The archive
Search by a name, a place, or a word he wrote — or just scroll to browse all 151.
1991 · Brochure
A printed AIFS orientation/guidebook page (header 'VIPs') profiling key Estonian leaders shortly after Estonia regained independence in 1991. Includes capsule biographies of President Arnold Rüütel, Prime Minister Edgar Savisaar, author Jaan Kross, and Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, with a fifth profile (Marju Lauristin) truncated at the page edge.
January 8, 1991 · Letter
A two-page handwritten letter from Seth, dated Jan 8, 1991, sharing two Russian jokes he forgot to include in an earlier note on Russian humor. Both jokes were told to him by two naval officers over glasses of vodka. The first is about a Russian submarine captain sending a diver named Vasily to identify a sunken sub, ending with the punchline that he knocked on the door and they opened it (revealing it was Russian). The second is a North Pole / directions joke poking fun at Russian guidance systems. Seth closes worrying the jokes are funnier in Russian with vodka.
August 1991 · Form
A printed letter from the American Institute for Foreign Study (AIFS) College Division, dated August 1991, listing the names, home addresses, and phone numbers of students participating in the Leningrad study-abroad program that semester. Seth Baker (the author of this collection) appears in the list with his Bloomfield, CT home address. Marked '--continued on back.'
October 1991 · Magazine clipping
A magazine 'Notable Qoutes' column (page 17) collecting memorable statements by Estonian and international figures around the August 1991 Soviet coup and Estonia's restoration of independence. Includes Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, magazine editor Kai Maran, TV director Hagi Shein, composer Veljo Tormis, the Dalai Lama, and novelist Jaan Kross. A pen box outlines the Lennart Meri quote referencing US Secretary of State James Baker, with one word redacted in ink.
October 1991 · Magazine clipping
A two-page clipping from an English-language magazine (consistent with the Saint Petersburg PREMIER milieu Seth was part of). Page 17 is a 'Notable Qoutes' feature collecting statements about the August 1991 coup and the restoration of Estonian independence, from figures including Estonian Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, librarian Kai Maran, Estonian TV director Hagi Shein, composer Veljo Tormis, the Dalai Lama, and novelist Jaan Kross, plus an editorial cartoon by Rein Lauks. Page 18 carries advertisements for the Maharaja Restaurant in Tallinn and a household-appliance/electronics retailer on Aia street.
October 7, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his parents Don and Jan Baker from Leningrad on Oct 7, 1991. He reacts with surprise to news of their trip to New Zealand, urges them to consider visiting the Soviet Union, and rhapsodizes about the beauty of Leningrad and the Baltics, the genuine antiquity of European architecture and art, and the palaces and royal estates.
October 8, 1991 · Postcard
A handwritten postcard from Seth Baker in Leningrad/St. Petersburg to his parents Don and Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT, telling his mother about his hobby of collecting currency from every country he visits — noting it is all Rubles since the former Soviet states still use the central money supply — plus an Estonian interwar-period coin, and describing St. Petersburg as the 'Venice of the North,' built on 44 islands linked by bridges.
November 1991 · Letter
A continuation (pages 2-4) of a handwritten letter from Seth Baker describing in detail the food and shopping situation in St. Petersburg in late 1991: the laborious multi-line Soviet shopping process, street vendors, markets, scarcity of cheese and vanilla, dorm-life food trading, learning not to waste food, and his upcoming trip to Lake Baikal.
November 1991 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents from a hotel high above Lake Baikal, recounting his friendship with a Russian boy (~age 8, whose name he renders 'Jean'/'Shena') who keeps gifting him cherished pins, a key chain from Petrodvorets, Tsarist banknotes, and hand-painted wooden spoons. He reflects on Russian gift-giving culture, the family on holiday, a taxi-driver conversation about the Hartford Whalers, and his frustrations learning Russian, before flying back to Leningrad.
November 1991 · Postcard
A picture postcard of Kaunas, Lithuania that Seth mails home to his parents, announcing his plan to visit Kaunas the last weekend of November and to stay with a multilingual Lithuanian who is about to emigrate to the United States.
November 4, 1991 · Letter
A four-page handwritten letter from Seth Baker to his parents, dated Nov 4, 1991, recounting a weekend trip to Vilnius, Lithuania with his roommate Brett. He describes flying Aeroflot, lax airport security, hunting for a hotel, opening a Lithuanian bank account, drinking all night with two Russians from near Riga, a chaotic delayed-flight day with an Austrian businessman, a Sri Lankan Trotskyite, and a Lithuanian named Eugene, and visiting the artist Ilya Repin's house outside St. Petersburg. He closes with news about his visa extension, plans to teach English, and an upcoming trip to Siberia (Irkutsk).
November 20, 1991 · Letter
A four-page handwritten letter from Seth Baker to his parents, written 20 Nov 1991 (annotated Dec 18), describing his efforts to extend his stay in St. Petersburg after his AIFS program ends: arranging a visa through Leningrad State Tech University, a teaching job, an apartment, and his fight with AIFS over changing his Finnair flight date. He reflects on worsening food shortages, the darkness of the northern winter, homesickness, and his desire not to miss this time of historic change.
November 20, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his parents from Leningrad at 3 AM on Nov 20, 1991, lamenting the dizzying complexity of Russian verbs of motion and joking that they justify his extra semester. The card is a reproduction of Ivan Bilibin's 1902 illustration for the folk tale 'The White Duck'.
November 20, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes from St. Petersburg to his sister Jessica on a Bilibin fairy-tale postcard, asking about high school, telling her about his escape-artist Russian dwarf hamster named Vassenka, and noting it gets dark at about 3 o'clock.
November 29, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes from St. Petersburg to his sister Rachel about how dark it gets in late November (the sun sets by 3:30) and gives her language-study advice, urging her to take German rather than Spanish in college because hardly anyone in Europe speaks Spanish. He closes that he'll see her soon, in January or June.
December 1, 1991 · Postcard
A picture postcard of the Peter and Paul Cathedral in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, sent by Seth Baker to his parents Don & Jan Baker on Dec 1, 1991. The message is a verbatim quotation from Boris Pasternak's Dr. Zhivago about the genius and unscheduled suddenness of revolution, which Seth notes was written about 1917 but feels particularly meaningful amid the collapse of the USSR.
December 1, 1991 · Postcard
An illustrated Soviet art postcard (Bilibin's illustration to Pushkin's 'Tale of the Golden Cockerel') from Seth in Russia to his parents Don & Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT, dated Dec 1, 1991. Seth asks them to copy his FONTS disk (with the Cyrillic character set) and mail it to his friend Jeanne M. Camiña in North Bethesda, MD, because he promised to get her the Russian font for her Mac as thanks for keeping him well fed.
December 2, 1991 · Letter
A quick logistical update Seth hand-delivers via a returning friend rather than the Soviet post. He covers enrolling at Leningrad University, paying tuition, the difficult apartment search, co-teaching his first English class, errands his parents can run for him (a $8 postmaster payment in Ashford CT and a Cyrillic fonts disk for the friend carrying the letter), possible travel to Asia or Europe, and the grim, sunless St. Petersburg winter.
December 10, 1991 · Letter
A December 1991 letter from Seth Baker to his parents describing the surreal difficulty of finding an apartment in St. Petersburg as a foreigner: closed-city residence permits, the MENU/SNEEMU classified-ad confusion, an open-air flea market where people sell single lightbulbs, a paranoid landlady who believes the KGB is watching her, a monarchist intelligentsia family, the dominance of the black market, and his cheap state-shop cross-country skis. He confesses he regrets staying but intends to stick out the long 7 months.
December 12, 1991 · Form
A Kinko's fax cover sheet sent by Jan Baker (Seth's mother) from Hartford, Connecticut to Seth Baker in care of Prof. Ilya Kruzhkov at Leningrad State Technical University in St. Petersburg/Leningrad, USSR. The fax was a 3-page transmission (including cover sheet). The second page is a reduced copy of the cover sheet plus a fax machine transmission report confirming the send on 12-12-91.
December 13, 1991 · Form
An official academic transcript for Seth Baker from Leningrad State Technical University covering the semester 04.09.91 to 13.12.91, listing Russian language courses (grammar, conversation, phonetics) plus History, Political Science/Sociology, and Literature, with hours and grades on a 5-point scale. Signed by Nina Malysheva, Acting Director of the Russian Language Center, and bearing the official Soviet-era preparatory faculty stamp.
December 14, 1991 · Letter
Seth writes a four-page letter to his parents describing his newly rented St. Petersburg apartment in loving detail, laying out his 7-month budget, repeating logistical reminders about money/visas/mail, recounting how the KGB intercepted roubles he mailed home, and profiling his wealthy jazz-musician landlord.
December 18, 1991 · Letter
On his birthday, Seth writes to his parents from Leningrad/Saint Petersburg describing his exhausting commute to teach an English class at an institute, the misery of overcrowded trolleybuses and the metro, a compliment on his Russian, a detailed list of food prices versus the average salary, fears of riots and the breakup of the USSR into the SNG (CIS), and observations on Hare Krishnas and Russians' devotion to their children.
December 22, 1991 · Letter
A two-page handwritten letter from Seth to his parents dated Dec. 22, 1991. He thanks them for packing envelopes and toilet paper, jokes about the scarcity of paper products in the USSR, describes news clippings and newspaper subscriptions he is sending about the coup and the Baltics, and recounts a comic visit to Estonian Airlines where there were no flights because there was no gasoline.
December 22, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his grandparents (Mr. & Mrs. Charles Garrod of Zephyrhills, FL) on Dec 22, 1991, reporting nonstop snow guaranteeing a white Christmas, his move to his own apartment, and his transfer to the more prestigious St. Petersburg State University for next semester. He notes Russian Christmas is Jan 7th, that travel has gotten harder under new regulations, and signs off with love.
December 22, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his parents about playing the board game Monopoly with his English class in Leningrad as a language exercise. The game teaches money vocabulary, leads to a discussion of Soviet monopolies (a student sits on a newly formed 'Anti-monopoly commission'), and Seth observes there are only ~8 basic drinking glasses across the entire USSR because single factories churn out identical products.
December 22, 1991 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents about playing the board game Monopoly with his English class in Leningrad. The game doubled as English practice; he reflects on the Soviet anti-monopoly commission, chronic product shortages and the uniformity of Soviet consumer goods.
December 24, 1991 · Letter
Writing from St. Petersburg the day after returning from Tallinn, Seth recounts how he stumbled into a conversation with Lennart Meri, the Foreign Minister of newly independent Estonia, while trying to learn how to get an Estonian visa. Meri quietly told him to just enter on the night train without a visa in January, and Seth only realized afterward he had spoken with the 4th most important person in Estonia.
December 27, 1991 · Postcard
A December 27, 1991 postcard from Seth Baker in Saint Petersburg to his parents describing the wave of price increases scheduled for January 1st and the mass panic buying he witnessed at the large department stores.
December 29, 1991 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg recounting his 5th or 6th trip to Tallinn, Estonia. He is repeatedly mistaken for Estonian or Finnish because of his Russian, scores a cheap room at the Viru hotel, watches Finnish TV (Beverly Hills 90210), endures a comically silent dinner with a cold Estonian, and on the train back meets a young Georgian/Russian woman from Sochi whom he helps and is smitten by.
1992 · Calendar card
A two-sided 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card. The front bears a full-year 1992 calendar grid in Russian for the Soviet Cultural Foundation, Irkutsk Branch, with publisher credits. The back is a color photograph from the series "Old Irkutsk" showing a weathered wooden two-story house and gates in Irkutsk, Siberia, photographed by A. Froydberg.
1992 · Calendar card
A two-sided Soviet pocket calendar card for the year 1992. One side prints the full 12-month calendar grid in Russian with the imprint of the Soviet Culture Foundation, Irkutsk Branch; the reverse shows a color photograph of a wooden rowboat on a sandy Lake Baikal beach from the "Baikal" series, photographed by A. Froydberg.
1992 · Calendar card
A small two-sided 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card. The front shows a full 12-month calendar grid with the year 1992 and the issuer 'Soviet Cultural Foundation, Irkutsk Branch.' The reverse is a color autumn photograph of a rocky crag above Lake Baikal, embossed with '1992', from the photo series 'BAIKAL' by photographer A. Froydberg. Printed in 1991 by Soyuzreklamkultura, edition No. 366, price 20 kopecks.
1992 · Calendar card
A small 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card issued by the Irkutsk branch of the Soviet Cultural Foundation, part of the 'Baikal' photo series. The reverse bears a color photograph of cracked ice on Lake Baikal by photographer A. Froydberg. Seth annotated the card by hand with the word 'BAIKAL' (in Latin script) above the printed credit line.
1992 · Calendar card
A small two-sided Soviet pocket calendar card for the year 1992, issued by the Soviet Culture Foundation (Irkutsk Branch). One side is a full-year 1992 calendar grid; the reverse is a color photograph of Lake Baikal's Shaman Rock (Shamanka Cape) on Olkhon Island, from the 'Baikal' photo series by A. Froydberg. Printed 1991 by Soyuzreklamkultura, price 20 kopecks.
1992 · Calendar card
A small printed 1992 wallet pocket calendar (kalendarik) issued by the Irkutsk branch of the Soviet Cultural Fund, part of a 'BAIKAL' series. The front carries the full twelve-month grid for 1992 in Cyrillic with Sundays in red; the reverse shows a color photograph by A. Froydberg of a vessel on Lake Baikal among spring ice floes. The only handwriting is the word 'BAIKAL' added in ballpoint beside the printed Russian caption, likely a translation note by Seth.
1992 · Magazine clipping
A printed magazine page (page 22) profiling three prominent Estonian figures of the early-independence era: novelist Jaan Kross (a Nobel Prize candidate), Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, and Deputy Speaker of Parliament Marju Lauristin. Each entry gives a biographical sketch, 'Other Facts', and an office telephone.
January 1, 1992 · Letter
A single page (likely the closing portion) of a handwritten letter in which Seth gives his Saint Petersburg street address (Aprilskaya Ulitsa #4, Kvartira #38) but urges his parents to keep using his old address, explaining he doesn't want to attract official or unofficial attention and that mail moves faster through the University.
January 1, 1992 · Ephemera
An Estonian-language Diet Pepsi ("DIEET-PEPSI", "SUHKRUTA" = sugar-free, "NUTRA SWEET") product label, printed by A/S Tallinna Karastusjoogid (Tallinn Soft Drinks) from PepsiCo concentrate. The card is laid out as a perpetual calendar with a top row of month Roman numerals (I-XII) and a bottom row of years 1992-1996, kept by Seth as ephemera from the early post-Soviet period.
January 2, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents describing how he spent New Year's Eve on Nevsky Prospect with a group of Soviet naval officers, cadets, artists and monarchists, recounting the celebration, the lifting of weeks of tension, a sunny day, his frustrated attempt to get money from American Express, and asking to be met at the Boston airport on June 30th with vegetarian pizzas.
January 5, 1992 · Letter
A six-page handwritten letter (Jan 5, 1992) Seth wrote home, beginning as an essay on the Russian sense of humor (black humor, wordplay, anecdotes, and two jokes that 'work' in English) and then recounting in vivid detail a vodka-soaked day in Pushkin with his Russian artist friends Volodya, Sergei, and Piotr — including lighting a candle in an underground church for Sergei's late mother, fending off teenagers, drunken antics, and an evening feast at a 'new rich' businessman's apartment.
January 9, 1992 · Letter
Seth, awake at 3-4 AM and inspired by Dostoevsky and Chekhov, writes a detailed account of a single ordinary winter day in St. Petersburg: rising at dawn, riding the trolley to Finland Station, browsing booksellers and kiosks, a failed daily attempt to cash traveler's checks at American Express (shut down by Moscow), buying bread and feeding ducks on the canals, hunting groceries at the markets, and the emotional pendulum of loving and hating the city.
January 17, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes a four-page letter from St. Petersburg describing daily life in the dissolving USSR three weeks after price liberalization: he paid tuition and rent, earned the 'average' Soviet salary of 300 roubles teaching, and itemizes how that salary is consumed by a few groceries amid hyperinflation. He recounts hours spent in bread lines, his landlord Sasha's generous repairs to the apartment, seeing Jesus Christ Superstar in Russian, and devouring nearly 30 English-translation books in two weeks. He closes reflecting on his unstable, disjointed state of mind and his sense of being in a 'state of change' mirroring the country's.
February 2, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg thanking his parents for a care package (boots, Clearasil, vitamins, cheese, Mace) brought over by his friend Eric, comments on a possible Northeast Magazine article, thanks people for school supplies and Rachel's stories, and weighs his options for summer jobs and whether to return home to finish school.
February 4, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg as intensive Russian classes resume after a month off. He describes an exhausting multi-hour commute by trolleybus across three islands, his international classmates (a Finn, an English 'chap,' and a beautiful French ballerina), and the surprise that he is getting 22-24 hours of instruction weekly instead of the 12 he paid for. He thanks his parents for food aid, reflects on shortages (sugar, ration cards) and the general improvement of his diet, and notes he may travel to Tallinn or Kiev to find sugar.
February 8, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg reassuring his parents he has recovered from a head injury (headaches and dizziness now passed), jokingly declining to write about Soviet brain surgery. The AIFS students are back and have restarted a barter/trading market (pasta for German chocolate; Cheerios for corn flakes), though there is no milk in the city. He encloses an International Herald Tribune article about the GAI traffic police, comments on jaywalking fines and the high price of cars (~$5,000) signaling wealth, and mentions seeing 'The Naked Gun' and planning to see 'Terminator 2' in Russian. He thanks them for the camera, vitamins, and boots.
February 9, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg about his first week of intensive Russian classes, his difficult daily commute, and a comic episode in which he, Stefon, and friends are mistaken for Latvians by an old woman and end up posing as Latvian black marketeers buying furs at the Polyustrovskii fur market.
April 18, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents on April 18, 1992 describing a Russian-style birthday celebration he attended for Christine, a fellow AIFS student, at the town of Pushkin outside St. Petersburg. He recounts the day-long feast and toasting with his boss Volodya and the artists Piotr and Sergei, marvels at Sergei's portrait paintings, the vodka and Champagne, and then closes the letter by writing out two Russian jokes about bread lines, Gorbachev, and kolbasa.
May 14, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes a four-page letter to his parents from Russia, sending it back to the States with the departing AIFS group. He covers his new visa, full-time English teaching, several job leads (an American Business Center in Moscow, hotels, IBM/P&G/AT&T, an English-language newspaper idea), domestic life with dubbed American movies, rappelling plans, a trip to Sochi and Riga, his uncertainty about whether to come home or stay, and farewells to the departing Americans.
September 27, 1992 · Letter
A two-page typed letter dated Sep. 27, 1992 from Seth in Russia (Saint Petersburg) to his parents Don and Jan Baker. He marvels at sending a typed letter from Russia, describes wrestling with Mac System 6/7 and MultiFinder, then recounts domestic life: sealing his cold apartment's windows with cotton and tape, buying his first tool set to fix a kitchen sink leak (and banging on pipes to satisfy a hostile neighbor), his cat Charyonka, stockpiling winter food (tomato paste, pasta, cheese), an odd item at his grocery store, slow progress on the business and English courses, and another nearly windless cruise on the yacht with Sanya.
Ephemera
Two loose pages of Seth Baker's working notes: page 1 is a pencil-written travel itinerary covering a March departure routed Moscow (Hotel Cosmos) to Leningrad (Aeroflot flight SU-2419) to a Leningrad hotel (Hotel Pulkovskaya, or Pribaltiskaya as 2nd choice), then leaving by train to Helsinki, with a reference contact 'Mark Michelli at Consulate in Moscow' and an Intourist car note. Page 2 is a printed Hartford-Ocotal (Nicaragua) Sister City Project petition form repurposed as scratch paper, with a few handwritten lines noting the 'Presid.' (president) of the 'Russian Commercial & investment Bank' and a joking message: 'Tell him thanks for skis, but no snow!'
Brochure
A printed introductory letter from Jane Maynard, Editor-in-Chief, presenting 'Saint Petersburg PREMIER', a new free monthly English-language magazine for English-speaking visitors and residents of Saint Petersburg, listing its regular features. Page 2 is a full Russian translation of the same letter.
Letter
Seth writes his parents not with news but to share a favorite passage from Tolstoy's War & Peace about how 'obligatory and irreproachable idleness' is the chief attraction of military service. He recommends his father read War & Peace or Anna Karenina, recounts quoting the passage to a naval officer who deflected, and ends with a note that 'peace' and 'world' are the same word in Russian (mir).
Letter
A single handwritten letter page in which Seth explains why Western humanitarian aid ends up on the black market in the collapsing USSR, using a tin of canned ham worth 175 rubles as an example: the recipient can sell it and buy far more useful food.
Postcard
A picture postcard of the Moika 12 (Pushkin Apartment-Museum) in Leningrad/Saint Petersburg, on which Seth tells his parents Don and Jan Baker that he arrived safely, that the semester looks great, and that they should phone or fax him because the Soviet mail system is not running smoothly.
Postcard
A Planeta photo postcard of the Lion's Bridge in Leningrad/Saint Petersburg, mailed by Seth to his parents (D & J Baker) in Bloomfield, CT. The brief handwritten note gives Seth's new mailing address in Saint Petersburg (written in Cyrillic) plus new telephone, fax (via Jane) and ARAPC numbers, signed 'Seth.'
Postcard
A picture postcard of Nevsky Prospekt (the Singer Building / Dom Knigi) from Leningrad/Saint Petersburg. Seth writes to his parents Don and Jan Baker about how Disney airs every Sunday night on Soviet TV, with the familiar 'Wonderful World of Disney' opening and surprisingly good in-character dubbing of cartoons like Uncle Scrooge and Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers, which he watches as good Russian-language practice.
Postcard
A postcard from Seth Baker in Leningrad to his parents Don and Jan Baker, describing a daily 9:00 a.m. British English lesson on Soviet TV. He jokes about the pompous British phrases taught and admits the program is more useful for his own Russian than for teaching English.
Postcard
A Soviet souvenir postcard depicting the Odessa Musical Comedy Theatre, mailed by Seth Baker to his parents Don and Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT. The handwritten message gives his updated St. Petersburg / Leningrad State Tech. College mailing address (care of Nina Meleteuna) and notes that Krushkov left for France in October, leaving Nina as the new boss.
Postcard
A picture postcard depicting the ruins of the Dormition Cathedral at the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, sent by Seth Baker from Saint Petersburg to his sister Rachel Baker in Bloomfield, CT. He reports all is well, that it is cold and snowy but his new apartment is warm, and asks how she likes Loomis Chaffee and whether it is hard to keep in touch with her Bloomfield friends.
January 8, 1991 · Letter
A two-page handwritten letter from Seth, dated Jan 8, 1991, sharing two Russian jokes he forgot to include in an earlier note on Russian humor. Both jokes were told to him by two naval officers over glasses of vodka. The first is about a Russian submarine captain sending a diver named Vasily to identify a sunken sub, ending with the punchline that he knocked on the door and they opened it (revealing it was Russian). The second is a North Pole / directions joke poking fun at Russian guidance systems. Seth closes worrying the jokes are funnier in Russian with vodka.
A printed letter from the American Institute for Foreign Study (AIFS) College Division, dated August 1991, listing the names, home addresses, and phone numbers of students participating in the Leningrad study-abroad program that semester. Seth Baker (the author of this collection) appears in the list with his Bloomfield, CT home address. Marked '--continued on back.'
October 1991 · Magazine clipping
A magazine 'Notable Qoutes' column (page 17) collecting memorable statements by Estonian and international figures around the August 1991 Soviet coup and Estonia's restoration of independence. Includes Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, magazine editor Kai Maran, TV director Hagi Shein, composer Veljo Tormis, the Dalai Lama, and novelist Jaan Kross. A pen box outlines the Lennart Meri quote referencing US Secretary of State James Baker, with one word redacted in ink.
October 1991 · Magazine clipping
A two-page clipping from an English-language magazine (consistent with the Saint Petersburg PREMIER milieu Seth was part of). Page 17 is a 'Notable Qoutes' feature collecting statements about the August 1991 coup and the restoration of Estonian independence, from figures including Estonian Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, librarian Kai Maran, Estonian TV director Hagi Shein, composer Veljo Tormis, the Dalai Lama, and novelist Jaan Kross, plus an editorial cartoon by Rein Lauks. Page 18 carries advertisements for the Maharaja Restaurant in Tallinn and a household-appliance/electronics retailer on Aia street.
October 7, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his parents Don and Jan Baker from Leningrad on Oct 7, 1991. He reacts with surprise to news of their trip to New Zealand, urges them to consider visiting the Soviet Union, and rhapsodizes about the beauty of Leningrad and the Baltics, the genuine antiquity of European architecture and art, and the palaces and royal estates.
October 8, 1991 · Postcard
A handwritten postcard from Seth Baker in Leningrad/St. Petersburg to his parents Don and Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT, telling his mother about his hobby of collecting currency from every country he visits — noting it is all Rubles since the former Soviet states still use the central money supply — plus an Estonian interwar-period coin, and describing St. Petersburg as the 'Venice of the North,' built on 44 islands linked by bridges.
A continuation (pages 2-4) of a handwritten letter from Seth Baker describing in detail the food and shopping situation in St. Petersburg in late 1991: the laborious multi-line Soviet shopping process, street vendors, markets, scarcity of cheese and vanilla, dorm-life food trading, learning not to waste food, and his upcoming trip to Lake Baikal.
November 1991 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents from a hotel high above Lake Baikal, recounting his friendship with a Russian boy (~age 8, whose name he renders 'Jean'/'Shena') who keeps gifting him cherished pins, a key chain from Petrodvorets, Tsarist banknotes, and hand-painted wooden spoons. He reflects on Russian gift-giving culture, the family on holiday, a taxi-driver conversation about the Hartford Whalers, and his frustrations learning Russian, before flying back to Leningrad.
November 4, 1991 · Letter
A four-page handwritten letter from Seth Baker to his parents, dated Nov 4, 1991, recounting a weekend trip to Vilnius, Lithuania with his roommate Brett. He describes flying Aeroflot, lax airport security, hunting for a hotel, opening a Lithuanian bank account, drinking all night with two Russians from near Riga, a chaotic delayed-flight day with an Austrian businessman, a Sri Lankan Trotskyite, and a Lithuanian named Eugene, and visiting the artist Ilya Repin's house outside St. Petersburg. He closes with news about his visa extension, plans to teach English, and an upcoming trip to Siberia (Irkutsk).
November 20, 1991 · Letter
A four-page handwritten letter from Seth Baker to his parents, written 20 Nov 1991 (annotated Dec 18), describing his efforts to extend his stay in St. Petersburg after his AIFS program ends: arranging a visa through Leningrad State Tech University, a teaching job, an apartment, and his fight with AIFS over changing his Finnair flight date. He reflects on worsening food shortages, the darkness of the northern winter, homesickness, and his desire not to miss this time of historic change.
Seth writes to his parents from Leningrad at 3 AM on Nov 20, 1991, lamenting the dizzying complexity of Russian verbs of motion and joking that they justify his extra semester. The card is a reproduction of Ivan Bilibin's 1902 illustration for the folk tale 'The White Duck'.
Seth writes from St. Petersburg to his sister Jessica on a Bilibin fairy-tale postcard, asking about high school, telling her about his escape-artist Russian dwarf hamster named Vassenka, and noting it gets dark at about 3 o'clock.
Seth writes from St. Petersburg to his sister Rachel about how dark it gets in late November (the sun sets by 3:30) and gives her language-study advice, urging her to take German rather than Spanish in college because hardly anyone in Europe speaks Spanish. He closes that he'll see her soon, in January or June.
December 1, 1991 · Postcard
A picture postcard of the Peter and Paul Cathedral in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, sent by Seth Baker to his parents Don & Jan Baker on Dec 1, 1991. The message is a verbatim quotation from Boris Pasternak's Dr. Zhivago about the genius and unscheduled suddenness of revolution, which Seth notes was written about 1917 but feels particularly meaningful amid the collapse of the USSR.
December 1, 1991 · Postcard
An illustrated Soviet art postcard (Bilibin's illustration to Pushkin's 'Tale of the Golden Cockerel') from Seth in Russia to his parents Don & Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT, dated Dec 1, 1991. Seth asks them to copy his FONTS disk (with the Cyrillic character set) and mail it to his friend Jeanne M. Camiña in North Bethesda, MD, because he promised to get her the Russian font for her Mac as thanks for keeping him well fed.
December 2, 1991 · Letter
A quick logistical update Seth hand-delivers via a returning friend rather than the Soviet post. He covers enrolling at Leningrad University, paying tuition, the difficult apartment search, co-teaching his first English class, errands his parents can run for him (a $8 postmaster payment in Ashford CT and a Cyrillic fonts disk for the friend carrying the letter), possible travel to Asia or Europe, and the grim, sunless St. Petersburg winter.
December 10, 1991 · Letter
A December 1991 letter from Seth Baker to his parents describing the surreal difficulty of finding an apartment in St. Petersburg as a foreigner: closed-city residence permits, the MENU/SNEEMU classified-ad confusion, an open-air flea market where people sell single lightbulbs, a paranoid landlady who believes the KGB is watching her, a monarchist intelligentsia family, the dominance of the black market, and his cheap state-shop cross-country skis. He confesses he regrets staying but intends to stick out the long 7 months.
December 12, 1991 · Form
A Kinko's fax cover sheet sent by Jan Baker (Seth's mother) from Hartford, Connecticut to Seth Baker in care of Prof. Ilya Kruzhkov at Leningrad State Technical University in St. Petersburg/Leningrad, USSR. The fax was a 3-page transmission (including cover sheet). The second page is a reduced copy of the cover sheet plus a fax machine transmission report confirming the send on 12-12-91.
December 13, 1991 · Form
An official academic transcript for Seth Baker from Leningrad State Technical University covering the semester 04.09.91 to 13.12.91, listing Russian language courses (grammar, conversation, phonetics) plus History, Political Science/Sociology, and Literature, with hours and grades on a 5-point scale. Signed by Nina Malysheva, Acting Director of the Russian Language Center, and bearing the official Soviet-era preparatory faculty stamp.
Seth writes a four-page letter to his parents describing his newly rented St. Petersburg apartment in loving detail, laying out his 7-month budget, repeating logistical reminders about money/visas/mail, recounting how the KGB intercepted roubles he mailed home, and profiling his wealthy jazz-musician landlord.
December 18, 1991 · Letter
On his birthday, Seth writes to his parents from Leningrad/Saint Petersburg describing his exhausting commute to teach an English class at an institute, the misery of overcrowded trolleybuses and the metro, a compliment on his Russian, a detailed list of food prices versus the average salary, fears of riots and the breakup of the USSR into the SNG (CIS), and observations on Hare Krishnas and Russians' devotion to their children.
December 22, 1991 · Letter
A two-page handwritten letter from Seth to his parents dated Dec. 22, 1991. He thanks them for packing envelopes and toilet paper, jokes about the scarcity of paper products in the USSR, describes news clippings and newspaper subscriptions he is sending about the coup and the Baltics, and recounts a comic visit to Estonian Airlines where there were no flights because there was no gasoline.
Seth writes to his grandparents (Mr. & Mrs. Charles Garrod of Zephyrhills, FL) on Dec 22, 1991, reporting nonstop snow guaranteeing a white Christmas, his move to his own apartment, and his transfer to the more prestigious St. Petersburg State University for next semester. He notes Russian Christmas is Jan 7th, that travel has gotten harder under new regulations, and signs off with love.
December 22, 1991 · Postcard
Seth writes to his parents about playing the board game Monopoly with his English class in Leningrad as a language exercise. The game teaches money vocabulary, leads to a discussion of Soviet monopolies (a student sits on a newly formed 'Anti-monopoly commission'), and Seth observes there are only ~8 basic drinking glasses across the entire USSR because single factories churn out identical products.
December 24, 1991 · Letter
Writing from St. Petersburg the day after returning from Tallinn, Seth recounts how he stumbled into a conversation with Lennart Meri, the Foreign Minister of newly independent Estonia, while trying to learn how to get an Estonian visa. Meri quietly told him to just enter on the night train without a visa in January, and Seth only realized afterward he had spoken with the 4th most important person in Estonia.
A December 27, 1991 postcard from Seth Baker in Saint Petersburg to his parents describing the wave of price increases scheduled for January 1st and the mass panic buying he witnessed at the large department stores.
December 29, 1991 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg recounting his 5th or 6th trip to Tallinn, Estonia. He is repeatedly mistaken for Estonian or Finnish because of his Russian, scores a cheap room at the Viru hotel, watches Finnish TV (Beverly Hills 90210), endures a comically silent dinner with a cold Estonian, and on the train back meets a young Georgian/Russian woman from Sochi whom he helps and is smitten by.
1992 · Calendar card
A two-sided 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card. The front bears a full-year 1992 calendar grid in Russian for the Soviet Cultural Foundation, Irkutsk Branch, with publisher credits. The back is a color photograph from the series "Old Irkutsk" showing a weathered wooden two-story house and gates in Irkutsk, Siberia, photographed by A. Froydberg.
A two-sided Soviet pocket calendar card for the year 1992. One side prints the full 12-month calendar grid in Russian with the imprint of the Soviet Culture Foundation, Irkutsk Branch; the reverse shows a color photograph of a wooden rowboat on a sandy Lake Baikal beach from the "Baikal" series, photographed by A. Froydberg.
1992 · Calendar card
A small two-sided 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card. The front shows a full 12-month calendar grid with the year 1992 and the issuer 'Soviet Cultural Foundation, Irkutsk Branch.' The reverse is a color autumn photograph of a rocky crag above Lake Baikal, embossed with '1992', from the photo series 'BAIKAL' by photographer A. Froydberg. Printed in 1991 by Soyuzreklamkultura, edition No. 366, price 20 kopecks.
1992 · Calendar card
A small 1992 Soviet pocket calendar card issued by the Irkutsk branch of the Soviet Cultural Foundation, part of the 'Baikal' photo series. The reverse bears a color photograph of cracked ice on Lake Baikal by photographer A. Froydberg. Seth annotated the card by hand with the word 'BAIKAL' (in Latin script) above the printed credit line.
A small two-sided Soviet pocket calendar card for the year 1992, issued by the Soviet Culture Foundation (Irkutsk Branch). One side is a full-year 1992 calendar grid; the reverse is a color photograph of Lake Baikal's Shaman Rock (Shamanka Cape) on Olkhon Island, from the 'Baikal' photo series by A. Froydberg. Printed 1991 by Soyuzreklamkultura, price 20 kopecks.
1992 · Calendar card
A small printed 1992 wallet pocket calendar (kalendarik) issued by the Irkutsk branch of the Soviet Cultural Fund, part of a 'BAIKAL' series. The front carries the full twelve-month grid for 1992 in Cyrillic with Sundays in red; the reverse shows a color photograph by A. Froydberg of a vessel on Lake Baikal among spring ice floes. The only handwriting is the word 'BAIKAL' added in ballpoint beside the printed Russian caption, likely a translation note by Seth.
A printed magazine page (page 22) profiling three prominent Estonian figures of the early-independence era: novelist Jaan Kross (a Nobel Prize candidate), Foreign Minister Lennart Meri, and Deputy Speaker of Parliament Marju Lauristin. Each entry gives a biographical sketch, 'Other Facts', and an office telephone.
A single page (likely the closing portion) of a handwritten letter in which Seth gives his Saint Petersburg street address (Aprilskaya Ulitsa #4, Kvartira #38) but urges his parents to keep using his old address, explaining he doesn't want to attract official or unofficial attention and that mail moves faster through the University.
January 1, 1992 · Ephemera
An Estonian-language Diet Pepsi ("DIEET-PEPSI", "SUHKRUTA" = sugar-free, "NUTRA SWEET") product label, printed by A/S Tallinna Karastusjoogid (Tallinn Soft Drinks) from PepsiCo concentrate. The card is laid out as a perpetual calendar with a top row of month Roman numerals (I-XII) and a bottom row of years 1992-1996, kept by Seth as ephemera from the early post-Soviet period.
January 2, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents describing how he spent New Year's Eve on Nevsky Prospect with a group of Soviet naval officers, cadets, artists and monarchists, recounting the celebration, the lifting of weeks of tension, a sunny day, his frustrated attempt to get money from American Express, and asking to be met at the Boston airport on June 30th with vegetarian pizzas.
January 5, 1992 · Letter
A six-page handwritten letter (Jan 5, 1992) Seth wrote home, beginning as an essay on the Russian sense of humor (black humor, wordplay, anecdotes, and two jokes that 'work' in English) and then recounting in vivid detail a vodka-soaked day in Pushkin with his Russian artist friends Volodya, Sergei, and Piotr — including lighting a candle in an underground church for Sergei's late mother, fending off teenagers, drunken antics, and an evening feast at a 'new rich' businessman's apartment.
January 9, 1992 · Letter
Seth, awake at 3-4 AM and inspired by Dostoevsky and Chekhov, writes a detailed account of a single ordinary winter day in St. Petersburg: rising at dawn, riding the trolley to Finland Station, browsing booksellers and kiosks, a failed daily attempt to cash traveler's checks at American Express (shut down by Moscow), buying bread and feeding ducks on the canals, hunting groceries at the markets, and the emotional pendulum of loving and hating the city.
January 17, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes a four-page letter from St. Petersburg describing daily life in the dissolving USSR three weeks after price liberalization: he paid tuition and rent, earned the 'average' Soviet salary of 300 roubles teaching, and itemizes how that salary is consumed by a few groceries amid hyperinflation. He recounts hours spent in bread lines, his landlord Sasha's generous repairs to the apartment, seeing Jesus Christ Superstar in Russian, and devouring nearly 30 English-translation books in two weeks. He closes reflecting on his unstable, disjointed state of mind and his sense of being in a 'state of change' mirroring the country's.
February 2, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg thanking his parents for a care package (boots, Clearasil, vitamins, cheese, Mace) brought over by his friend Eric, comments on a possible Northeast Magazine article, thanks people for school supplies and Rachel's stories, and weighs his options for summer jobs and whether to return home to finish school.
February 4, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg as intensive Russian classes resume after a month off. He describes an exhausting multi-hour commute by trolleybus across three islands, his international classmates (a Finn, an English 'chap,' and a beautiful French ballerina), and the surprise that he is getting 22-24 hours of instruction weekly instead of the 12 he paid for. He thanks his parents for food aid, reflects on shortages (sugar, ration cards) and the general improvement of his diet, and notes he may travel to Tallinn or Kiev to find sugar.
February 8, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes from St. Petersburg reassuring his parents he has recovered from a head injury (headaches and dizziness now passed), jokingly declining to write about Soviet brain surgery. The AIFS students are back and have restarted a barter/trading market (pasta for German chocolate; Cheerios for corn flakes), though there is no milk in the city. He encloses an International Herald Tribune article about the GAI traffic police, comments on jaywalking fines and the high price of cars (~$5,000) signaling wealth, and mentions seeing 'The Naked Gun' and planning to see 'Terminator 2' in Russian. He thanks them for the camera, vitamins, and boots.
Seth writes from St. Petersburg about his first week of intensive Russian classes, his difficult daily commute, and a comic episode in which he, Stefon, and friends are mistaken for Latvians by an old woman and end up posing as Latvian black marketeers buying furs at the Polyustrovskii fur market.
April 18, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes to his parents on April 18, 1992 describing a Russian-style birthday celebration he attended for Christine, a fellow AIFS student, at the town of Pushkin outside St. Petersburg. He recounts the day-long feast and toasting with his boss Volodya and the artists Piotr and Sergei, marvels at Sergei's portrait paintings, the vodka and Champagne, and then closes the letter by writing out two Russian jokes about bread lines, Gorbachev, and kolbasa.
May 14, 1992 · Letter
Seth writes a four-page letter to his parents from Russia, sending it back to the States with the departing AIFS group. He covers his new visa, full-time English teaching, several job leads (an American Business Center in Moscow, hotels, IBM/P&G/AT&T, an English-language newspaper idea), domestic life with dubbed American movies, rappelling plans, a trip to Sochi and Riga, his uncertainty about whether to come home or stay, and farewells to the departing Americans.
September 27, 1992 · Letter
A two-page typed letter dated Sep. 27, 1992 from Seth in Russia (Saint Petersburg) to his parents Don and Jan Baker. He marvels at sending a typed letter from Russia, describes wrestling with Mac System 6/7 and MultiFinder, then recounts domestic life: sealing his cold apartment's windows with cotton and tape, buying his first tool set to fix a kitchen sink leak (and banging on pipes to satisfy a hostile neighbor), his cat Charyonka, stockpiling winter food (tomato paste, pasta, cheese), an odd item at his grocery store, slow progress on the business and English courses, and another nearly windless cruise on the yacht with Sanya.
Ephemera
Two loose pages of Seth Baker's working notes: page 1 is a pencil-written travel itinerary covering a March departure routed Moscow (Hotel Cosmos) to Leningrad (Aeroflot flight SU-2419) to a Leningrad hotel (Hotel Pulkovskaya, or Pribaltiskaya as 2nd choice), then leaving by train to Helsinki, with a reference contact 'Mark Michelli at Consulate in Moscow' and an Intourist car note. Page 2 is a printed Hartford-Ocotal (Nicaragua) Sister City Project petition form repurposed as scratch paper, with a few handwritten lines noting the 'Presid.' (president) of the 'Russian Commercial & investment Bank' and a joking message: 'Tell him thanks for skis, but no snow!'
Brochure
A printed introductory letter from Jane Maynard, Editor-in-Chief, presenting 'Saint Petersburg PREMIER', a new free monthly English-language magazine for English-speaking visitors and residents of Saint Petersburg, listing its regular features. Page 2 is a full Russian translation of the same letter.
Letter
Seth writes his parents not with news but to share a favorite passage from Tolstoy's War & Peace about how 'obligatory and irreproachable idleness' is the chief attraction of military service. He recommends his father read War & Peace or Anna Karenina, recounts quoting the passage to a naval officer who deflected, and ends with a note that 'peace' and 'world' are the same word in Russian (mir).
A picture postcard of the Moika 12 (Pushkin Apartment-Museum) in Leningrad/Saint Petersburg, on which Seth tells his parents Don and Jan Baker that he arrived safely, that the semester looks great, and that they should phone or fax him because the Soviet mail system is not running smoothly.
A Planeta photo postcard of the Lion's Bridge in Leningrad/Saint Petersburg, mailed by Seth to his parents (D & J Baker) in Bloomfield, CT. The brief handwritten note gives Seth's new mailing address in Saint Petersburg (written in Cyrillic) plus new telephone, fax (via Jane) and ARAPC numbers, signed 'Seth.'
A picture postcard of Nevsky Prospekt (the Singer Building / Dom Knigi) from Leningrad/Saint Petersburg. Seth writes to his parents Don and Jan Baker about how Disney airs every Sunday night on Soviet TV, with the familiar 'Wonderful World of Disney' opening and surprisingly good in-character dubbing of cartoons like Uncle Scrooge and Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers, which he watches as good Russian-language practice.
Postcard
A Soviet souvenir postcard depicting the Odessa Musical Comedy Theatre, mailed by Seth Baker to his parents Don and Jan Baker in Bloomfield, CT. The handwritten message gives his updated St. Petersburg / Leningrad State Tech. College mailing address (care of Nina Meleteuna) and notes that Krushkov left for France in October, leaving Nina as the new boss.
A picture postcard depicting the ruins of the Dormition Cathedral at the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, sent by Seth Baker from Saint Petersburg to his sister Rachel Baker in Bloomfield, CT. He reports all is well, that it is cold and snowy but his new apartment is warm, and asks how she likes Loomis Chaffee and whether it is hard to keep in touch with her Bloomfield friends.