Poludensky, Sergey Petrovich

From the family of an official of the Board of Trustees , the son of Pyotr Semyonovich Poludensky from his marriage with Elena Alexandrovna Lunina. Brother M.P. Poludensky .

He graduated from the Law Faculty of Moscow University (1842) with the title of candidate . He joined the Department of the Ministry of Justice . In 1847, for health reasons, he quit his job and went abroad for treatment. Upon his return to Moscow (1850), he was approved by the director of the library of Moscow University . He established a new procedure for the use of funds, prohibiting open access to books, which inevitably led to their loss and damage. Presented to the Rector A. A. Alfonsky a draft of the “Rules” for visitors to the library, where he set out the requirements under no circumstances to allow readers to enter the library’s internal rooms and catalogs, and only use the first room for reading and distribution. An audit of the funds carried out by Poludensky showed a large shortage of books and forced them to take measures "to prevent the loss of books": the number of copies issued to one person was strictly limited and the period of their return was imposed, fines were imposed for late returns or loss, and the service of outside readers was limited to one day a week. The responsibility for the implementation of these measures was assigned to four assistants, each of whom was in charge of a specific department of the library.

... a man joined our circle, one cannot help but thank him for those moments of pure, young and sober fun that he gave us in our meetings - precious minutes especially because they were given in a difficult, hopeless time: was Sergei Petrovich Poludensky, older than me a university course. Despite his connections, which could have brought him a strong official movement, he took a modest place as a university librarian; he was drawn to the higher interests that the best representatives of science lived. This man possessed an inexhaustible supply of gaiety and wit; in the latter he was inferior only to Herzen, but Poludensky did not have Herzen's pricklyness, intolerance and one-sidedness; he was inimitable in inventing scenes in which very familiar people acted, introducing each comic side of his character and way of life. In addition to the classroom meetings, it happened that after the lecture you go to the library and there you will find a sweet librarian and one or two of ours with him: here you will find all the news and relax in a smart, serious conversation, and laugh enough from comic conversations and the wit of Poludensky. And this man, the culprit of our gaiety, had to prepare for an imminent death: all his brothers, one by one, were dying of consumption, and the turn came to our Sergey Petrovich.

- S. M. Solovyov "My notes for my children, and if possible, for others", 1877

In 1856, Poludensky filed a petition for permission to leave for the treatment of progressive tuberculosis. During his absence, the duties of a librarian were performed by D. I. Steinberg . Having returned from abroad in the autumn of 1857, Poludensky again began to bother about a trip abroad to continue treatment, but did not have time to go abroad.

• N.E. Kalinovskaya. Poludensky Sergey Petrovich // Imperial Moscow University: 1755-1917: Encyclopedic Dictionary / authors of the project, compiled by A. Yu. Andreev, D. A. Tsygankov. - M .: Russian Political Encyclopedia (ROSSPEN), 2010 .-- S. 581 . - ISBN 978-5-8243-1429-8 .
• S. M. Soloviev. My notes are for my children, and if you can, for others. - M. , 1877.