Rally, Ivan Stefanovich

Born on the island of Chios in the family of the merchant Stefan Rally (1755, Chios - 1827, Marseille). When Stefan Rally arrived in Odessa at the very beginning of the 1800s, his firm had a total turnover of only 150 thousand rubles; in 20 years - already 1.5 million rubles. The family-owned enterprise, founded by Stefan Rally, had many branches throughout Europe; Odessa office was the largest, and it began to be headed by his eldest son Ivan, who arrived in Odessa in 1822, in 1828. He was also the American consul in Odessa, although he was not an American citizen.

In 1833, I.S. Rally became one of the founders of the Odessa Shipping Company. In 1835, Ivan Rally filed a petition with the authorities to classify him as an Odessa merchant ^[1] and grant him Russian citizenship, which was granted the same year.

I. S. Rally owned trading firms not only in various parts of Russia, but also in England ^[2] , France, Turkey, Persia, India, America, the Danubian principalities, and others. The subject of his business was not only grain, but also many others goods, including wool, linen, textiles.

In Odessa, the Rally belonged to a number of buildings and structures in the most prestigious part. In 1848, he owned: two houses and four shops on Italian Street with a total value of 42,248 rubles, an old patriarchal house on the Greek Bazaar (3860 rubles), a large house on Greek Street (21,500 rubles), a cottage and an outbuilding on Bolshoi Fontane (4571 rubles), and even small shops on Preobrazhenskaya and Bolshaya Arnautskaya streets . By the end of the third quarter of the XIX century, the Rally owned the best house-building: including on Nikolaevsky Boulevard (Hotel Londonskaya), on Deribasovskaya , Rishelievskaya , Italian, Troitskaya , Preobrazhenskaya, on Alexander Square , in Theater Lane ^[3] . The Art Nouveau Rally family house today admires with its beauty of architecture ^[4] .

The Rally family ^[5] actively participated in the city's charity and mercy movement: the wife of Ivan Rally, Louise Mikhailovna (Stefan Lucius), already in the 1830s was a full member of the first charity in Odessa - the Women's Society for the Poor of Charity.

The only son, Stefan Ivanovich Rally (1818, London - 1902), was the co-founder of the Greek charity in Odessa (1861), the founder and chairman of the Odessa Society for the Protection of Animals, which opened on December 21, 1863. He owned the idea of ​​creating one of the first animal hospitals in Russia. Continuing his father’s business, Stefan changed the direction of the trading house’s business from grain trading to iron trading. Like his father, he was respected among the inhabitants of the city and was elected "honorary citizen of Odessa." The Rally Coat of Arms is included in Part 12 of the Collection of Diploma-Coats of Arms of the Russian Nobility Not Included in the Common Coat of Arms, p. 10 ^[6] .

Grandchildren, Peter and Pavel Stefanovich Rally, graduates of Novorossiysk University . Peter served in the imperial guard in St. Petersburg with the rank of captain. Pavel Rally continued the work of his father and grandfather; He was a large landowner, the owner of many houses, a large sugar factory; took an active part in city management, was president of the Odessa Interest Bank and a member of the board of the Odessa Accounting Bank; with his death in 1911, the Odessa branch of the Rally Brothers trading house ceased to exist.

Since 1895, a scholarship named after Peter Stefanovich Rally was established at the financial resources of the Rally family at the Novorossiysk University.

• Biography on the site "Greeks of Ukraine"