There is a golden town...": Everyday life of Yeniseisk on pages of Siberian newspapers of the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries

The article deals with some aspects of everyday life in Yeniseisk in the second half of the 19th - the beginning of the 20th centuries on the basis of materials of newspaper periodicals. An appeal to newspaper material enables to reconstruct the role of subjective factors in history: public mood, attitude of different social groups to particular events, people's worldview. Everyday life in Yeniseisk was covered mostly in publications of the informational genre. Notes in a summary form supplied news material without event analysis. The author's evaluation in the written information was minimal. Along with the notes in the newspapers, such periodical press genres as correspondence, essays, reports, satirical articles and messages were distributed. The authors of articles on the everyday life of the city were mostly writers, journalists, officials and entrepreneurs. Mostly they were locals and were well acquainted with the needs and problems of the town. The press was a commercial enterprise and, therefore, editors were guided not only by their own interests, but also took into account readers' sentiments and opinions. Therefore, the focus when selecting materials, information, stories etc. was on the needs and preferences of the reading public. On the pages of newspapers reports touched upon various aspects of citizens' everyday life: business activities of local authorities, sanitary state and street landscaping, construction of roads and buildings, employment of residents of the city, town dwellers' leisure activities, etc. Analysis of newspaper publications indicates that the most popular topics for readers were landscaping and criminal incidents. The press demonstrated the influence of the gold mining industry on various spheres of Yeniseisk life. The pages of newspapers clearly reflected the everyday life of the city, from luxury and revelry during the "gold rush" to its turn into a typical provincial town. The decline of gold mining was accompanied by a financial crisis. All this further led to the deterioration of the economic situation, declining population growth, labor force reductions. Having lost power, the city fell out of sight of journalists. When studying the press, additional information should be drawn from reference bibliographic literature, auxiliary archival materials, statistical information, memoirs, diaries and personal notes, etc. Thus, on the basis of Siberian newspapers journalists' attention to the city can be traced. There is a huge amount of publications about Yeniseisk during its heyday in the second half of the nineteenth century and a gradual decline of interest in the city in the early twentieth century. In whole, the information capacity of Siberian newspapers on the everyday life of Yeniseisk is significant and contains an extensive source layer for researchers.

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