1922 Almanac Added to the ASP Library

Staff Report

Almanacs and yearbooks, with their practical compilation of facts and figures, were the mainstay of the 18th and 19th century American home. This was no less true of the newly established Armenian-American home, where yearbooks and almanacs also included information concerning local Armenian communities, societies and businesses. As such, they offer a wealth of information for historians and researchers interested in the life of early Diasporan communities.

The Armenian Studies Program library recently added to its catalog a copy of one such volume. Printed in Fresno in 1922, Արշալոյս պատկերազարդ տարեգիրք/Arshalouys patkerazard taregirkʻ (Volume 3, 160pp., in Armenian) was a yearly publication prepared by Armenak Melikian. The Taregirk‘, or yearbook, contains the customary calendars, sections on cosmology, astronomy and farming (“village economy”) present in other almanacs.

The yearbook also features topics specific to the Armenian American diaspora, such as a listing of American diasporan newspapers in print, and statistics pertaining to the number of Armenians attending American universities. An interest in statistics carries through to the Fresno Armenian population, with a breakdown of immigrants to Fresno, according to the various towns of origin in historic Armenia. Facts and figures are also given on agriculture and farming by Armenians in Fresno.

The yearbook also offers fascinating contemporary accounts of the trials of Soghomon Tehlirian and Misak Torlakian, just one year after the killings of Talaat Pasha and Behbud Khan Javanshir.

The yearbook offers a glimpse onto the interest of the times, and the international world which touched the Armenians of the Central Valley. Poems by Persians Hafez and Omar Khayyam, translated into western Armenian, are printed alongside a work by Bengali poet (and Nobel Prize winner) Rabindranath Tagore, translated in Eastern Armenian and first published in the monthly Armenian newspaper of Baku, Gorts.

At the back of the volume are a number of interesting advertisements for local Fresno business, such as the one pictured.

The Armenian Studies Program is seeking information about Volumes 1 and 2 of the Yearbook. If you have information about them, please call the Armenian Studies Program office at 559-278-2669.