer, journalist, politician and Regent-President of Hungary in 1849. He was widely honored during his lifetime, including in the United Kingdom and the United States, as a freedom fighter and bellwether of democracy in Europe.-Family:Lajos...
, leader of
HungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
after the
Hungarian Revolution of 1848The Hungarian Revolution of 1848 was one of many of the European Revolutions of 1848 and closely linked to other revolutions of 1848 in the Habsburg areas...
. Over the course of next several years Charles Feleky would develop a network of book dealers in the United States,
CanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, England, Ireland, British Africa, India and Australia who would send him copies of books written in English about Hungary and Hungarians. His apartment in New York became his library.
After his
deathDeath is the permanent termination of the biological functions that sustain a living organism. Phenomena which commonly bring about death include old age, predation, malnutrition, disease, and accidents or trauma resulting in terminal injury....
, his wife sold the floor-to-ceiling collection to the
Hungarian National Museum- History:The Hungarian National Museum is said to have been founded in 1802 when Count Ferenc Széchényi set up the National Széchényi Library. This would then be followed a year later by the donating of a mineral collection by Széchényi’s wife. This led to the creation of the Hungarian National...
, which established the Hungarian Reference Library in New York. By then, the Feleky library covered many academic disciplines. When Hungary declared war on the United States in 1941, the collection was seized by the U.S. Office of Alien Property and put into
storageA warehouse is a commercial building for storage of goods. Warehouses are used by manufacturers, importers, exporters, wholesalers, transport businesses, customs, etc. They are usually large plain buildings in industrial areas of cities and towns. They usually have loading docks to load and unload...
, where it remained until purchased by the Library of Congress in 1953 for $2,000.00.
This book
History of the Feleky Collection and Its Acquisition by the Library of Congress may be read online at the Hathi Trust site:
http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015034923154