In this edition we'll look at what was happening in the year 1906... The biggest political highlight of the year was the inauguration of the first Russian parliament, the State Duma, which started work in St.Petersburg on April 27th. Shortly before that, the MPs heard an address by Emperor Nicholas the Second who pledged guarantees for the country's main laws and stressed that freedom was not enough for a country's wellbeing that's why it had to be propped up law and order. A motley and fractuous assemblage of deputies from ll cross the political spectrum, the First Duma found it really hard to reach a compromise on many issues. Almost each session degenerated into a brawl which finally gave Nicholas a pretext to disband Russia's first parliament after only 72 days of work. The 1905 revolution was over, but government officials, most of them innocent and good-intended people, continued to be killed by members of radical terrorist groups. A really blood-curdling attempt was made on the life of the then Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin which left 27 people dead and his 14 year-old daughter severely mutilated in a powerful explosion that shattered the Premier's mansion just outside St.Petersburg. Stolypin himself escaped unhurt... The year 1906 bore witness to two major catastrophes. One was a terrible earthquake that devastated much of the United States' West Coast whose industrial and trading hub, San Francisco, was literally reduced to rubble by a series of powerful temblors and fires.
Another major tragedy happened in France where 1,200 people died in a methane gas explosion which devastated a coal-mine near the northern industrial city of Lille. In 1906 the scientific world was pained by the news of the untimely death of the outstanding French physicist Pierre Curie. In late 19th century he voluntarily gave up his own experiments to assist his equally learned wife Marie Sklodowskaya who discovered many radioactive elements. Working together, they obtained in 1902 two such elements they called Polonium and Radium - an outstanding scientific discovery which won them a Nobel prize in physics.
And now we'll tell you about people who were born in 1906 and left a big trace in the history of this country. The first man we are going to talk about is Dmitry Likhachev who is emblematic of intelligence, honesty and integrity in today's Russia. Professor Likhachev has spent all his life studying ancient Russian culture. A man of truly encyclopedic knowledge, he contributed immensely to popularizing the works by the greatest Russian poets and writers. Doctor Likhachev is a honorary member of some of the world's most prestigious universities and only recently he became the first recipient of the born-again St.Andrew's Cross which is the highest award in today's Russia...
The whole world knows the great Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich who felt equally at ease in various musical genres. Shostakovich left behind 15 symphonies, chamber music and many operas and ballets. The music written by this larger-than-life composer who lived ahead of his time is still being extensively performed by some of the world's best orchestras.
There is another great Russian artist who was born in 1906 and this is the world-acclaimed choreographer Igor Moiseyev who still remains at the helm of the globe-trotting Russian Dance Ensemble he set up 62 years ago and which is so much loved everywhere in the world. The 93 year-old maestro is still bubbling with energy and working hard training a new generation of dancers.
It's hard to imagine modern cosmonautics without Sergei Korolyov, the man who designed the world's first man-made satellites and presided over the first manned space flight and space-walk.
Modern economics is equally unthinkable without the Nobel prizewinning economist Vasily Leontyev. Born in Russia, he rose to scientific prominence in the United States where he spent years teaching at the prestigious Harward University. His principles of economic analysis are still being widely used in modern-day economic forecasting and programming.
The year 1906 also saw the birth of the last Chinese Emperor Pu Yi. At the tender age of two he ascended the throne only to be ousted four years later. Bernardo Bertolucci made a really outstanding film recreating the life of China's last Emperor. Unlike Pu Yi, the political career of the Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev was a lot more impressive. Brezhnev ruled this country for a whole 18 years and even though much of his tenure has since been dismissed as a period of stagnation mainly because of his conservative domestic policy, there is no denying the fact that the Soviet Union was then a power to reckon with...
Those were the main highlights of 1906 prepared for you by Vladimir Zhamkin.
    


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