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06.0007.0008.0009.0010.0011.0012.0013.0014.0015.0016.00MARCH 201124 thursdayDelivery of the Biržiška family archiveIn 2011, the Manuscript Department (VU Library) received some valuable addition to its holdings.Documents dating back from 1944 to 1964 written by three outstanding personalities,members of the Biržiška family, namely Mykolas, a former rector of Vilnius University, Vaclovas,an historian of culture and Viktoras, a mathematician, were donated to VU Library by descendantsof the Biržiška family Vytautas Barauskas, Venta Biržiškaitė-Leon, and Danutė Biržiškaitė-Mažeikienė.Works, articles, speeches, some parts of handwritten presentations, correspondence – allthese documents which used to belong to Mykolas, Vaclovas and Viktoras, members of the Biržiškafamily, will be stored as a separate archival unit F314. The authentic documents bear witnessto the difficult life of the three brothers at a displaced persons camp in Germany, their work atThe Baltic University in Exile, their scholarly, cultural and social activities. Old yellowish pages ofvarious sizes contain articles, researches, memoirs, speeches delivered at meetings or broadcaston radio, bibliographical references, neatly written with effort to make maximum use of the pagespace. Copious and a wide-ranging correspondence of the three brothers with the families of theirdaughters – lawyer, artist, ceramicist Marija Biržiškaitė Žakevičienė-Žymantienė, and piano-playerOna Biržiškaitė-Barauskienė – shows close-knit bonds of the family. Letters written by formercolleagues, students and friends helped to forget loneliness and hardships. The correspondencepresents life episodes (now hardly imaginable) of many Lithuanians living in exile, who found temporaryshelter at displaced persons camps in Germany and America. These documents have sufficientlyimproved and enlarged the archival unit of the Biržiška family, which has already existed inthe Manuscript Department. The heritage was delivered for safekeeping and it will be accessiblefor researchers and the public.http://www.mb.vu.lt17.0018.0019.0020.0021.0022.00Photo from the library collection: on the left Viktoras,Mykolas, Vaclovas, members of the Biržiška family23.0024.0001.0002.0003.0004.0005.00http://www.mb.vu.lt7