The People's Archive was established in December 1988 on the initiative of a group of professors and students of the Moscow State Historico-Archival Institute. The People's Archive focuses on materials inadequately represented in official state archives from the 18th century to the present, such as unofficial social organizations, political parties, religious and ecological organizations, and private documents of individual citizens not normally acquired by state archives.
Its leading collection concerns documentation of personal origin with over 270 fonds of personal papers and family archives, most of which focus on little known individuals and include diaries, memoirs, photographs and extensive personal correspondence. The People's Archive also holds several hundred thousand letters to the editors of various newspapers and magazines that otherwise would have not been preserved.
90 reels