Sokolov-Mikitov Ivan Sergeevich
(17(29).05.1892–20.02.1975)

Soviet writer.
Born in the village of Oselki, Kaluga province, but still in infancy he was transported to the Smolensk province, to the homeland of his father, where he spent his childhood, adolescence and youth.
He studied at the Smolensk Alexandrovsky Real School, but was expelled from grade 5 "because of low academic performance and for bad behavior on suspicion of belonging to student revolutionary organizations". To continue his studies, Sokolov-Mikitov left for St. Petersburg in 1910 and entered the 4-year agricultural courses of the General Directorate for Land Management and Agriculture. There began to take shape his writing talent.
In St. Petersburg, Sokolov-Mikitov formed a wide circle of acquaintances, which largely determined his future fate. It included the pilot G.V. Alekhnovich, traveler and naturalist Z.F. Svatosh, writers A.I. Kuprin, M.M. Prishvin, A.M. Remizov, V.Ya. Shishkov, A.S. Green The young man was convinced that he was not inclined towards agronomical sciences, left the courses and began to attend literary disputes and public libraries. In 1910, the first work was born - the tale "The Salt of the Earth".
In 1912, Sokolov-Mikitov moved to Revel (now Tallinn), where he worked as secretary of the newspaper Revelsky Leaf, and from there he went as a sailor on his first voyage, visiting Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Greece, Africa, the Netherlands, England, Italy. Sea travel interrupted the First World War. Having demobilized in 1918, Sokolov-Mikitov went to his parents in the Smolensk region, worked there as a teacher of a unified labor school. By this time he had already published the first stories noticed by Bunin and Kuprin.
Since 1919, he again entered the merchant navy. In 1920, from the steamer "Omsk", sold in Goule England (at auction), it was among the other members of the crew charged off to the coast. He lived in England, Germany, met A.N. Tolstoy, S.A. Yesenin and Isadora Duncan, A.M. Bitter.
In 1922, Sokolov-Mikitov returned to Russia, settled in the Smolensk region. Here he created his best works: the stories “Childhood”, “Helen”, “Chizhikova Lavra”, cycles of stories “On the River Nevestnitsa”, “For the Someone's Realm” and others. In most of them, the theme of the Russian village, the fate of the Russian peasantry, is close to the author. His work was highly appreciated by I.A. Bunin, A.I. Kuprin, M. Gorky.
In 1929, Sokolov-Mikitov moved with his family to Gatchina. During this period, he, as a Izvestia correspondent, participated in O.Yu. Schmidt Arctic campaigns icebreaker steamer "G. Sedov”, expedition to rescue icebreaker steamer “Malygin”. Arctic expeditions gave him material for a series of essays on the “White Shores” and an essay story “Ship Rescue”. Numerous travels of the writer around the country are described in the books "Lenkoran", "Ways of the ships", "Swans are flying", "Northern stories", "On the awakened land", "Stories about the Motherland".
Sokolov-Mikitov is widely known as a children's writer. His books "Fox Dodges", "Listopadnichek", "Friendship of Animals", "Karacharovsky House" and many others acquaint the little reader with the colorful world of nature; collections of Russian children's books "On a Pebble", "Zaryatsya-Zarenitsa" - with folk traditions and folklore.
During the war years, Sokolov-Mikitov served in the forest conservation of the Perm Region. There he met with V.V. Bianchi, wrote stories from the lives of children in the evacuation. In the summer of 1945 he returned with his family to Leningrad.
For a quarter of a century, the life of Sokolov-Mikitov was associated with the Karacharovo Konakovsky District, where since the summer of 1952 he spent most of the year. There was work on the books “Childhood”, “On the Warm Earth”, “Sounds of the Earth”, “Karacharovsky Records” and others.
During this period, Sokolov-Mikitov often turned to the memoir genre. Then “Autobiographical notes”, “Dating with childhood” were written. The book of memories “Old Meetings”, which the author wrote until the last day, contains portrait essays by writers M. Gorky, I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, M. Prishvin, K. Fedin, A. Green, A. Twardowski, polar explorer P. Svirnenko, artist and scientist N. Pinegin and others.
Sokolov-Mikitov experienced a lot of grief in his personal life - he was destined to bury his three daughters.
In the last years of his life the writer went blind. The last book of memoirs “Old Meetings” was written under dictation and was published after his death. Works Sokolov-Mikitova translated into many languages of the world.
He died in Moscow, where he lived the last 11 years of life. The urn with ashes was buried in the family cemetery in Gatchina.
Bay (Mikitova) northeast of the Savich Peninsula on the western coast of the northern island of Novaya Zemlya. Named in 1930, the expedition to the licebreaker steamer "G. Sedov".