P.P. Malinovsky – Architect, Bolshevik, People’s Commissar of Property of the Republic

The article presents a biographical sketch of Pavel Petrovich Malinovsky (1869-1943), one of the prominent representatives of the Russian radical intelligentsia of the pre-revolutionary and Soviet period. The first part of the study focuses on the activities of Malinovsky, an architect (who built a number of bright buildings in Nizhny Novgorod and Moscow) and Malinovsky, a revolutionary who joined the ranks of the Bolshevik Party back in 1904. Malinovsky's personal and creative contacts with prominent people of the era, such as writer Maxim Gorky and opera singer Fyodor Chaliapin, are considered. The central part of the work is devoted to Malinovsky's activities in 1917-1918, primarily in the posts of commissioner of the Moscow Palace Administration and People's Commissar of Property of the Republic. The measures he took to suppress "sabotage" in the palace department, and the conflict with A.V. Lunacharsky, are also highlighted. The latter had both a bureaucratic dimension (the People's Commissariat for Education headed by Lunacharsky absorbed the People's Commissariat of Property of the Republic) and an ideological one: Lunacharsky relied on cooperation with specialists, whereas Malinovsky was primarily interested in the loyalty of his staff to the Bolshevik Party. Finally, a previously almost unknown period in Malinovsky's life (1920s - 1940s) has been studied, during which he not only continued to work in his profession, but also wrote memoirs. The article is written on a large archival material, while Malinovsky's personal fund in the Russian State Archive of Economics is of particular importance, which stores numerous personal documents, including Malinovsky's valuable memoirs.