Serebrovskii, Aleksandr

Born Dec. 13 (25), 1884; died Feb. 10, 1938. Soviet party and state figure. Member of the Communist Party from 1903. The son of a member of the People’s Will exiled in Ufa, Sere-brovskii became a worker. He was active in the revolutionary movement from 1899. In 1905 he became a member of the Executive Committee of the St. Petersburg soviet, representing the Putilov Factory. In 1907 he took part in an armed uprising in Vladivostok. Serebrovskii was arrested several times, and in 1908 he emigrated to Belgium, where he graduated from the Higher Technical School in 1911. Beginning in 1912 he engaged in party work in Nizhny Novgorod (now the city of Gorky), Moscow, and Rostov.

Serebrovskii participated in the October Revolution of 1917. Thereafter he was a member of the collegium of the People’s Commissariat of Trade, deputy chairman of the Extraordinary Commission for Supplying the Red Army, chairman of the Central Board of Artillery Plants, deputy people’s commissar of railroads, and director of war supplies for the Ukrainian Front. In 1921 he participated in the struggle to establish Soviet power in Georgia. From 1920 to 1930, Serebrovskii was chairman of Azneft’ (Azerbaijan Petroleum Industry) in Baku, chairman of the board of the All-Russian Petroleum Syndicate, and deputy chairman of the All-Russian Council of the National Economy. In 1926 he became director of Glavzoloto (Central Board of the Gold Industry) and a member of the collegium of the People’s Commissariat of Finances of the USSR. In 1931 he became deputy people’s commissar of heavy industry. Beginning in 1924, simultaneous with his government activity, Serebrovskii taught at the Azerbaijan Polytechnic Institute, the Moscow Academy of Mines, and the G. V. Plekhanov Institute of the National Economy.

Serebrovskii was a delegate to the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Seventeenth Congresses of the CPSU. At the Fourteenth through Seventeenth Congresses he was elected a candidate member of the Central Committee. He was also a member of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR. Serebrovskii was awarded the Order of Lenin and three other orders.