Collection of Kārlis Bukums

Kārlis Bukums (1884–1979) of Valmiera is one of the most prominent Latvian local history researchers. His ancestors come from the Vaidava and Kocēnu parishes. Due to the nonsensical recommendation of his relatives, his education was limited to four years in Valmiera and Rubene. He studied to be a cobbler for a short time, worked in a shop, was a book distributor, and learned the art of photography from D. Spunde in Strenči. He lost his leg in the First World War and became an invalid. He was given the Jura medal 4^th grade. After the war he lived in Riga, and from 1927 he lived in Valmiera on Meža Street.

In early childhood, his grandfather introduced him to the world of fairy tales and legends. Later, he began to write them down and listened to the stories told by others as well. In 1925 he responded to Anna Bērzkalne’s invitation to submit all of his materials to the Archives of Latvian Folklore. Bukums began his collection with publication in the newspaper Zemgales balss [The Voice of Semgale] about the name of Garoza parish. The first submissions also provide information about his places of residence in Riga during a period of about two years—on Lāčplēša, Matīsa, Rēveles and Artilērijas streets. He titles his notebooks “Latvian Folklore” and it can be seen that he brought then to the Archive himself (9 times at the end of 1925), as on the inner cover of several notebooks, after their conversation Bērzkalne recorded the locations from which he obtained the materials. When, during their first meetings folk narrator Liene Folkrote did not indicate that she was actually from Terneja, Bukums hurry to report error correction by postcard (9 January 1928).

One of the first and most prolific of the great, was Bukums’ mother, Kristina née Jēkabsone. Until the spring of 1927, Bukums recorded the folk songs in a prose. His recordings improved throughout his lifetime and neat handwriting did not change. His collection includes many expressions, sayings, riddles, games, singing games, transcriptions of children’s verse, traditions, beliefs, spells, folk medicine, and even a notebook of popular songs from 1902, but it mostly consists of legends, tales, and anecdotes, many of which are bawdy. In addition to Valmiera and Cēsis, materials were also acquired from the inhabitants of Tukums and Bauska. In the collection, As the Bauska collection was one of the earliest submissions to LFK, many of its register numbers are crossed out in red; early on the archive catalogued items per page, but later switched to inventorying items per submission. The Bauska collection contains 16242 items.

Bukums’ connection with folklorists continued until 1978. He hoped to instigate a folklore collection movement in Valmiera and find people to continue his work. The linguists, who were sent local place names and local names (around 50 000 items),also benefited from Bukums’ work. Bukums’ autobiography, which he wrote at the age of 90, can be found the LNB Rare Book and Manuscript Colection; it has now been digitized. The study of her great-grandfather Kārlis Bukums’ local history activities was initiated by Paula Grīnberga.