Bács-Kiskun megye múltjából 19. (Kecskemét, 2004)

SUMMARY

success was that the family of the count with huge lands couldn't and on the other hand didn't want to pay more attention to the poor village a long way off from thencentral farmsteads. The population of Akasztó earned their living by renting the so called "puszta" (lowland plains used for extensive animal husbandry and grain growing) outside the boundary of the settlement. In spite of all these efforts the inhabitants remained very poor until the 20

lh century and that is why Ferenc Erdei referred to the region in the period between the two word wars as a poor district with a population with bad financial prospects. "They have poor soil and and poor yeald... Residents attend the nearby clerical possession for working by the day and making share-cropper work... there's no conceit among farmers, but there is an unrelanting fluctuation among smallholders and villeins (agricultural workers without estates). They have extended relationships with each other, therefore this settlement is a big family. There are no social and labour problems inside the village because the whole setlement is a great social problem." FERENC M. HORVÁTH Statistical description of Pest-Solt County and the town of Kecskemét between 1857-1859 The modernization of Hungary started during the absolutism without constitution and independency. The Austrian regime reoccupying the country got information in several ways: eg. from statistical surveys and reports on administration. The study about the document publication is devided into two main parts: there's a report about a statistical description with a military purpose and another one about an annual report summarizing the administrative actions. These reports introduce PestPilis County and the town of Kecskemét between 1857-1859. The county and the county town is got to be better known through these documents of geographical features, natural values, migration of population, administration, agriculture and industry, religion, education, social life, situation of medical system. We could be informed about purposes, suggestions arising in order to make conditions better. JÁNOS KEMÉNY Adelaine (Adél) Madarász's letters, 1903-1931 Selected letters of paintress Adelaine Madarász (1871-1962) are published in the study. Viktor Madarász's granddaughter wrote her letters to Béla Katona Jr., who was the grandson of a famous pharmacist in Kecskemét, Zsigmond Katona. In 1903 Adelaine Madarász got married to Béla Katona Snr. Solicitor General, so she had family connections with his 19-year-old son for a while. The marriage lasted hardly a year because of the husband's sudden death. At this time the relationship between stepmother and son broke off, but several years later it was refreshed and became a really sincere friendship. The Bács-Kiskun Megyei Önkormányzat Levéltára preserves fifty such letters in the Katona family's archive group altogether. From 21 of them the writer of the