Kalmykov A, Aleksandra Mikhailovna

Born Dec. 26, 1849 (Jan, 7, 1850), in Ekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk); died Apr. 1, 1926, in Leningrad. Progressive Russian public figure.

After completing training in a Gymnasium, Kalmykova received a diploma as a schoolteacher. In the 1880’s she participated in the organization and operation in Kharkov and St. Petersburg of Sunday schools to eliminate illiteracy among adolescents. She took part in the Narodnik (Populist) movement and was connected with the Liberation of Labor group; later she had ties with activists in the St. Petersburg Union of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class. Kalmykova was on the editorial boards of the “legal Marxist” magazines Novoe slovo and Nachalo. From 1889 to 1902 she maintained a storehouse of popular literature in St. Petersburg that served as a meeting place for Social Democrats; she supported Lenin’s Iskra and Zaria with donations. In 1902, Kalmykova was exiled abroad. She gave financial assistance to Bolsheviks. According to N. K. Krupskaia, Lenin had absolute trust in Kalmykova. After the October Revolution in 1917 she worked in public education and at the K. D. Ushinskii Pedagogical Institute in Leningrad.