Viacheslav Karpinskii

Born Jan. 16, 1880, in Penza; died Mar. 20, 1965, in Moscow. Figure in the revolutionary movement in Russia, publicist, doctor of economics. Hero of Socialist Labor (1962). Became a member of the Communist Party in 1898. The son of a government official.

Karpińskii was expelled from the University of Kharkov for revolutionary activity. He helped organize the Union of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class in Kharkov in late 1902. Persecuted by the authorities, he emigrated in 1904 to Geneva. Under V. I. Lenin’s direction, he worked for the newspapers Vpered and Proletarii and contributed to Pravda. In World War I (1914–18) he set up the publication of the newspaper Sotsial-demokrat and carried out a number of Lenin’s assignments. Returning to Russia in 1917, Karpińskii worked for the newspaper Derevenskaia pravda and directed the agitation and instruction department of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. During the Civil War of 1918–20, Karpińskii edited the newspaper Krasnaia zvezda, which was published on the propaganda steamship of the same name; he became the editor of the newspaper Bednota in 1918. A member of the editorial board of Pravda and of the editorial boards of several newspapers and magazines from 1918 to 1927, Karpińskii in 1936–37 worked in the apparatus of the Central Committee of the ACP (Bolshevik). After 1937 he was engaged in scholarly and literary propaganda work.

Karpińskii was a delegate to the Eighth, Sixteenth, and Twenty-second Congresses of the party and was elected a member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. Lenin wrote more than 100 letters to Karpińskii. Karpińskii was the author of books, pamphlets, and articles on Lenin and on the history of the Communist Party and the Soviet state. He was awarded three Orders of Lenin.