Belfast to Moscow

The Russians have a lot at stake, and the power of Moscow pride should never be underestimated.

Bob Schaffer

Joe Baker

Glenravel Local History Project

Joe Baker and Joe Doherty on Red Square

Glenravel Local History Project McSweeney Centre 29 Henry Place Belfast BT15 2AY

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INTRODUCTION

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any, many years ago, while doing geography in secondary school, I picked up a book called Portraits of Moscow. As you can see from the title it was about Moscow and contained lots of colour photographs. I have no idea why I picked this book as I never had any interest in Moscow or Russia or even any interest in geography. While flicking through this book I came across the picture above and that was me changed forever.

This picture of this massive statue totally amazed me and from that point onwards I had always dreamed that one day I would go to Moscow and see this wonderful sight. That dream came true in May 2005 when I arrived in Moscow for the first time and, like an excited schoolboy again, I was eager to see this monument as this was the porpose of my visit in the first place. So out came all the maps and we worked out exactly where it was and off we headed. When we got to the general area there was no sign of the said statue and we looked, and looked and even went up one of those massive fair ground wheels to get a better view but still no sign. Gutted we headed back to the hotel and it was then that we found out that the statue had been dismantled and taken away for a compete restoration which would take a few years. I was heart broken!

However all was not lost. While there I got to see many things including the massive Victory Day Parade which I was able to watch from my hotel window which overlooked the Kremlin, St Basil's and Red Square. How many people can say they've looked out their hotel window and seen a nuclear missile launcher going past while Sukhoi fighter jets flew past! I instantly fell in love with the place and the people and in the following pages I'll show you why.

Incidentally I eventually saw the statue, fully restored, in May 2010!

MOSCOW FROM BELFAST Getting to Moscow is quite simple enough as all you need to do is book a flight. It's the paper work that's the problem!

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s you would expect there are no direct flights from Belfast to Moscow but it is still quite easy to get to. The best way is to fly to London Heathrow and from there to Moscow. At the time of writing the best airline to use for this is BMI as it's all listed as a single journey. There are also flights from Dublin Airport. All can be booked online or through a travel agent and hotel bookings can be done in the same way. My recommendation would be to book into any of the Izmailovo Hotels which were all built for the Moscow Olympics such as Izmailovo Vega, Izmailovo Delta, Izmailovo Beta etc. These are directly next to the Izmailovo Market which is a must see for all visitors to Moscow and the Izmailovo Metro which is on the Blue Line which brings you directly to the centre of the city in about 15 minutes.

Before you do any of this you will need your Visa to visit the Russian Federation and this is where the fun begins. My recommendation is to use one of the visa services and save yourself a lot of grief. It's a bit extra but in my opinion well worth it. The one I use is www.russiavisa24.co.uk and on their site there is a video showing how to apply for your visa. They also apply for what is known as an invite which you need to apply for a visa but they should be able to sort all that out for you. You will need a valid passport and if you are using an Irish passport you need three bank statements to prove that you are resident in the UK. You will need to send your completed visa Application (facing page), two passport style photographs and payment.

Your passport will be returned to you and inside will be stuck your Russian Visa. (that’s mine below)

You can also go through the Russian Embassy in Dublin or Limerick but take my word for it - nightmare.com!

Once you get there you will be presented with a entry card at passport control. Under no circumstances lose this as you will find it extremely difficult to get out again. Passing through customs you will be out on the airport reception area and all the dodgy taxis of the day. If you want to take a taxi the dodgy ones are no different than the regular ones but secure a price before you get in with (again at the time of writing) the average price being 3000 roubles.

You can travel by train which will leave you at the Metro which you will then need to use to get to your hotel. If there are a few of you the taxi is the same price but I must warn you to fasten your seat belt and hold on tight as the roads are totally insane - but great fun!

When you arrive at the hotel (hopefully in one piece) your passport and entry card will be taken from you for a security check. It will be returned to you the following day but I usually ask reception to hold it until I leave as there are no safes in the rooms.

Moscow is a 24 hour city so there are lots of bars, shops, supermarkets etc., open constantly so do not panic over your 'provisions.'

Once you get settled learn how to use the Metro system (see page 22). It is really quite simple and if you've used the London Underground before then it'll be wee buns! I'll be your guide so grab this book and off you go.

GORKY PARK

Although not as famous as New York's Central Park it is certainly a lot safer! Gorky Park is world famous and well worth a visit. Naturally summertime is best but another great date to go is May 9th when the park come alive with several concerts and hundreds of different activities for children.

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he Central Park of Rest and Culture Named After M. Gorky, to give it its full name, is one of the most famous places in Moscow (thanks presumably to Martin Cruz Smith's grizzly tale of a psychopathic professor, and the Hollywood film it inspired shot mostly in Stockholm). Laid out in 1928, this was the first park of its kind, and the prototype for hundreds of others across the Soviet Union.

The park stretches along the banks of the Moscow River, and is divided into two parts. The first is primarily of interest to children or those trying to entertain them, as it contains a range of funfair rides and rollercoasters - some safer looking than others, although they are being upgraded all the time. You can also hire boats or horses, go bungee jumping, and there's a sports club with tennis courts. In winter the whole area becomes a vast skating rink with skate hire, disco lights and music to match. In summer the "beach" area is hugely popular with sun-worshippers, and becomes an open air club in the evenings.

The other, older, half of the park is considerably more restrained, consisting of formal gardens and woodland that combine the former Golitsynskiy and Neskuchniy Gardens, names that crop up regularly in Russian literary classics. There are a number of fine old To get to Gorky Park get the Metro to Oktyabrskya Station (Orange Line). This will leave you at the junction of Krymskiy Val and Leninsky Prospect where you'll come across this impressive monument to Lenin (facing page).

The main entrance to Gorky Park is on Krymskiy Val (below).

buildings dating from the late 18th and early 19th Centuries, including two summerhouses by the great Moscow architect Mikhail Kazakov (who designed the Senate Building in the Kremlin), and the first City Hospital. Nearby is the enormous Green Theater, an outdoor amphitheater that hosts various gigs and concerts in the summer months. Also in the park is a life size copy of the Buran, the Soviet space shuttle (above).

Gorky Park's attractions are generally more appealing for locals than for tourists but it's the place to come if you want to find out how the majority of Muscovites spend their free time. Across the road from the main entrance, in front of the House of Artists, is Sculpture Park where hundreds of monuments are on display including many Soviet ones. Once you reach this park go through it and head for the Peter The Great Monument (believe me you can’t miss it - see next page) and that will bring you out towards the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour and the Kremlin.

The absolutely massive monument to Peter the Great. When you leave Gorky Park go straight across the road and through the Sculpture Park. Head in the general direction of this monument to lead you to the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour and the Kremlin

Made world famous by this film it was not even made in Gorky Park - it was shot in Sweden!

One of the crests at the main entrance of Gorky Park

Two of the sculptures in Sculpture Park which is directly facing Gorky Park (above)

Belfast group outside Gorky Park, May 2011

CATHEDRAL OF CHRIST THE SAVIOUR The original cathedral was blown up to make way for Stalin’s House of Soviets which never happened. The present cathedral was rebuilt after the fall of the Soviet Union and is one of the most impressive cathedrals in the world ne of the most imposing and controversial buildings in Rus displays of hubris. The project was abandoned, and the site turned sia, the resurrected Cathedral of Christ the Saviour has had a over to become an open-air swimming pool, the largest in the world, short but turbulent history. It was originally commissioned after which was kept at a temperature of 27°C all year round. The result the defeat of Napoleon, but work did not begin on its construction was a thick covering of fog that shrouded a number of gruesome until 1839. Designed by the great St. Petersburg architect Konstantin deaths (and murders) among the swimmers.

Ton, who was also responsible for the Grand Kremlin Palace and The symbolic significance of the site was reaffirmed after the fall the Kremlin Armoury and whose church designs pioneered the of the Soviet Union, when ambitious Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov Byzantine-revival style, the cathedral was erected, for maximum joined forces with the Orthodox Church to resurrect the cathedral effect, on the embankment only a few minutes' walk from the Krem- in a $360-million reconstruction project. Completed in 2000, the lin. Sadly, this entailed the destruction of the medieval Alekseevskiy new cathedral is loosely based on Ton's original designs, but conConvent, a course of events which lends an intriguing irony to the structed with modern building materials and fitted out with all modcons including air conditioning, telecommunications facilities, elcathedral's own fate.

The enormous - and extremely expensive - cathedral was eventu- evators and underground parking. Visitors can only see the catheally consecrated in 1883, and its vast copper domes dominated the dral as part of an organized tour, one of the highlights of which is Moscow skyline. However, the cathedral had taken almost as much the panoramic view from the 40-meter-high observation platform. time to build and to decorate as it would remain standing in its original incarnation. For fairly obvious reasons, it was singled out by the Soviet government for destruction and, in 1931, blown to pieces to make way for a proposed Palace of Soviets, one of the To enter the cathedral you need to go to the back. Entrance is free most influential pieces of architecture never to be built. The design but women need to cover their heads. If you do not have a scarf approved by Stalin would have stood over 400 meters high, with a there is a small gift shop near the entrance which sells them cheaply vast statue of Lenin at its peak, and, although it was never built, the enough. You can risk going in without one but sometimes you get blueprint was nonetheless the forefather of the Seven Sisters, the approached by someone you have just offended and sometimes magnificent Stalinist skyscrapers that lower over central Moscow. you do not. Once you go round the cathedral you will be let out at Only the foundations had been laid when the Second World War the front. From here go down to the river embankment and walk to brought an abrupt end to such an ambitious project, and Stalin's your left. This will bring you towards the Kremlin and Red Square. successor, Nikita Khruschev, had no stomach for such grandiose

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Margaret Valentie, Anne Baker and Lucinda Carbine at the Cathedral.

In the background one of the Stalin Skyscrapers can be seen

RED SQUARE Red Square is the very heart of Moscow and, as its name suggests, is one of the most beautiful in the world. To any visitor it is extremely easy to get to by foot and by the nearby main metro stop at Revolution Square.

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he square separates the Kremlin, the former royal citadel and currently the official residence of the President of Russia, from a historic merchant quarter known as Kitai-gorod. As major streets of Moscow radiate from here in all directions, being promoted to major highways outside the city, Red Square is often considered the central square of Moscow and all of Russia.

The rich history of Red Square is reflected in many artworks, including paintings by Vasily Surikov, Konstantin Yuon and others.

The square was meant to serve as Moscow's main marketplace. It was also used for various public ceremonies and proclamations, and occasionally as the site of coronation for Russia's Tsars. The square has been gradually built up since that point and has been used for official ceremonies by all Russian governments since it was established.

The name Red Square derives neither from the colour of the bricks around it (which, in fact, were whitewashed at certain points in history) nor from the link between the colour red and communism.

Rather, the name came about because the Russian word (krasnaya) can mean either "red" or "beautiful" (the latter being rather archaic; of. prekrasnaya). This word, with the meaning "beautiful", was originally applied to Saint Basil's Cathedral and was subsequently transferred to the nearby square. It is believed that the square acquired its current name (replacing the older Pozhar, or "burnt-out place") in the 17th century. Several ancient Russian towns, such as Suzdal, Yelets, and Pereslavl-Zalessky, have their main square named Krasnaya ploshchad.

The east side of the Kremlin triangle, lying adjacent to Red Square and situated between the rivers Moskva and the now-underground Neglinnaya River was deemed the most vulnerable side of the Kremlin to attack, since it was neither protected by the rivers, nor any other natural barriers, as the other sides were. Therefore, the Kremlin wall was built to its highest height on this side, and furthermore, the Italian architects involved in the building of these

fortifications convinced Ivan the Great to clear the area outside of the walls in order to create a field for fire shooting. The relevant decrees were issued in 1493 and 1495. They called for the demolition of all the buildings within 110 sazhens (234 metres) of the wall.

In 1508–1516, the Italian architect Aloisio the New arranged for the construction of a moat in front of the eastern wall, which would connect the Moskva and Neglinnaya and be filled in with water from Neglinnaya. This moat, known as the Alevizov moat and having a length of 541 meters, width of 36 meters, and a depth of 9.5– 13 m was lined with limestone and, in 1533, fenced on both sides with low, 4-meter thick cogged brick walls. Three square gates existed on this side of the wall, which in the 17th century, were known as: Konstantino-Eleninsky, Spassky, Nikolsky (owing their names to the icons of Constantine and Helen, the Savior and St. Nicholas which hung over them). The last two are directly opposite the Red Square, while the Konstantino-Elenensky gate was located behind Saint Basil's Cathedral. In the early 19th century, the Arch of Konstantino-Elenensky gate was paved with bricks, but the Spassky Gate was the main front gate of the Kremlin and used for royal entrances. From this gate, wooden and (following the 17th century improvements) stone bridges stretched across the moat. Books were sold on this bridge and stone platforms were built nearby for guns – "raskats". The Tsar Cannon was located on the platform of the Lobnoye mesto.

The square was called Veliky Torg (Great market) or simply Torg (Market), then Troitskaya by the name of the small Troitskaya (Trinity) Church, burnt down in the great fire during the Tatar invasion in 1571. After that, the square held the name Pozhar, which means "burnt". It was not until 1661–62, when it was first mentioned by its contemporary Krasnaya – "Red" name.

The Red Square was the landing stage and trade center for Moscow. Ivan the Great decreed that trade should only be conducted from person to person, but in time, these rules were relaxed and

Looking towards the Russian History Museum with the Kremlin and Lenin’s Mausoleum to the left

permanent market buildings began appearing on the square. After a fire in 1547, Ivan the Terrible reorganized the lines of wooden shops on the eastern side into market lines. The streets Ilyinka and Varvarka were divided into the Upper lines (now GUM department store), Middle lines and Bottom lines, although Bottom Lines were already in Zaryadye).

After a few years, the Cathedral of Intercession of the Virgin, commonly known as Saint Basil's Cathedral, was built on the moat.

This was the first building which gave the square its present-day characteristic silhouette (Pyramidal roofs had not yet been built on the Kremlin towers). In 1595, the wooden market lines were replaced with stone. By that time, a brick platform for the proclamation of the tsar's edicts, known as Lobnoye Mesto had also been constructed.

headed eagle. After this, the square became known as Krasevaya – «beautiful».

In the late 17'th century the square was cleared of all wooden structures (1679–1680). Then all Kremlin towers received tent roofs, except Nikolskaya. One tent was even erected on the wall above the Red Square (the so-called Tsarskaya Tower, intended so that the tsar could watch from this spot the various ceremonies in the square). Tent roofs were also constructed at Voskrerensky (Iberian) gates, arranged in the wall of Kitai-gorod. These were the fortified gates at Voskresensky Bridge over the River Neglinnaya.

In 1697 and 1699, gates were built on both sides of Voskresensky onto large stone buildings: the Mint and Zemsky prikaz (department in charge of urban and police matters). Zemsky prikaz, then, was known as the Main Pharmacy (on-site new Historical Museum). In the building of Zemsky prikaz in 1755 was organised by first Russian University. At the same time in the Alevizov moat, where there was no water, a state Pharmacy's garden (where the growing of medicinal plants) was arranged.

In 1702, the first public theater in Russia was built near the Nikolsky gate; It stood until 1737, when it was destroyed in a fire.

In the 1730s, a new mint building, called the Gubernskoye pravlenie (Provincial Board), was built in front of the old one During her reign, Catherine the Great decided to make improvements to the square. In 1786, the upper floor of the market lines was made of stone. This line was built on the opposite side of the square—at moat between the Spasskaya and Nikolskaya towers.

Then architect Matvey Kazakov built (in the old forms) the new Lobnoye mesto of hewn stone, slightly west of the place where it was before.

2011 Victory Day Parade on Red Square The Red Square was considered a sacred place. Various festive processions were held there, and during Palm Sunday the famous "procession on a donkey" was arranged, in which the patriarch, sitting on a donkey, accompanied by the tsar and the people went out of Saint Basil's Cathedral into the Kremlin.

During the expulsion of Poles from Moscow in 1612, Prince Dmitry Pozharsky entered the Kremlin through the square. In memory of this event, he built the Kazan Cathedral – in honour of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God, followed his army in a campaign.

At the same time (1624–1625) Spasskaya tower received contemporary tent roofs. This was done on the proposal and the draught of Englishman Christopher Galloway, who was summoned to design the new tower's clock (clock watch it there with the 1585) and suggested the arrangement of the tent roof over the clock. In the mid-century on the top of the tower was set up a gilded double-

In 1804, at the request of merchants, the square was paved in stone.

In 1806 Nikolskaya Tower was reconstructed in the Gothic style, and received a tent roof. The new phase of improvement of the square began after the Napoleonic invasion and fire in 1812. The moat was filled in 1813 and in its place, rows of trees were planted.

The market Line along the moat, dilapidated after the fire, had been demolished, and on the eastern side, Joseph Bové constructed new building of lines in Empire style. In 1818 the Monument to Minin and Pozharsky, was erected, symbolising the rise in patriotic consciousness during the war.

In 1874, the historic building of Zemsky prikaz was demolished.

In its place was built the Imperial Historical Museum in pseudoRussian style. After Bové's lines were demolished, new large buildings were erected between 1888–1893 in the pseudo-Russian style: upper lines (Gum department store) and middle lines. The upper lines was intended for retail sale and were in fact the first department store in Moscow; middle lines intended for the wholesale trade. At the same time (in 1892) the square was illuminated by electric lanterns. In 1909, a tram appeared on the square for the first time.

During the Soviet era, Red Square maintained its significance, becoming a focal point for the new state. Besides being the official address of the Soviet government, it was renowned as a showcase for military parades. Kazan Cathedral and Iverskaya Chapel with the Resurrection Gates were demolished to make room for heavy military vehicles driving through the square (both were later rebuilt after the fall of the Soviet Union). There were plans to demolish Moscow's most recognized building, Saint Basil's Cathedral, as well. The legend is that Lazar Kaganovich, Stalin's associate and director of the Moscow reconstruction plan, prepared a special model of Red Square, in which the cathedral could be removed, and brought it to Stalin to show how the cathedral was an obstacle for parades and traffic. But when he jerked the cathedral out of the square, Stalin objected with his rather famous quote: "Lazar! Put it back!".

A nuclear missile launcher makes its way to the 2011 Victory Day Parade on Red Square Two of the most significant military parades on Red Square were the one in 1941, when the city was besieged by Germans and troops were leaving Red Square straight to the front lines, and the Victory Parade in 1945, when the banners of defeated Nazi armies were thrown at the foot of Lenin's Mausoleum. The Soviet Union held many parades in Red Square for May Day, Victory Day, and the October Revolution which consisted of propaganda, flags, a labor demonstration, and a troops march and show-off of tanks and missiles. On Victory Day in 1945, 1965, 1985, and 1990 there were military marches and parades as well.

On May 28, 1987, a West German pilot named Mathias Rust landed a light aircraft on St Basil's descent next to Red Square.

In 1990, the Kremlin and Red Square were among the very first sites in the USSR added to UNESCO's World Heritage List.

Red Square has also served as a venue for high-profile concerts.

Linkin Park, The Prodigy, t.A.T.u., Shakira, Scorpions, Paul McCartney, Roger Waters, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and other celebrities performed there. For the New Year 2006, 2007 and 2008 celebrations, a skating rink was set up on Red Square. Paul McCartney's performance there was a historic moment for many, as The Beatles were banned in the Soviet Union, preventing any live performances there of any of The Beatles; the Soviet Union also banned the sales of Beatles records. While McCartney's performance was historic, he was not the first Beatle to perform in Russia. Former Beatle Ringo Starr and His All Starr Band performed at Moscow's Russia Hall in August 1998.

In January 2008, Russia announced that they would resume parading military vehicles through Red Square, although recent restoration of Iverski Gate complicated this, by closing one of existing passages along Historical Museum for the heavy vehicles.

In May 2008, Russia held its annual Victory day parade, marking the 63rd anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War. For the first time since the collapse of the USSR in

1991, Russian military vehicles paraded through the square. On December 4, 2008, The KHL announced they would be holding their first ever all-star game outdoors on January 10 at the Red Square.

On May 9, 2010 to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the capitulation of Germany in 1945, The armed forces of France, Poland, the United Kingdom and the United States marched in the Moscow Victory Day parade for the first time in history.

The buildings surrounding the Square are all significant in some respect. Lenin's Mausoleum, for example, contains the embalmed body of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, the founder of the Soviet Union.

Nearby to the south is the elaborate brightly-domed Saint Basil's Cathedral and the palaces and cathedrals of the Kremlin.

On the eastern side of the square is the GUM department store, and next to it the restored Kazan Cathedral. The northern side is occupied by the State Historical Museum, whose outlines echo those of Kremlin towers. The Iberian Gate and Chapel have been rebuilt to the northwest.

The only sculptured monument on the square is a bronze statue of Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky, who helped to clear Moscow from the Polish invaders in 1612, during the Times of Trouble.

Nearby is the so-called Lobnoye Mesto, a circular platform where public ceremonies used to take place. Both the Minin and Pozharskiy statue and the Lobnoye Mesto were once located more centrally in Red Square but were moved to their current locations to facilitate the large military parades of the Soviet era. The square itself is around 330 meters (1100 ft) long and 70 meters (230 ft) wide.

The Kremlin and Red square were together recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1990, due to their inextricable links to Russian history since the 13th century.

THE KREMLIN There is no doubt that The Kremlin is the most visited building in the whole of Russia for tourists. Not only is it one of the best known structures throughout the world but also one of the most fascinating.

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he Kremlin, is a historic fortified complex at the heart of Mos cow, overlooking the Moskva River (to the south), Saint Basil's Cathedral and Red Square (to the east) and the Alexander Garden (to the west). It is the best known of kremlins (Russian citadels) and includes four palaces, four cathedrals and the enclosing Kremlin Wall with Kremlin towers. The complex serves as the official residence of the President of the Russian Federation.

The name The Kremlin is often used as a metonym to refer to the government of the Soviet Union (1922–1991) and its highest members (such as general secretaries, premiers, presidents, ministers, and commissars), in the same way that the metonym Élysée Palace refers to the President of the French Republic, the White House refers to the Executive Office of the President of the United States and Number 10 Downing Street or Whitehall refers to the Offices of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and the British Government. It is still used in reference to the government of the Russian Federation and even the Russian President's official website is Kremlin.Ru. "Kremlinology" refers to the study of Soviet and Russian policies.

The site has been continuously inhabited since the 2nd century BC, and originates from a Vyatich fortified structure (or "grad") on Borovitsky Hill where the Neglinnaya River flowed into the Moskva River. The Slavs occupied the south-western portion of the hill as early as the 11th century, as evidenced by a metropolitan seal from the 1090s, which was unearthed by Soviet archaeologists in the area.

Up to the 14th century, the site was known as the 'grad of Moscow'. The word "kremlin" was first recorded in 1331 and its etymology is disputed (see Max Vasmer online (Russian)). The grad was greatly extended by Prince Yuri Dolgorukiy in 1156, destroyed by the Mongols in 1237 and rebuilt in oak in 1339.

John Climacus (1329), the monastery church of the Saviour's Transfiguration (1330), and the Archangel Cathedral (1333)—all built of limestone and decorated with elaborate carving, each crowned by a single dome. Of these churches, the reconstructed Saviour Cathedral alone survived into the 20th century, only to be pulled down at the urging of Stalin in 1933.

Dmitri Donskoi replaced the oaken walls with a strong citadel of white limestone in 1366–1368 on the basic foundations of the current walls; this fortification withstood a siege by Khan Tokhtamysh.

Dmitri's son Vasily I resumed construction of churches and cloisters in the Kremlin. The newly built Annunciation Cathedral was painted by Theophanes the Greek, Andrei Rublev, and Prokhor in 1405. The Chudov Monastery was founded by Dmitri's tutor, Metropolitan Alexis; while his widow, Eudoxia, established the Ascension Convent in 1397.

Grand Prince Ivan III organised the reconstruction of the Kremlin, inviting a number of skilled architects from Renaissance Italy, like Petrus Antonius Solarius, who designed the new Kremlin wall and its towers, and Marcus Ruffus who designed the new palace for the prince. It was during his reign that three extant cathedrals of the

The Metro Stations Ploshad Revolyutsy, Okhotny Ryad and Alexandrovsky Sad will leave you at the Kremlin and Red Square. The most impressive of these and the best to use is Ploshad Revolyutsy

Kremlin, the Deposition Church, and the Palace of Facets were constructed. The highest building of the city and Muscovite Russia was the Ivan the Great Bell Tower, built in 1505–08 and augmented to its present height in 1600. The Kremlin walls as they now appear were built between 1485 and 1495. Spasskie gates of the wall still bear a dedication in Latin praising Petrus Antonius Solarius for the design.

After construction of the new kremlin walls and churches was complete, the monarch decreed that no structures should be built in the immediate vicinity of the citadel. The Kremlin was separated from the walled merchant town (Kitay-gorod) by a 30-metre-wide moat, over which the Intercession Cathedral on the Moat was constructed during the reign of Ivan the Terrible. The same tsar also renovated some of his grandfather's palaces, added a new palace and cathedral for his sons, and endowed the Trinity metochion inside the Kremlin. The metochion was administrated by the Trinity Monastery and boasted the graceful tower church of St. Sergius, which was described by foreigners as one of the finest in the country.

During the Time of Troubles, the Kremlin was held by the Polish forces for two years, between 21 September 1610 and 26 October 1612. The Kremlin's liberation by the volunteer army of prince Dmitry Pozharsky and Kuzma Minin paved the way for the election of Mikhail Romanov as the new tsar. During his reign and that of his son Alexis, the eleven-domed Upper Saviour Cathedral, Armorial Gate, Terem Palace, Amusement Palace and the palace of Patriarch Nikon were built. Following the death of Alexis, the Kremlin witnessed the Moscow Uprising of 1682, from which tsar Peter barely escaped, causing him to dislike the Kremlin. Three decades later, Peter abandoned the residence of his forefathers for his new capital, Saint Petersburg.

Although still used for coronation ceremonies, the Kremlin was abandoned and neglected until 1773, when Catherine the Great engaged Vasili Bazhenov to build her new residence there.

Bazhenov produced a bombastic Neoclassical design on a heroic scale, which involved the demolition of several churches and palaces, as well as a portion of the Kremlin wall. After the preparations were over, construction halted due to lack of funds. Several years later, the architect Matvey Kazakov supervised the reconstruction of the dismantled sections of the wall and of some structures of the Chudov Monastery, and constructed the spacious and luxurious offices of the Senate, since adapted for use as the principal workplace of the President of Russia.

Following the French invasion of Russia in 1812, the French forces occupied the Kremlin from 2 September to 11 October. When Napoleon retreated from Moscow, he ordered the whole Kremlin to be blown up. The Kremlin Arsenal, several portions of the Kremlin Wall and several wall towers were destroyed by explosions and fires damaged the Faceted Chamber and churches. Explosions continued for three days, from 21 to 23 October. Fortunately, the rain

damaged the fuses, and the damage was less severe than intended.

Restoration works were held in 1816–19, supervised by Osip Bove.

During the remainder of Alexander I's reign, several ancient structures were renovated in a fanciful neo-Gothic style, but many others were condemned as "disused" or "dilapidated" (including all the buildings of the Trinity metochion) and simply torn down.

On visiting Moscow for his coronation festivities, Nicholas I was not satisfied with the Grand, or Winter, Palace, which had been erected to Rastrelli's design in the 1750s. The elaborate Baroque structure was demolished, as was the nearby church of St. John the Precursor, built by Aloisio the New in 1508 in place of the first church constructed in Moscow. The architect Konstantin Thon was commissioned to replace them with the Grand Kremlin Palace, which was to rival the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg in its dimensions and the opulence of its interiors. The palace was constructed in 1839–49, followed by the new building of the Kremlin Armoury in 1851.

After 1851, the Kremlin changed little until the Russian Revolution of 1917; the only new features added during this period were the Monument to Alexander II and a stone cross marking the spot where Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia was assassinated by Ivan Kalyayev in 1905. These monuments were destroyed by the Bolsheviks in 1918.

The Soviet government moved from Petrograd to Moscow on 12 March 1918. Vladimir Lenin selected the Kremlin Senate as his residence. Joseph Stalin also had his personal rooms in the Kremlin. He was eager to remove from his headquarters all the "relics of the tsarist regime". Golden eagles on the towers were replaced by shining Kremlin stars, while the wall near Lenin's Mausoleum was turned into the Kremlin Wall Necropolis.

The Chudov Monastery and Ascension Convent, with their magnificent 16th-century cathedrals, were dismantled to make room for the military school and Palace of Congresses. The Little Nicholas Palace and the old Saviour Cathedral were pulled down as well.

The residence of the Soviet government was closed to tourists until 1955. It was not until the Khrushchev Thaw that the Kremlin was reopened to foreign visitors. The Kremlin Museums were established in 1961 and the complex was among the first Soviet patrimonies inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1990.

Although the current director of the Kremlin Museums, Elena Gagarina (Yuri Gagarin's daughter) advocates a full-scale restoration of the destroyed cloisters, recent developments have been confined to expensive restoration of the original interiors of the Grand Kremlin Palace, which were altered during Stalin's rule. The Patriarch of Moscow has a suite of rooms in the Kremlin, but divine service in the Kremlin cathedrals is held irregularly, because they are still administered as museums.

The existing Kremlin walls and towers were built by Italian masters over the years 1485 to 1495. The irregular triangle of the Kremlin wall encloses an area of 275,000 square metres (68 acres). Its overall length is 2235 metres (2444 yards), but the height ranges from 5 to 19 metres, depending on the terrain. The wall's thickness is between 3.5 and 6.5 metres.

Originally there were eighteen Kremlin towers, but their number increased to twenty in the 17th century. All but three of the towers are square in plan. The highest tower is the Troizkaya, which was built up to its present height of 73,9 metres in 1495. Most towers were originally crowned with wooden tents; the extant brick tents with strips of colored tiles go back to the 1680s.

Cathedral Square is the heart of the Kremlin. It is surrounded by six buildings, including three cathedrals. The Cathedral of the Dormition was completed in 1479 to be the main church of Moscow and where all the Tsars were crowned. The massive limestone facade, capped with its five golden cupolas was the design of Aristotele Fioravanti. Several important metropolitans and patriarchs are buried there, including Peter and Makarii. The gilded, three-domed Cathedral of the Annunciation was completed next in 1489, only to be reconstructed to a nine-domed design a century later. On the south-east of the square is the much larger Cathedral of the Archangel Michael (1508), where almost all the Muscovite monarchs from Ivan Kalita to Alexis I of Russia are interred. (Boris Godunov was originally buried there, but was moved to the Trinity Monastery.)

There are two domestic churches of the Metropolitans and Patriarchs of Moscow, the Church of the Twelve Apostles (1653–56) and the exquisite one-domed Church of the Deposition of the

Virgin's Robe, built by Pskov artisans over the years 1484–88 and featuring superb icons and frescoes from 1627 and 1644.

The other notable structure is the Ivan the Great Bell Tower on the north-east corner of the square, which is said to mark the exact centre of Moscow and resemble a burning candle. Completed in 1600, it is 81 meters (266 ft) high. Until the Russian Revolution, it was the tallest structure in the city, as construction of buildings taller than that was forbidden. Its 21 bells would sound the alarm if any enemy was approaching. The upper part of the structure was destroyed by the French during the Napoleonic Invasion and has, of course, been rebuilt. The Tsar bell, the largest bell in the world, stands on a pedestal next to the tower.

The oldest secular structure still standing is Ivan III's Palace of Facets (1491), which holds the imperial thrones. The next oldest is the first home of the royal family, the Terem Palace. The original Terem Palace was also commissioned by Ivan III, but most of the existing palace was built in the 17th century. The Terem Palace and the Palace of Facets are linked by the Grand Kremlin Palace.

This was commissioned by Nicholas I in 1838. The largest structure in the Kremlin, it cost an exorbitant sum of eleven million rubles to build and more than one billion dollars to renovate in the 1990s. It contains dazzling reception halls, a ceremonial red staircase, private apartments of the tsars, and the lower storey of the Resurrection of Lazarus church (1393), which is the oldest extant structure in the Kremlin and the whole of Moscow.

The northern corner of the Kremlin is occupied by the Arsenal, which was originally built for Peter the Great in 1701. The southwestern section of the Kremlin holds the Armoury building. Built in 1851 to a Renaissance Revival design, it is currently a museum housing Russian state regalia and Diamond fund.

One of the most impressive sights to see in Moscow is the changing of the guard at the Kremlin Walls

St BASIL’S CATHEDRAL You don’t have to be a religious person to appreciate that St Basil’s Cathedral is one of the most beautiful buildings in the world.

Seeing it for real truly is a wonderful experience

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lthough it's known to everyone as St. Basil's, this legendary building is officially called "The Cathedral of the Intercession of the Virgin by the Moat". The popular alternative refers to Basil the Blessed, a Muscovite 'holy fool' who was buried on the site (in the Trinity Cathedral that once stood here) a few years before the present building was erected.

The Cathedral was ordered by Ivan the Terrible to mark the 1552 capture of Kazan from Mongol forces. It was completed in 1560.

That's pretty much all the genuine history that's known about this celebrated landmark. There are, however, scores of legends.

Nothing is known about the builders, Barma and Postnik Yakovlev, except their names and the dubious legend that Ivan had them blinded so that they could not create anything to compare. Historians unanimously state that this is nothing but urban folklore.

Architectural specialists are to this day unable to agree about the governing idea behind the structure. Either the creators were paying homage to the churches of Jerusalem, or, by building eight churches around a central ninth, they were representing the medieval symbol of the eight-pointed star. The original concept of the Cathedral of the Intercession has been hidden from us beneath layers of stylistic additions and new churches added to the main building. In fact, when built, the Cathedral was all white to match the

white-stone Kremlin, and the onion domes were gold rather than multi-colored and patterned as they are today.

In the 17th century a hip-roofed bell tower was added, the gallery and staircases were covered with vaulted roofing, and the helmeted domes were replaced with decorated ones. In 1860 during rebuilding, the Cathedral was painted with a more complex and integrated design, and has remained unchanged since.

For a time in the Soviet Union, there was talk of demolishing St. Basil's - mainly because it hindered Stalin's plans for massed parades on Red Square. It was only saved thanks to the courage of the architect Pyotr Baranovsky. When ordered to prepare the building for demolition, he refused categorically, and sent the Kremlin an extremely blunt telegram. The Cathedral remained standing, and Baranovsky's conservation efforts earned him five years in prison.

The Cathedral is now a museum. During restoration work in the seventies a wooden spiral staircase was discovered within one of the walls. Visitors now take this route into the central church, with its extraordinary, soaring tented roof and a fine 16th Century iconostasis. You can also walk along the narrow, winding gallery, covered in beautiful patterned paintwork.

One service a year is held in the Cathedral, on the Day of Intercession in October.

LENIN MAUSOLEUM One of the most impressive experiences on Red Square is to enter Lenin’s Mausoleum and see the preserved body of the founder of the Soviet Union. One word of warning though. No stopping, taking photographs, hand in pockets and certainly no talking

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enin's Mausoleum also known as Lenin's Tomb, situated in Red Square in the center of Moscow, is the mausoleum that serves as the current resting place of Vladimir Lenin. His embalmed body has been on public display there since shortly after his death in 1924 (with rare exceptions in wartime). Aleksey Shchusev's diminutive but monumental granite structure incorporates some elements from ancient mausoleums, such as the Step Pyramid and the Tomb of Cyrus the Great.

Soon after January 21, 1924, the day that Lenin died, the Soviet government received more than 10,000 telegrams from all over Russia, which asked the government to preserve his body somehow for future generations. On the morning of January 23, Professor Alexei Ivanovich Abrikosov—a prominent Russian pathologist and anatomist (not to be confused with physicist Alexei Alexeyevich Abrikosov, his son) embalmed Lenin's body to keep it intact until the burial. On the night of January 23, architect Aleksey Shchusev was given a task to complete within three days: design and build a tomb to accommodate all those who wanted to say their goodbyes to Lenin. On January 26, the decision was made to place the tomb in Red Square by the Kremlin Wall. By January 27, Shchusev built a tomb out of wood and at 4 p.m. that day they placed Lenin's coffin in it. More than 100,000 people visited the tomb within a month and a half. By August 1924, Shchusev upgraded the tomb to a bigger version. The architect Konstantin Melnikov designed Lenin's sarcophagus.

In 1929, it was established that it would be possible to preserve Lenin’s body for a much longer period of time. Therefore, architects Aleksey Shchusev, I.A. Frantsuz, and G.K. Yakovlev were entrusted to replace the wooden mausoleum with one made of stone.

Marble, porphyry, granite, labradorite, and other construction materials were used. In October 1930, the construction of the stone tomb was finished. In 1973, sculptor Nikolai Tomsky designed a new sarcophagus.

On January 26, 1924, the Head of the Moscow Garrison issued an order to place the Guard of Honour at the mausoleum. Russians call it the "Number One Sentry". After the events of the Russian constitutional crisis of 1993, the Guard of Honour was disbanded.

In 1997 the "Number One Sentry" was restored at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Alexander Garden.

The body was removed in October 1941 and evacuated to Tyumen, in Siberia, when it appeared that Moscow might be in imminent danger of falling to invading Nazi troops. After the war, it was returned and the tomb reopened.

More than 10 million people visited Lenin's tomb between 1924 and 1972.

Joseph Stalin's embalmed body shared a spot next to Lenin's, from the time of his death in 1953 until October 31, 1961, when Stalin was removed as part of de-Stalinization and Khrushchev's Thaw, and buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis outside the walls of the Kremlin.

Lenin's body was to have been transferred to the Pantheon upon its completion but the project was cancelled in the aftermath of deStalinization.

The family of Lenin's embalmers states that the corpse is real and requires daily work to moisturise the features and inject preservatives under the clothes. Lenin's sarcophagus is kept at a temperature of 16 °C (61 °F) and kept at a humidity of 80 - 90 percent. The chemical used was referred to by the caretakers as "balsam", which was glycerine and potassium acetate. Every eighteen months the corpse is removed and undergoes a special chemical bath. The

Vladimir Putin at Lenin’s Mausoleum in 2009 chemicals were unknown until after the fall of the Soviet Union, kept secret by authorities. The bath consists of placing the corpse in a glass bath with potassium acetate, alcohol, glycerol, distilled water, and as a disinfectant, quinine. This was the process used for all subsequent treatments of Lenin's body and continues to be used even now.

One of the main problems the embalmers faced was the appearance of dark spots on the skin, especially on the face and hands.

They managed to solve the problem by the use of a variety of different agents in between baths. For example, if a patch of wrinkling or discoloration occurred it was treated with an acetic acid diluted with water. Hydrogen peroxide could be used to restore the tissues' original colouring. Damp spots were removed by means of disinfectants like quinine or phenol.

Until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 the continued preservation work was funded by the Russian government. At that point the government discontinued financial support and now private donations support the preservation staff The Mausoleum is open every day from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm, except holidays, Mondays and Fridays. Visitors still wait in lines to see Lenin's body although they are not as long as they once were. Entrance is free of charge. All items capable of recording video or audio as well as taking a picture are strictly forbidden inside the mausoleum. All electronic items must be checked in a nearby building containing lockers. Before visitors are allowed to enter the mausoleum, armed police or military guards search each visitor. Visitors are required to show respect while in the tomb; photography and videotaping inside the mausoleum are forbidden, as are talking, smoking, keeping hands in pockets, or wearing hats (if male) Since 1991, there has been some discussion about removing the Kremlin Wall Necropolis and burying Lenin's body. President Boris Yeltsin, with the support of the Russian Orthodox Church, intended to close the tomb and bury Lenin next to his mother, Maria Alexandrovna Ulyanova, at the Volkov Cemetery in Saint Petersburg; however, his successor, Vladimir Putin, opposed this, pointing out that a reburial of Lenin would imply that generations of citizens had observed false values during 70 years of Soviet rule.

VLADIMIR LENIN Lenin was one of the leading political figures and revolutionary thinkers of the 20th century, who masterminded the Bolshevik take-over of power in Russia in 1917, and was the architect and first head of the USSR.

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ladimir Ilich Ulyanov was born in Simbirsk on the Volga River on 22 April 1870 into a well-educated family. He excelled at school and went on to study law. At university, he was exposed to radical thinking, and his views were also influenced by the execution of his elder brother, a member of a revolutionary group.

Expelled from university for his radical policies, Lenin completed his law degree as an external student in 1891. He moved to St Petersburg and became a professional revolutionary. Like many of his contemporaries, he was arrested and exiled to Siberia, where he married Nadezhda Krupskaya. After his Siberian exile, Lenin the pseudonym he adopted in 1901 - spent most of the subsequent decade and a half in western Europe, where he emerged as a prominent figure in the international revolutionary movement and became the leader of the 'Bolshevik' faction of the Russian Social Democratic Worker's Party.

In 1917, exhausted by World War One, Russia was ripe for change.

Assisted by the Germans, who hoped that he would undermine the Russian war effort, Lenin returned home and started working against the provisional government that had overthrown the tsarist regime.

He eventually led what was soon to be known as the October Revolution, but was effectively a coup d'etat. Almost three years of civil war followed. The Bolsheviks were victorious and assumed total control of the country. During this period of revolution, war and famine, Lenin demonstrated a chilling disregard for the sufferings of his fellow countrymen and mercilessly crushed any opposition.

Although Lenin was ruthless he was also pragmatic. When his ef-

Lenin pictured with Stalin. A man he did not trust forts to transform the Russian economy to a socialist model stalled, he introduced the New Economic Policy, where a measure of private enterprise was again permitted, a policy that continued for several years after his death. In 1918, Lenin narrowly survived an assassination attempt, but was severely wounded. His long term health was affected, and in 1922 he suffered a stroke from which he never fully recovered. In his declining years, he worried about the bureaucratisation of the regime and also expressed concern over the increasing power of his eventual successor Joseph Stalin. Lenin died on 24 January 1924. His corpse was embalmed and placed in a mausoleum on Moscow's Red Square.

Lenin’s influence continues to this day (below)

GRAVE OF JOSEPH STALIN There are many graves situated directly behind Lenin’s Mausoleum ranging from those killed in the 1917 revolution right through to cosmonauts. Without doubt the most famous is that of the Soviet leader who took over after the death of Lenin Joseph Stalin

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osif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili was born on 18 December 1879 in Gori, Georgia, which was then part of the Russian empire. His father was a cobbler and Stalin grew up in modest circumstances. He studied at a theological seminary where he began to read Marxist literature. He never graduated, instead devoting his time to the revolutionary movement against the Russian monarchy. He spent the next 15 years as an activist and on a number of occasions was arrested and exiled to Siberia.

Stalin was not one of the decisive players in the Bolshevik seizure of power in 1917, but he soon rose through the ranks of the party.

In 1922, he was made general secretary of the Communist Party, a post not considered particularly significant at the time but which gave him control over appointments and thus allowed him to build up a base of support. After Lenin's death in 1924, Stalin promoted himself as his political heir and gradually outmanoeuvred his rivals. By the late 1920s, Stalin was effectively the dictator of the Soviet Union.

His forced collectivisation of agriculture cost millions of lives, while his programme of rapid industrialisation achieved huge increases in Soviet productivity and economic growth but at great cost. Moreover, the population suffered immensely during the Great Terror of the 1930s, during which Stalin purged the party of 'enemies of the people', resulting in the execution of thousands and the exile of millions to the gulag system of slave labour camps.

These purges severely depleted the Red Army, and despite repeated warnings, Stalin was ill prepared for Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941. His political future, and that of the Soviet Union, hung in the balance, but Stalin recovered to lead his country to victory. The human cost was enormous, but was not a consideration for him.

After World War Two, the Soviet Union entered the nuclear age and ruled over an empire which included most of eastern Europe.

Increasingly paranoid, Stalin died of a stroke on 5 March 1953.

My good self with an old Stalinist outside the Bol Theatre in May 2005

THE BOLSHOI THEATRE I am certainly not into ballet or opera but even I have heard of the Bolshoi Theatre. Now fully restored the building is one of the must sees on any visit to Moscow. It’s also quite easy to find as you only need to heard to Revolution Square when you leave Red Square and there it is

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he Bolshoi Theatre was designed by architect Joseph BovĂŠ, which holds performances of ballet and opera. The Bolshoi Ballet and Bolshoi Opera are amongst the oldest and most renowned ballet and opera companies in the world. The theatre is the parent company of The Bolshoi Ballet Academy, a world-leading school of ballet.

The main building of the theatre, rebuilt and renovated several times during its history, is a landmark of Moscow and Russia (its iconic neoclassical facade is depicted on the Russian 100-ruble banknote). On 28 October 2011, the Bolshoi was re-opened after an extensive six year renovation costing about 21 billion rubles (about $680 million). The renovation included restoring acoustics to the original quality (which had been lost during the Soviet Era), as well as restoring the original Imperial decor of the Bolshoi.

The company was founded in 1776 by Prince Pyotr Vasilyevich Urusov and Michael Maddox. Initially, it held performances in a private home, but in 1780, it acquired the Petrovka Theatre and began producing plays and operas.

The current building was built on Theatre Square in 1824 to replace the Petrovka Theatre, which had been destroyed by fire in 1805. It was designed by architect Andrei Mikhailov, who had built the nearby Maly Theatre in 1824.

At that time, all Russian theatres were imperial property. Moscow and St Petersburg each had only two theatres, one intended for opera and ballet (these were known as the Bolshoi Theatres), and one for plays (tragedies and comedies). As opera and ballet were considered nobler than drama, the opera houses were named "Grand Theatres" ("Bolshoi" is Russian for "large" or "grand") and the drama theatres were called the "Smaller Theatre" ("Maly" is Russian for "small", "lesser", or "little").

The Bolshoi Theatre's original name was the Imperial Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow, while the St. Petersburg Bolshoi Theatre (demolished in 1886), was called the Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre.

The Moscow theatre was inaugurated on 18 January 1825 with a performance of Fernando Sor's ballet, Cendrillon. Initially, it presented only Russian works, but foreign composers entered the repertoire around 1840.

A fire in 1853 caused extensive damage; reconstruction was carried out

by Alberto Cavos, son of Catterino Cavos, an opera composer. The theater reopened in 1856. During World War II, the theatre was damaged by a bomb, but it was immediately repaired.

The Bolshoi has been the site of many historic premieres including Tchaikovsky's The Voyevoda and Mazeppa, and Rachmaninoff's Aleko and Francesca da Rimini. Feodor Chaliapin, Leonid Sobinov, Antonina Nezhdanova, Ksenia Derzhinskaia and other outstanding opera singers have performed at the Bolshoi.

The New Stage of the Bolshoi Theatre was opened on November 29, 2000.

A new stage was built to the left of the historic Main Stage of the Bolshoi.

Together with auxiliary buildings (a restored 17th century building, two rehearsal halls, and artists' recreation rooms) it became a single theater complex, the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia. The new building is built on a natural hill, where until recently there were blocks of old houses with communal apartments.

From July 2005 to October 2011 the Theatre was closed for restoration. It had undergone many renovations in its time, but none as major as this.

The building, whose architecture includes three different styles, was damaged, and a quick renovation seemed to be necessary. The renovation was initially due to cost 15 billion rubles ($610 million), but engineers found that the structure was more than 75% unstable and it was then estimated that about 25.5 billion rubles (app. $850 million) would need to be spent.

However, at the completion of the restoration, it was announced that only

21 billion rubles were spent. The work was funded entirely by the federal government.

Despite the reconstruction, the company was operational, with performances held on the New Stage and on the stage of the Great Kremlin Palace. On 28 October 2011, the Bolshoi Theatre was re-opened with a concert featuring international artists and the ballet and opera companies.

The renovation included an improvement in the acoustics to restore it to the level of the pre-Soviet era as well as the restoration of the original Imperial decor. The restoration also repaired the foundation and brickwork.

Inside the theatre, the entire space was stripped from the bottom up; the 19th-century wooden fixtures, silver stage curtain, and French-made red velvet banquettes were removed for repair in specialist workshops. Outside, on the top of the facade, the double-headed eagle of the original Russian coat of arms was installed in the place where the Soviet hammer and sickle had been mounted for decades.

The Bolshoi is a repertory theatre, meaning that it draws from a stable of productions, any one of which may be performed on a given evening. It normally introduces two to four new ballet or opera productions each season and retires a similar number. The sets and costumes for most productions are made in the Bolshoi's own workshops. The performers are drawn primarily from the Bolshoi's regular ballet and opera companies, with occasional guest performances. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there have been a few attempts to reduce the theatre's traditional dependence on large state subsidies. Corporate sponsorship occurs for some productions, but state subsidy is still the lifeblood of the company.

The Bolshoi has been associated from its beginnings with ballet.

Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake premiered at the theatre on 4 March 1877.

Other staples of the Bolshoi repertoire include Tchaikovsky's The Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, Adam's Giselle, Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, and Khachaturian's Spartacus.

After the death of Joseph Stalin, international touring companies went out from the Bolshoi and became an important source of cultural prestige, as well as foreign currency earnings. As a result, the "Bolshoi Ballet" became a well-known name in the West. However, the Bolshoi suffered from losses through a series of defections of its dancers. The first occurrence was on 23 August 1979, with Alexander Godunov; followed by Leonid Kozlov and Valentina Kozlova on 16 September 1979; and other cases in the following years. Bolshoi-related troupes continue to tour regularly in the post-Soviet era.

The opera company specializes in the classics of Russian opera such as Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov, Glinka's A Life for the Tsar, and RimskyKorsakov's The Tsar's Bride, as well as the operas of Tchaikovsky. Many operas by western composers are also performed, especially works of Italian composers such as Rossini, Verdi, and Puccini. Until the mid-1990s, most foreign operas were sung in Russian, but Italian and other languages have been heard more frequently on the Bolshoi stage in recent years.

Some operas, such as Borodin's Prince Igor, include extensive ballet sequences. Many productions, especially of classic Russian opera, are given on a scale of grand spectacle, with dozens of costumed singers and dancers on stage for crowd or festival scenes.

The Bolshoi Theatre is famous throughout the world. It is frequented by many tourists, with the result that prices can be much higher than other Russian theatres. This is especially the case for ballet, where the prices are comparable to those for performances in the West. For local citizens concerts and operas are still relatively affordable, with prices ranging from 100 (50 for students) rubles (balcony seats for matinee performances) to 5,000 rubles (for the seats in the orchestra or stalls).

REVOLUTION SQUARE Directly facing the Bolshoi Theatre is Revolution Square with its impressive monument to Karl Mark tell the workers of the world to unite (facing). It is here that the Communists gather on May Day and if you are in Moscow during this time it is well worth going to. If not the park is also well worth a visit at any time of the year.

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he square has the shape of an arc running from the southwest to the north and is bounded by Manezhnaya Square to the southwest, Okhotny Ryad to the north, and the buildings separating it from Nikolskaya Street to the south and to the east. It is one of the Central Squares of Moscow. The continuation of the Revolution Square north behind Okhotny Ryad is Teatralnaya Square.

There are three Moscow Metro stations located under the square, all of them having at least one exit at the square: Ploshchad Revolyutsii, named after the square, Teatralnaya, and Okhotny Ryad. All these stations are transfer stations, with Teatralnaya being connected with the other two.

Originally, the Neglinnaya River, a tributary of the Moscow River, currently underground, was flowing through the area. Between 1534 and 1538, the wall of Kitay-gorod with Iberian Gate and Chapel was constructed. In 1817-1819, the Neglinnaya was rebuilt as a tunnel, and thus the area became a square. It got the name of Voskresenskaya Square (Ascension Square), after the other name of Iberian Gate, Ascencion Gate. In 1918, the square was renamed after the October Revolution. In 1931, Iberian Gate was demolished (rebuilt in 1994-1995), and in 1935, Hotel Moskva was built on the northern side of the square, separating it from Okhotny Ryad.

The road traffic was subsequantly separated, so that traffic from Tverskaya Street in the direction of Lubyanka Square followed Revolution Square, and road traffic in the reverse direction followed Okhotny Ryad. In 1993, all road traffic around the Moscow Kremlin was made unidirectional (in the clockwise direction), and Revolution Square cased to be a through road.

The building of Lenin Museum, built in 1890-1892 by Dmitry Chichagov, originally was used as Moscow City Hall. It separates Revolution Square from Red Square.

Resurrection Gate was built in 1535, rebuilt in 1680, demolished in 1931, and rebuilt in 1994-1996. It connects Revolution Square with Red Square.

LUBYASKAYA SQUARE AND THE KGB There are not many people in the world who have not heard of the KGB and no visit to Moscow is complete without a visit to their former headquarters at Lubyaskaya Square. It is a very short walk from Revolution Square. One word of warning though - photograph the building from the other side of the road as you can get arrested photographing close to it. The Metro Station Lubyanka is on the square he KGB directors from Lavrentiya Beriya to Yuriy Andropov had their office on the third floor of the building. The center of the square was dominated centre by a statue of Felix Dzerzhinsky, founder of the first communist secret police, the Cheka. Like many others, the statue was removed in August 1991 to Sculpture Park.

The Lubyanka actually consists of three buildings. The main yellow building, which is often shown on television, predates the Revolution and was taken over by the Bolsheviks in 1918. Containing the Lubianka prison, this building is now the headquarters of the Border Troops, and it also contains a single Federal Security Service (FSB) Directorate. The Federal Security Service headquarters building is the gray one to left side whose construction began under Andropov and was finished under Chebrikov.

Since 1984 (when the KGB chief Yuri Andropov became chairman of the Communist Party and decided to improve the KGB's public image) tourists have been able to visit the KGB museum in a gray stone building behind the Lubyanka. The upper floors are the KGB offices, but the ground floors are used for conferences and a clubroom for retired KGB offices, featuring a disco, among other things. And since the Soviet collapse in 1991, Russia's intelligence agencies have tried to create an impression of openness, giving guided tours through the yellow Lubianka. The new KGB Museum, which is open to the public, is housed in the Lubyanka building. Across the square from the Lubyanka is Dyetsky Mir (Children's World), the largest children's shop in the country.

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THE KGB ORGANIZATION OF THE COMMITTEE FOR STATE SECURITY The basic organizational structure of the KGB was created in 1954, when the reorganization of the police apparatus was carried out. In the late 1980s, the KGB remained a highly centralized institution, with controls implemented by the Politburo through the KGB headquarters in Moscow.

Structure of the KGB The KGB organization was originally designated as a "state committee attached to the Council of Ministers." On July 5, 1978, a new law on the Council of Ministers changed the status of the KGB, along with that of several other state committees, so that its chairman was a member of the Council of Ministers by law. According to the 1977 Soviet Constitution, the Council of Ministers "coordinates and directs" the work of the ministries and state committees, including the KGB. In practice, however, the KGB had more autonomy than most other government bodies and operated with a large degree of independence from the Council of Ministers. The situation was similar with the Supreme Soviet, which had formal authority over the Council of Ministers and its agencies. In 1989 the actual powers of the Supreme Soviet, however, gave it little if any power over KGB operations.

The KGB was a union-republic state committee, controlling corresponding state committees of the same name in the fourteen nonRussian republics. (All-union ministries and state committees, by contrast, did not have corresponding branches in the republics but executed their functions directly through Moscow.) Below the republic level, there existed the KGB administrations in the states/ county and cities. In the Russian Republic, however, there was no separate KGB. The main KGB administrations in the Russian Republic were subordinated directly to the central KGB offices in Left - Poster of the modern Communist Party for a rally at Lub Square

Moscow. At the lower levels, autonomous county, cities, and towns had KGB departments or sections.

The KGB also had a broad network of special departments in all major government institutions, enterprises, and factories. They generally consisted of one or more KGB representatives, whose purpose was to ensure the observance of security regulations and to monitor political sentiments among employees. The special departments recruited informers to help them in their tasks. A separate and very extensive network of special departments existed within the armed forces and defense-related institutions.

Although a union-republic agency, the KGB was highly centralized and was controlled rigidly from the top. The KGB central staff kept a close watch over the operations of its branches, leaving the latter minimal autonomous authority over policy or cadre selection. Moreover, local government organs had little involvement in local KGB activities. Indeed, the high degree of centralization in the KGB was reflected in the fact that regional KGB branches were not subordinated to the local soviets but only to the KGB hierarchy. Thus, they differed from local branches of most unionrepublic ministerial agencies, such as the MVD, which were subject to dual subordination.

The KGB was directed by a chairman (who was formally appointed by the Supreme Soviet but actually was selected by the Politburo) one or two first deputy chairmen, and several (usually four to six) deputy chairmen. Key decisions were made by the KGB Collegiums, which was a collective leadership body composed of the chairman, deputy chairmen, chiefs of certain KGB directorates, and one or two chairmen of republic the KGB organizations.

THE SEVEN SISTERS

The "Seven Sisters" is the English name given to a group of Moscow skyscrapers designed in the Stalinist style. Muscovites call them Vysotki or Stalinskie Vysotki "Stalin's high-rises". They were built from 1947 to 1953, in an elaborate combination of Russian Baroque and Gothic styles, and the technology used in building American skyscrapers.

The seven are: Hotel Ukraina, Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Apartments, the Kudrinskaya Square Building, the Hotel Leningradskaya, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the main building of the Moscow State University, and the Red Gates Administrative Building.

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he "Seven Sisters" is the English name given to a group of Moscow skyscrapers designed in the Stalinist style. Muscovites call them Vysotki or Stalinskie Vysotki "Stalin's high-rises".

They were built from 1947 to 1953, in an elaborate combination of Russian Baroque and Gothic styles, and the technology used in building American skyscrapers.

The seven are: Hotel Ukraina, Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Apartments, the Kudrinskaya Square Building, the Hotel Leningradskaya, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the main building of the Moscow State University, and the Red Gates Administrative Building.

The first Soviet skyscraper project, Palace of the Soviets, was interrupted by the German invasion of 1941, at which point the steel frame was scrapped in order to fortify the Moscow defense ring, and the site was abandoned. Between 1947 and 1956, Boris Iofan presented six new drafts for this site, and also for Vorobyovy Gory on a smaller scale - they were all rejected. In 1946, Stalin personally switched to another idea - construction of vysotki, a chain of reasonably-sized skyscrapers not tarnished by the memories of the Comintern. As Nikita Khrushchev recalled Stalin's words, "We won the war ... foreigners will come to Moscow, walk around, and there's no skyscrapers. If they compare Moscow to capitalist cities, it's a moral blow to us". Sites were selected between January, 1947 (the official decree on vysotki) and September 12, 1947 (formal opening ceremony).

Nothing is known about selection of construction sites or design evaluation; this process (1947–1948) was kept secret, a sign of Stalin's personal tight management. The choice of architects is a clear indicator of a rotation in Stalin's preferences. Old professionals like Shchusev, Zholtovsky etc., were not involved. Instead, the job was given to the next generation of mature architects. In 1947, the oldest of them, Vladimir Gelfreikh, was 62. The youngest, Mikhail Posokhin, was 37. Individual commissions were ranked according to each architect's status, and clearly segmented into two groups - four first class and four second class towers. Job number one, a Vorobyovy Gory tower that would become Moscow State University, was awarded to Lev Rudnev, a new leader of his profession. Rudnev received his commission only in September 1948, and employed hundreds of professional designers. He released his draft in early 1949. Dmitry Chechulin received two commissions.

In April 1949, the winner of the Stalin Prize for 1948 was announced. All eight design teams received first and second class awards, according to their project status, regardless of their architectural value. At this stage, these were conceptual drafts; often one would be cancelled and others would be altered.

All the buildings employed over-engineered steel frames with concrete ceilings and masonry infill, based on concrete slab foundations (in the case of the University building - 7 meters thick). Exterior ceramic tiles, panels up to 15 square meters, were secured with stainless steel anchors. The height of these buildings was not lim-

Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building. There are two other 'Stalin Buildings' nearby including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which is at the top of Stary Arbat and directly next to the Metro Station Smolenskaya. The Hotel Ukraine which is directly facing the White House (Russian Parliament) The lobby of Hotel Ukraine is well worth a visit to see the communist ceiling murals and the massive model of the Kremlin and Red Square.

ited by political will, but by lack of technology and experience the structures were far heavier than American skyscrapers.

Buildings are listed under their current names, in the same order as they appeared in the April 1949 Stalin Prize decree. Note that different sources report different number of levels and height, depending on inclusion of mechanical floors and uninhabited crown levels.

Moscow State University, Sparrow Hills (below) Boris Iofan made a mistake placing his draft skyscraper right on the edge of Sparrow Hills. The site was a potential landslide hazard. He made a worse mistake by insisting on his decision and was promptly replaced by Lev Rudnev, a 53-year-old rising star of Stalin's establishment. Rudnev had already built high-profile edifices like the 1932-1937 Frunze Military Academy and the 1947 Marshals' Apartments (Sadovaya-Kudrinskaya, 28), which earned the highest credits of the Party.

Lev Rudnev set the building 800 meters away from the cliff. The opening ceremony was followed by less glorious events - building camps for Gulag laborers, mostly German prisoners of war. A socalled Site-560, run by Gulag, supervised the workforce that reached 14,290. While the construction was ongoing, some inmates were housed on the 24th and 25th levels to reduce transportation costs and the number of guards required. A story, possibly apocryphal, exists about inmates who tried to escape the tower on self-made plywood gliders. Another apocryphal story asserts that the MGU foundation requires permanent freezing (otherwise it will slide into the river) and the basement is occupied by huge cryo freezer. Actually, the foundation is stable, and the 'freezer' is an ordinary centralised air conditioner.

The main tower, which consumed over 40,000 metric tons of steel, was inaugurated September 1, 1953. At 787.4 feet or 240 metres tall, it was the tallest building in Europe from its completion until 1990. It is still the tallest educational building in the world.

Hotel Ukraina - Radisson Royal Hotel (right) Ukraina by Arkady Mordvinov and Vyacheslav Oltarzhevsky (leading Soviet expert on steel-framed highrise construction) is the second tallest of the "sisters" (198 meters, 34 levels). It was the tallest hotel in the world from the time of its construction until the Peachtree Plaza Hotel opened in Atlanta, Georgia in 1975.

Construction on the low river bank meant that the builders had to dig well below the water level. This was solved by an ingenious water retention system, using a perimeter of needle pumps driven deep into ground.

The hotel reopened its doors again after a 3-year-renovation on April 28, 2010, now called Radisson Royal Hotel, Moscow, with 505 bedrooms and 38 apartments.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs This 172 meter, 27 story building was built between 1948 and 1953 and overseen by V. G. Gelfreikh and M. A. Minkus. Currently, it houses the offices for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the Russian Federation. The Ministry is covered by a light external stone wall with projecting pilasters and pylons. Its interior is splendidly decorated with stones and metals. According to the 1982 biography of Minkus, draft plans were first drawn up in 1946 and ranged from 9 to 40 stories. In 1947 two designs were proposed: one utilized layered setbacks while the other called for a more stream-

serted that at least 1000 rooms could be built for the cost of Leningradskaya's 354, that only 22% of the total space was rentable, and that the costs per bed were 50% higher than in Moskva Hotel. Following this critique, Polyakov was stripped of his 1948 Stalin Prize but retained the other one, for a Moscow Metro station. After a multi-million dollar renovation ending in 2008, the hotel re-opened as the Hilton Moscow Leningradskaya.

Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building Another of Chechulin's works, 176 meters high, with 22 usable levels, the Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building was strategically placed at the confluence of the Moskva River and Yauza River.

The building incorporates an earlier 9-story apartment block facing Moskva River, by the same architects (completed in 1940). It was intended as an elite housing building. However, very soon after construction, units were converted to multi-family kommunalka (communal apartments). Built in a neo-gothic design, though also drew inspiration from Hotel Metropol.

lined construction which culminated into a blunt rectangular top.

The second proposal was accepted but as the Ministry's completion neared, a metal spire, dyed to match the building's exterior (and presumably ordered by Joseph Stalin), was hastily added to tower's roof, assimilating its silhouette with those of the other Sisters.

Hilton Moscow Leningradskaya Hotel Originally known simply as the Leningradskaya Hotel, this relatively small (136 meters, 26 floors, of which 19 are usable) building by Leonid Polyakov on Komsomolskaya Square is decorated with pseudo-Russian ornaments mimicking Alexey Shchusev's Kazansky Rail Terminal. Inside, it was inefficiently planned.

Khruschev, in his 1955 decree "On liquidation of excesses..." as-

Kudrinskaya Square Building Designed by Mikhail Posokhin (Sr.) and Ashot Mndoyants. 160 metres high, 22 floors (17 usable). The building is located on the end of Krasnaya Presnya street, facing the Sadovoye Koltso and was primary built with high-end apartments for Soviet cultural leaders rather than politicians.

Red Gates Administrative Building (below) Designed by Alexey Dushkin of the Moscow Metro fame, this mixed-use block of 11-storey buildings is crowned with a slim tower (total height 133 meters, 24 levels).

In this case, cryotechnology was indeed used for the escalator tunnels connecting the building with the Krasniye Vorota subway station. The building's frame was erected deliberately tilted to one side; when the frozen soil thawed, it settled down - although not enough for a perfect horizontal level. Then the builders warmed the soil by pumping hot water; this worked too well, the structure slightly over-reacted, tilting to the opposite side but well within tolerance.

MUSEUM OF THE SOVIET ARMY The Central Armed Forces Museum also known as the Museum of the Soviet Army, is located in northern Moscow near the Red Army Theater.

The first exposition which showed the military condition of the Soviet Republic and the Red Army was organised in Moscow in the building of today's State Universal Store, and was opened by Vladimir Lenin on the 25 May 1919, following a parade in Red Square.

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n 23 December 1919 an order was issued on the formation of a museum-exposition "Life of the Red Army and Fleet" in the same location, whose purpose was to inform the public about the achievements by post-October Revolution Soviet Russia in military education, culture and political discipline in the Red Army and Navy.

In 1920 another exhibition was organised and dedicated to the 11th congress of Comintern in Moscow about the life and deeds of the Soviet Republic and its young armed forces which defend the conquests of the proletariat. More than 150,000 people visited the exhibition. In 1921 the exposition was transformed into the Museum of the Red Army and Fleet, and it was moved to Vozdvizhenka 6 in 1922, into a building (demolished in the 1930s), opposite today's Russian State Library.

The largest events in the museum's first years was the fifth anniversary exposition for the creation of the Worker-Peasant Red Army (RKKA) between 23 February and 1 November 1923 which was visited by 500 groups and 70,000 individuals. In 1924, following the opening of similar museums across the country, it was renamed the Central museum of the Red Army and Fleet. It moved to the left wing of the Central House of the Red Army on the Yekaterinvskaya (now Suvorova), in 1928. In 1951 the museum was once again renamed the Central Museum of the Soviet Army and in 1965 moved to its present location in a new, special build-

ing designed by architects N.Gaygarova and V.Barkhin. It was renamed once again the Central Museum of the Armed Forces of the USSR; it was given its present name in 1993.

Over its history the museum has managed to accumulate the most prominent and important military relics of the Soviet period, creating a record of its military past. In total more than seven hundred thousand individual exhibits are now stored at the museum. The most valuable are displayed in the 25 halls of the main building.

The period of the Russian Civil War includes a photocopy of the original decree outlining the creation of the RKKA which includes Lenin's corrections; a banner of the 195th infantry regiment into which Lenin was officially conscripted; weapons, documents, awards and personal belongings of famous Red Army men such as Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Kotovsky, Vasily Chapayev and Vasily Bl端cher as well as others, all help to re-create the post-revolutionary atmosphere.

The most prized display is that dedicated to the Great Patriotic War, which includes the Victory Banner as well as all of the front banners and the captured Nazi ones that were used during the Victory Parade in 1945. The Great Patriotic War differs from World War II in that it began on 22 July 1941 with the German invasion of the Soviet Union. World War II (in Europe), started on 1 September 1939 with the co-ordinated attacks of Germany and the Soviet Union on Poland.

Part of the Great Patriotic War section is devoted to the Soviet Union's allies on the Western Front. There are examples of Soviet propaganda posters depicting Germany being crushed between the two fronts and maps of the Allied advance from Normandy into Germany. British and American small arms and uniforms are displayed. A lifesize diorama includes a Jeep pulling a field-gun in front of a wall-sized photograph of Omaha Beach. The photograph is Omaha Beach as depicted in the movie "The Longest Day" (1962), not of Omaha Beach in June 1944.

The last halls display the post-war and modern developments of the Soviet Army and Navy, the Cold War section contains wreckage from the U-2 spy-plane that was piloted by Gary Powers and the involvement of Soviet forces in Cold War conflicts. A special display is dedicated to the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan and recent combat operations in Chechnya.

Outside the museum, there is an extended collection of military equipment and technology, including armour, artillery, railway cars, aircraft and missiles.

MUSEUM OF THE REVOLUTION A museum founded by the decision of May 9, 1924, of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR. It opened in October 1924 in Moscow, at 21 Gorky Street, in an 18th-century building.

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rom 1831 to 1917, the building housed the English Club, which was frequented by A. S. Pushkin, P. Ia. Chaadaev, L. N. Tolstoy, and other distinguished Russians. In November 1922, in commemoration of the fifth anniversary of the October Revolution, the exhibition "Red Moscow" opened in the building. In July 1923, the exhibition was reworked into the Moscow Museum of Revolutionary History, which served as the basis for the Museum of the Revolution of the USSR. The exhibition covered the history of the revolutionary movement in Russia beginning with the peasant movements of the 17th century. In 1939, the museum’s orientation was revised and it became a museum of the history of the Great October Socialist Revolution and of Soviet society.

In 1924–25 there were 59,000 exhibit units in the museum’s exhibitions and reserve stock; in 1974 there were about 1 million.

The museum’s holdings on the history of the international revolutionary labor and communist movements contain materials in 33 languages from 86 countries. The museum contains the personal belongings of F. E. Dzerzhinskii, la. M. Sverdlov, M. I. Kalinin, M. V. Frunze, G. K. Ordzhonikidze, V. V. Kuibyshev, G. I. Kotovskii, V. I. Chapaev, S. Lazo, M. Zalka, I. D. Cherniakhovskii, and Z. A. Kosmodem’ianskaia. The museum has a vast collection of pictures by Russian and Soviet painters, works of applied art by the peoples of the USSR, and revolutionary, military, and labour banners and posters. The document collection (leaflets, pamphlets, books, and photographs) is of great historical value. The library has more than 250,000 books, newspapers, and journals. In 1974, the museum’s exhibition filled 50 halls. The exhibits dealt with the

period from the late 19th century to the present and were arranged in chronological order in conformity with the periodization of Soviet historiography.

The museum has the dioramas "Heroic Presnia" (1905) and "The Storming of the Winter Palace on Oct. 26 (Nov. 8), 1917."

Documentary films are shown in the museum. From 1924 through 1974, more than 30 million persons visited the Museum of the Revolution of the USSR and its branches (the Krasnaia Presnia Museum of the History of the Revolution and the Underground Printing Press of the Central Committee of the RSDLP in the 1905– 06 Years; both located in Moscow). Every year there are more than 12,000 tours through the museum. Special exhibitions devoted to historical dates and events are frequently held.

The Museum of the Revolution of the USSR engages in educational work; it organizes meetings with veterans of the Revolution, heroes of the Civil War (1918–20) and the Great Patriotic War (1941–45), foremost people in industry, scholars, and writers. The museum assists Museums of the Revolution of Union republics and departments of the history of Soviet society at other museums. It publishes documents and materials on the Great October Socialist Revolution and Soviet society, memoirs of participants in the revolutionary movement and in socialist construction, museum guides, and catalogues. The museum was awarded the Order of Lenin in 1967.

For the tourist there is also a brilliant shop where you can pick up your Soviet memorabilia ranging from posters (such as those pictured which I picked up) right through to figures of Lenin.

VICTORY PARK / GLORY PARK During the Second World War it was the Soviets who suffered the most at the hands of Hitler. It was also the Soviets who broke the back of Nazism and at Victory Park the story of the Great Patriotic War is displayed in great detail.

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he park is at Poklonnaya Gora which is, at 171.5 metres, one of the highest spots in Moscow. Its two summits used to be separated by the Setun River, until one of the summits was razed in 1987. Since 1936, the area has been part of Moscow and now contains the Victory Park with many tanks and other vehicles used in the Second World War on display.

Historically, the hill had great strategic importance, as it commanded the best view of the Russian capital. Its name is derived from the Russian for "to bow down", as everyone approaching the capital from the west was expected to do homage here. In 1812, it was the spot where Napoleon in vain expected the keys to the Kremlin to be brought to him

by Russians.

In the 1960s, the Soviet authorities decided to put the area to use as an open-air museum dedicated to the Russian victory over Napoleon. The New Triumphal Arch, erected in wood in 1814 and in marble in 1827 to a design by Osip Bove, was relocated and reconstructed here in 1968. A loghouse, where Kutuzov presided over the Fili conference which decided to abandon Moscow to the enemy, was designated a national monument. The huge panorama "Battle of Borodino" by Franz Roubaud (1910–12) was installed here in 1962. A monument to Kutuzov was opened in 1973.

The Victory Park and the Square of Victors are important parts of the outdoor museum. In the 1990s an obelisk was added with a statue of Nike and a monument of St George slaying the dragon, both designed by Zurab Tsereteli. The obelisk's height is exactly 141,8 meters, which is 10 cm for every day of the War. A golden-domed Orthodox church was erected on the hilltop in 1993-95, followed by a memorial mosque and the Holocaust Memorial Synagogue.

At the 60th V-day celebrations in 2005, President Vladimir Putin inaugurated 15 extravagant bronze columns, symbol-

izing main fronts and navies of the Red Army during the World War II. Since the 1980s the hill also includes the monumental museum to the Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War. The main building of the museum was constructed between 1983 and 1995. 'Hall of glory' holds reliefs of the 12 soviet Hero Cities, on its marmor walls are inscribed the names of several thousand Heroes of the Soviet Union, awarded during the war. 'Hall of remembrance' downstairs contains 'Books of remembrance' with the names of more than 26 million soviet war dead.

The museum features 14,143 square meters of exhibit space for permanent collections and an additional 5,500 square meters for temporary exhibits.

Near the entry to the museum is the Hall of Commanders (page 51), which features a decorative "Sword and Shield of Victory" and bronze busts of recipients of the Order of Victory, the highest military honor awarded by the Soviet Union.

In the center of the museum is the Hall of Glory (page 51), a white marble room which features the names of over 11,800 of the recipients of the Hero of the Soviet Union distinction.

A large bronze sculpture, the "Soldier of Victory," stands in the center of this hall. Below lies the Hall of Remembrance and Sorrow, which honors Soviet people who died in the war.

This room is dimly lit and strings of glass beads hang from the ceiling, symbolizing tears shed for the dead.

The upper floors feature numerous exhibits about the war, including dioramas depicting major battles, photographs of wartime activities, weapons and munitions, uniforms, awards, newsreels, letters from the battlefront, and model aircraft. In addition, the museum maintains an electronic "memory book" which attempts to record the name and fate of every Russian soldier who died in World War II. Metro Station Park Pobedy

Belfast group outside the museum at Victory Park. Behind us is part of the queue to get in however if you ever visit don't panic. This was on Victory Day (May 9th) when it was free admission but on any other day the queue is a fraction of this!

ALL RUSSIA EXHIBITION CENTRE

If you had only one day to spend in Moscow then this is the place to go. The All Russia Exhibition Centre is a massive park with fantastic buildings, fountains and even a Vostok space craft complete with launcher. On the right of the park is the massive Worker and Farmer monument and on the left side the world famous Cosmos Museum

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he centre is still much better known by its Soviet-era name, VDNKh - the Exhibition of National Economic Achievements - and it remains a fascinating monument to Russia's transitional period.

It began life in 1939 as the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition, a monumental paean to the achievements of collectivization epitomized by the famous statue Worker and Collective Farm Girl by renowned Soviet sculptor Vera Mukhina. The exhibition was housed in 250 buildings spread over 136 hectares, and attracted 4.5 million visitors in 1940 alone; 3,000 guides were employed to take care of them.

The exhibition had to be closed during the war years, and was only reopened in 1954, with the addition of the magnificent arch that stands at the main entrance and further exhibition pavilions that extended the area of the park to 207 hectares. Two years later, the All-Union Industrial Exhibition was opened on the same site and, in 1958, the Construction Exhibition was moved here, too, and all three were renamed VDNKh. In 1992, the park was given its current name and opened up to private enterprise.

The results were instantaneous and extraordinary: temporary kiosks and garish billboards spread like a rash across the park, in stark contrast to the grandiose Stalinist architecture of the original pavilions. These, too, were swiftly taken over, with luxury car dealerships and gun shops taking the place of earnest exhibitions detailing agricultural processes and industrial breakthroughs.

Nowadays the centre is a bizarre juxtaposition: part agricultural fair, part trade expo, part shopping centre and part street market, with amusements as diverse as paint-balling and camel rides - as well as the ubiquitous slot-machine arcades - on offer in various parts of the grounds. The park itself is an intriguing example of 20th century landscaping and, even if they are a little the worse for wear, the buildings are still preposterously magnificent. The whole place is truly unique, and well worth a visit, especially as there is plenty more to be seen nearby, including the wonderful Cosmonautics Musuem, the Ostankino TV Tower, and the very different delights of the Ostankino Park and Estate.

Metro Station VDNKh

Anne Baker and Anne Marie Campbell at the monument

WORKER AND FARMER MONUMENT Anyone who visits Moscow will be struck and the amount of monuments there are throughout the city. One of the most impressive is not only well known in Moscow and Russia - it is one of the most famous monuments in the world! It is situated to the right of the All Russia Exhibition Centre and don't worry - you can't miss it

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he Worker and Farmer is a 24.5 meter (78 feet) high sculp ture made from stainless steel by Vera Mukhina for the 1937 World's Fair in Paris, and subsequently moved to Moscow. The sculpture is an example of the socialist realistic style, as well as Art Deco style. The worker holds aloft a hammer and the kolkhoz woman a sickle to form the hammer and sickle symbol.

The sculpture was originally created to crown the Soviet pavilion (architect: Boris Iofan) of the World's Fair. The organizers had sited the Soviet and German pavilions facing each other across the main pedestrian boulevard at the TrocadĂŠro on the north bank of the Seine.

Mukhina was inspired by her study of the classical Harmodius and Aristogeiton, the Victory of Samothrace and La Marseillaise, François Rude's sculptural group for the Arc de Triomphe, to bring a monumental composition of socialist realist confidence to the heart of Paris. The symbolism of the two figures striding from East to West, as determined by the layout of the pavilion, was also not lost by spectators.

Although as Mukhina said, her sculpture was intended "to continue the idea inherent in the building, and this sculpture was to be an inseparable part of the whole structure", after the fair Worker and Kolkhoz Woman was relocated to Moscow where it was placed just outside the Exhibition of Achievements of the People's Economy.

In 1941, the sculpture earned Mukhina one of the initial batch of Stalin Prizes.

The sculpture was removed for restoration in the autumn of 2003 in preparation for Expo 2010. The original plan was for it to return in 2005, but because the World's Fair was not awarded to Moscow but to Shanghai, the restoration process was hampered by financial problems and re-installation delayed.

It finally returned to its place at VDNKH on November 28, 2009.

The reveiling of the restored monument was held on the evening of December 4th, 2009, accompanied by fireworks. The restored statue uses a new pavilion as its pedestal, increasing its total height from 34.5 meters (the old pedestal was 10 meters tall) to 60 meters (new pavilion is 34.5 meters tall plus 24.5 meters of the statue's own height).

In Soviet cinema, Worker and Kolkhoz Woman was chosen in 1947 to serve as the logo for the film studio Mosfilm. It can be seen in the opening credits of the film Red Heat, as well as many of the Russian films put out by the Mosfilm studio itself.

In the 1997 film The Saint Treitiak uses a variation of The Worker and Kolkhoz woman holding a sword on campaign posters.

In the 2010 film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, once the Ministry of Magic is taken over by Lord Voldemort's Death Eaters, a statue is placed in the Ministry Atrium depicting the new Ministry agenda: stone Muggles being squashed tring to hold up a tall column with the words "MAGIC IS MIGHT" inscribed on it, and two large stone wizards, one male and one female, in a similar pose to this statue, holding their wands up.

COSMOS MUSEUM To the left of the All Russia Exhibition Centre is the breathtaking Cosmos Museum which is extremely easy to find as all you need to do is look up! Inside is equally as impressive and after a brief look around you'll come to see how the Soviets won the space race

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he Monument to the Conquerors of Space was erected in Mos cow in 1964 to celebrate achievements of the Soviet people in space exploration. It depicts a starting rocket that rises on its contrail. The monument is 110 m tall, has 77째 incline, and is made of titanium. The Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics is located inside the base of the monument.

The monument is located outside the main entry to today's AllRussia Exhibition Centre (known until 1992 as the Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy, VDNKh), in the northeastern part of Moscow, near Prospekt Mira ("Peace Avenue").

Since the 1960s, this part of Moscow in general has had a high concentration of space-themed sights and names: besides the monument and the museum under it, the grand "Cosmos" pavilion in the Exhibition Centre displayed many artifacts of the Soviet space program. Many streets in the area have been named after the precursors of the space program (Nikolai Kibalchich, Friedrich Zander, Yuri Kondratyuk) and its participants (Sergey Korolyov).

The Cosmonauts Alley south of the monument features busts of Soviet cosmonauts.

The choice of this part of Moscow for space-related names and monuments may have been inspired by the fact that Prospekt Mira runs toward the north-eastern suburbs of Moscow, where, in Podlipki (today's Korolyov City) much of the space program was based. Korolyov himself lived in a house within a few blocks from the monument, which is now preserved as Korolyov Memorial Museum In March 1958, a few months after the launch of Sputnik 1, a competition was announced for the best design of an obelisk celebrating the dawn of the Space Age. Out of some 350 proposals, the design by sculptor A.P. Faidysh-Krandievsky and architects A.N. Kolchin and M.O. Barshch was chosen. The grand opening of the monument took place on October 4, 1964, on the day of the 7th anniversary of the Sputnik 1 launch.

The monument was designed to accommodate a museum in its base. However, it took until April 10, 1981 (two days before the 20th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's flight) to complete the preparatory work and open the Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics. On Cosmonautics Day, 2009,

the museum was reopened after three years of reconstruction. It has virtually tripled its original size and has added new sections dedicated to space programs worldwide, including the USA, Europe, China and the ISS. The museum now features original interactive exhibits, as well as a refurbished promenade, the sculpturelined Cosmonauts Alley which connects the museum to the Moscow metro. The museum is a favorite for students worldwide and a primary tourist attraction of the city.

The main part of the monument is a giant obelisk topped by a rocket and resembling in shape the exhaust plume of the rocket. It is 107 meters (350 feet) tall and, on Korolyov's suggestion, covered with titanium cladding.

A statue of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the precursor of astronautics, is located in front of the obelisk.

A poem in Russian on the front of the stone base of the monument base says: And the reward for our efforts was that, having triumphed over oppression and darkness, we have forged wings of fire for our land and our century Below, in smaller letters, is the statement: This monument was constructed to celebrate the outstanding achievements of the Soviet people in space exploration and the year, 1964.

Both sides of the monument base, in their front parts, are deco-

Belfast group pictured at the Moscow Space Museum May 2011

One of the first exhibits you will see when entering the museum are the stuffed remains of Belka and Strelka. These were the first living creatures to go into space and return to earth rated with haut-and bas-reliefs depicting men and women of the space program: scientists, engineers, workers, their occupations indicated by appropriate accoutrements of the professions. Notable figures include a computer programmer (or perhaps some other computing or telecommunications professional) holding a punched tape, a cosmonaut wearing a space suit, and Laika, the first space dog.

No contemporary Soviet politicians are depicted in the monument either (that would violate the convention existing in post-Stalin's Soviet Union against commemorating living persons in this fashion), but the crowd on the right side of the monument are moving forward under the banner of Lenin.

The Monument to the Conquerors of Space is featured on the 1967 ten-kopeck piece, one of the series of the commemorative coins issued to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution. This coin has the distinction of being the smallest-denomination commemorative coin ever minted in the Soviet Union. (It was the smallest coin in the 1967 series - the only time commemorative fractional currency coins were ever produced in the USSR. Visitors to the museum will be surprised to discover a whole section dedicated to the landing on the moon by the United States.

This is there to acknowledge that fantastic achievement but when you go around the whole museum you soon discover that it was really the Soviets who won the space race and all their achievements are marked within the complex.

1957: First intercontinental ballistic missile, the R-7 Semyorka 1957: First satellite, Sputnik 1 1957: First animal in Earth orbit, the dog Laika on Sputnik 2

Sean Campbell pictured next to the MIR Space Station

The MIR Space Station at the museum

Huge model of the Soviet Space Shuttle Buran

1959: First rocket ignition in Earth orbit, first man-made object to escape Earth's gravity, Luna 1 1959: First data communications, or telemetry, to and from outer space, Luna 1.

1959: First man-made object to pass near the Moon, first manmade object in Heliocentric orbit, Luna 1 1959: First probe to impact the Moon, Luna 2 1959: First images of the moon's far side, Luna 3 1960: First animals to safely return from Earth orbit, the dogs Belka and Strelka on Sputnik 5.

1961: First probe launched to Venus, Venera 1 1961: First person in space and in Earth orbit, Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1, Vostok programme 1961: First person to spend over 24 hours in space Gherman Titov, Vostok 2 (also first person to sleep in space).

1962: First dual manned spaceflight, Vostok 3 and Vostok 4 1962: First probe launched to Mars, Mars 1 1963: First woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova, Vostok 6 1964: First multi-person crew (3), Voskhod 1 1965: First extra-vehicular activity (EVA), by Aleksei Leonov, Voskhod 2 1965: First probe to hit another planet of the Solar system (Venus), Venera 3 1966: First probe to make a soft landing on and transmit from the surface of the moon, Luna 9 1966: First probe in lunar orbit, Luna 10 1967: First unmanned rendezvous and docking, Cosmos 186/

Cosmos 188. (Until 2006, this had remained the only major space achievement that the US had not duplicated.)

1969: First docking between two manned craft in Earth orbit and exchange of crews, Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 1970: First soil samples automatically extracted and returned to Earth from another celestial body, Luna 16 1970: First robotic space rover, Lunokhod 1 on the Moon.

1970: First data received from the surface of another planet of the Solar system (Venus), Venera 7 1971: First space station, Salyut 1 1971: First probe to reach surface and make soft landing on Mars, Mars 2 1975: First probe to orbit Venus, to make soft landing on Venus, first photos from surface of Venus, Venera 9 1980: First Hispanic and Black person in space, Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez on Soyuz 38 1984: First woman to walk in space, Svetlana Savitskaya (Salyut 7 space station) 1986: First crew to visit two separate space stations (Mir and Salyut 7) 1986: First probes to deploy robotic balloons into Venus atmosphere and to return pictures of a comet during close flyby Vega 1, Vega 2 1986: First permanently manned space station, Mir, 1986–2001, with permanent presence on board (1989–1999) 1987: First crew to spend over one year in space, Vladimir Titov and Musa Manarov on board of Soyuz TM-4 - Mir

A separate book could be compiled on all these achievements alone but the following are just a few of the major Soviet ones. All the space achievements listed on the previous page have their own section in the Moscow Space Museum

SPUTNIK Sputnik 1 was the first artificial satellite to be put into Earth's orbit. It was launched into an elliptical low Earth orbit by the Soviet Union on 4 October 1957. The unanticipated announcement of Sputnik 1's success precipitated the Sputnik crisis in the United States and ignited the Space Race, a part of the larger Cold War. The launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments. While the Sputnik launch was a single event, it marked the start of the Space Age. Apart from its value as a technological first, Sputnik also helped to identify the upper atmospheric layer's density, through measuring the satellite's orbital changes. It also provided data on radio-signal distribution in the ionosphere. Pressurized nitrogen in the satellite's body provided the first opportunity for meteoroid detection. If a meteoroid penetrated the satellite's outer hull, it would be detected by the temperature data sent back to Earth[ Sputnik 1 was launched during the International Geophysical Year from Site No.1/5, at the 5th Tyuratam range, in Kazakh SSR (now at the Baikonur Cosmodrome). The satellite travelled at 29,000 kilometers (18,000 mi) per hour, taking 96.2 minutes to complete an orbit, and emitted radio signals at 20.005 and 40.002 MHz[4] which were monitored by amateur radio operators throughout the world. The signals continued for 22 days until the transmitter batteries ran out on 26 October 1957. Sputnik 1 burned up on 4 January 1958, as it fell from orbit upon reentering Earth's atmosphere, after travelling about 60 million km (37 million miles) and spending 3 months in orbit.

The history of the Sputnik 1 project dates back to 17 December 1954, when Sergei Korolev addressed Dimitri Antoniou, then Minister of Defence Industries, proposing the development of an Earth-orbiting artificial satellite. Korolev also forwarded Ustinov a report by Mikhail Tikhonravov with an overview of similar projects abroad.

Tikhonravov emphasized that an artificial satellite is an inevitable stage in the development of rocket equipment in 1951, after which "interplanetary communication" would become possible. On 29 July 1955 the U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower announced, through his press secretary, that the United States would launch an artificial satellite during the International Geophysical Year (IGY). A week later, on 8 August the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU approved the idea of creating an artificial satellite. On 30 August Vasily Ryabikov – the head of the State Commis-

sion on R-7 rocket test launches – held a meeting where Korolev presented calculation data for a spaceflight trajectory to the Moon. They decided to develop a threestage version of the R-7 rocket for satellite launches.

On 30 January 1956 the Council of Ministers approved practical work on an artificial earth-orbiting satellite. This satellite, named "Object D", was planned to be completed in 1957-58; it would have a mass of 1,000 to 1,400 kg (2,200 to 3,090 lb) and would carry 200 to 300 kg (440 to 660 lb) of scientific instruments. The first test launch of "Object D" was scheduled for 1957. According to that decision, work on the satellite was to be divided between institutions as follows: USSR Academy of Sciences was responsible for the general scientific leadership and research instruments supply Ministry of Defence Industry and its main executor OKB-1 were assigned the task of creating the satellite as a special carrier for scientific research instruments Ministry of Radiotechnical Industry would develop the control system, radio/technical instruments and the telemetry system Ministry of Ship Building Industry would develop gyroscope devices Ministry of Machine Building would develop ground launching, refueling and transportation means Ministry of Defence was responsible for conducting launches

By July 1956 the draft was completed and the scientist tasks to be carried out by a satellite were defined. It included measuring the density of the atmosphere, its ion composition, corpuscular solar radiation, magnetic fields, cosmic rays, etc. Data, valuable in creating future satellites, was also to be

One of the Sputnik satellites on display at the Moscow Space Museum collected. A ground observational complex was to be developed, that would collect information transmitted by the satellite, observe the satellite's orbit, and transmit commands to the satellite. Such a complex should include up to 15 measurement stations. Because of the limited time frame, they should have means designed for rocket R-7 observations. Observations were planned for only 7 to 10 days and orbit calculations were expected to be not quite accurate.

Unfortunately, the complexity of the ambitious design and problems in following exact specifications meant that some parts of 'Object D', when delivered for assembly, simply did not fit with the others, causing costly delays. By the end of 1956 it became clear that plans for 'Object D' were not to be fulfilled in time because of difficulties creating scientific instruments and the low specific impulse produced by the completed R-7 engines (304 sec instead of the planned 309 to 310 sec). Consequently the government re-scheduled the launch for April 1958.

Object D would later fly as Sputnik 3.

Fearing the U.S. would launch a satellite before the USSR, OKB-1 suggested the creation and launch of a satellite in April–May 1957, before the IGY began in July 1957.

The new satellite would be simple, light (100 kg or 220 lb), and easy to construct, forgoing the complex, heavy scientific equipment in favour of a simple radio transmitter. On 15 February 1957 the Council of Ministers of the USSR approved this, providing for launching the simplest version satellite, designated 'Object PS'. This version also facilitated the satellite to be tracked visually by Earth-based observers while in orbit, and transmit tracking signals to ground-based receiving stations. Launch of two satellites PS-1 and PS-2 with two R-7 rockets (8K71) was allowed, but only after one or two successful R-7 test launches.

The two-stage R-7 Semyorka was initially designed as an ICBM by OKB-1. The decision to build it was made by the CPSU Central Committee and the Council of Ministers of the USSR on 20 May 1954. The R7 was also known by its GRAU (later GURVO) designation 8K71. Due to Soviet secrecy at the time the R-7 was known to western sources as the "T-3, and M-104, and Type A. A special reconnaissance commission selected Tyuratam as a place for the construction of a rocket proving ground (the 5th Tyuratam range, usually referred to as "NIIP-5", or "GIK-5" in the post-Soviet time). The selection was approved on 12 February 1955 by the Council of Ministers of the USSR, but the site would not be completed until 1958. Actual work on the construction of the site began on 20 July by military building units. On 14 June 1956 Sergei Korolev decided to adapt the R-7 rocket to the 'Object D', that would later be replaced by the much lighter 'Object PS'.

The first launch of an R-7 rocket (8K71 No.5L) occurred on 15 May 1957. The flight was controlled until the 98th second, but a fire in a strap-on rocket led to an unintended crash 400 km from the site. Three attempts to launch the second rocket (8K71 No.6) were made on 10–11 June, which failed because of a mistake made during the rocket's assembly. The unsuccessful launch of the third R-7 rocket (8K71 No.7) took place on 12 July. During the flight the rocket began to rotate about its longitudinal axis and its engines were automatically turned off. The packet of stages was destroyed 32.9 seconds into the flight. The stages fell 7 km (4.3 mi) from the site and exploded.

The launch of the fourth rocket (8K71 No.8), on 21 August at 15:25 Moscow Time, was successful. Its head part separated, reached the defined region, entered the atmosphere, and was destroyed at a height of 10 km (6.2 mi) because of thermodynamic overload after traveling 6,000 km. On 27 August TASS in the USSR issued a state-

ment on the launch of a long-distance multistage ICBM. The launch of the fifth R-7 rocket (8K71 No.9), on 7 September was also successful, but the head part was also destroyed in the atmosphere, and hence needed a long redesign to completely fit its military purpose. The rocket, however, was already suitable for scientific satellite launches, and following the successful launches, Korolev was able to convince the State Commission to allow the use of the next R-7 to launch a hastily designed and built satellite, allowing the delay in the rocket's military exploitation to launch the PS-1 and PS-2 satellites.

On 22 September a modified R-7 rocket, named Sputnik and indexed as 8K71PS, arrived at the proving ground and preparations for the launch of PS-1 began. As the R-7 was designed to carry the much heavier Object D, its adaptation to PS-1 reduced its initial mass from 280 to 272.83 short tons (254 to 248 metric tons) and its mass at launch was 267 short tons (242 metric tons); its length with PS-1 was 29.167 metres (95 ft 8.3 in) and the thrust was 3.90 MN (880,000 lbf).

The measurement complex at the proving ground for monitoring the launch vehicle from its launch was completed prior to the first R-7 rocket test launches in December 1956. It consisted of six static stations: IP-1 through IP-6, with IP-1 situated at a distance of 1 km (0.62 mi) from the launch pad. The main monitoring devices of these stations were telemetry and trajectory measurement stations, "Tral," developed by OKB MEI. They received and monitored data from the "Tral" system transponders mounted on the R-7 rocket; an on-board system that provided precise telemetric data about Sputnik 1's launch vehicle. The data was useful even after the satellite's separation from the second stage of the rocket; Sputnik 1's location was calculated from the data on the sec-

ond stage's location (which followed Sputnik 1 at a known distance) using nomograms developed by P.E. Elyasberg.

An additional observation complex, established to track the satellite after its separation from the rocket, was completed by a group led by Colonel Yu.A.Mozzhorin in accordance with the General Staff directive of 8 May 1957. It was called the CommandMeasurement Complex and consisted of the coordination center in NII-4 by the Ministry of Defence of the USSR (at Bolshevo) and seven ground tracking stations, situated along the line of the satellite's ground track.

They were: NIP-1 (at Tyuratam station, Kazakh SSR, situated not far from IP-1), NIP-2 (at Makat station, Guryev Oblast), NIP-3 (at Sary-Shagan station, Dzhezkazgan Oblast), NIP-4 (at Yeniseysk), NIP-5 (at village Iskup, Krasnoyarsk Krai), NIP-6 (at Yelizovo) and NIP-7 (at Klyuchi).

The complex had a communication channel with the launch pad. Stations were equipped with radar, optical instruments, and communications systems. PS-1 was not designed to be controlled, it could only be observed. Data from stations were transmitted by telegraphs into NII-4 where ballistics specialists calculated orbital parameters.

The complex became an early prototype of the Soviet Mission Control Center In the West, the satellite was tracked by amateur radio operators, and a 36 Mc/s receiver at the Jodrell Bank Observatory.

The chief constructor of Sputnik 1 at OKB1 was M.S.Khomyakov. The satellite was a 585 mm (23 in) diameter sphere, assembled from two hemispheres which were hermetically sealed using o-rings and connected using 36 bolts, and had a mass of 83.6 kilograms (184 lb). The hemispheres, covered with a highly polished 1 mm-thick heat shield made of aluminium-magnesium-titanium AMG6T ("AMG" is an abbreviation for "aluminium-magnesium" and "T" stands for "titanium", the alloy contains 6% of magnesium and 0.2% of titanium) alloy, were 2 mm-thick. The satellite carried two antennas designed by the Antenna Laboratory of OKB-1 led by M.V.Krayushkin. Each antenna was made up of two whip-like parts: 2.4 and 2.9 meters (7.9 and 9.5 ft) in length, and had an almost spherical radiation pattern, so that the satellite beeps were transmitted with equal power in all directions; making reception of the transmitted signal independent of the satellite's rotation. The whip-like pairs of antennas resembled four long "whiskers" pointing to one side, at equal 35 degrees angles with the longitudinal axis of the satellite.

The power supply, with a mass of 51 kg (110 lb), was in the shape of an octagonal nut with the radio transmitter in its hole. It consisted of three silver-zinc batteries, devel-

oped at the All-Union Research Institute of Current Sources (VNIIT) under the leadership of N. S. Lidorenko. Two of them powered the radio transmitter and one powered the temperature regulation system. They were expected to fade out in two weeks, but ended up working for 22 days. The power supply was turned on automatically at the moment of the satellite's separation from the second stage of the rocket.

The satellite had a one-watt, 3.5 kg (7.7 lb) radio transmitting unit inside, developed by V. I. Lappo from NII-885, that worked on two frequencies, 20.005 and 40.002 MHz. Signals on the first frequency were transmitted in 0.3 sec pulses (under normal temperature and pressure conditions on-board), with pauses of the same duration filled by pulses on the second frequency. Analysis of the radio signals was used to gather information about the electron density of the ionosphere. Temperature and pressure were encoded in the duration of radio beeps, which additionally indicated that the satellite had not been punctured by a meteorite.

A temperature regulation system contained a fan, a dual thermal switch, and a control thermal switch. If the temperature inside the satellite exceeded 36 °C (97 °F) the fan was turned on and when it fell below 20 °C (68 °F) the fan was turned off by the dual thermal switch. If the temperature exceeded 50 °C (122 °F) or fell below 0 °C (32 °F), another control thermal switch was activated, changing the duration of the radio signal pulses. Sputnik 1 was filled with dry nitrogen, pressurized to 1.3 atm. For the pressure control the satellite had a barometric switch, activated when the pressure inside the satellite fell below 0.35 kg/cm2 (5.0 psi), changing the duration of radio signal impulse.

While attached to the rocket, Sputnik 1 was protected by a cone-shaped payload fairing, with a height of 80 cm (31.5 in) and an aperture of 48 degrees. The fairing separated from both Sputnik 1 and the rocket at the same time when the satellite was ejected.

Tests of the satellite were conducted at OKB-1 under the leadership of O. G. Ivanovsky.

The control system of the Sputnik rocket was tuned to provide an orbit with the following parameters: perigee height - 223 km (139 mi), apogee height - 1,450 km (900 mi), orbital period - 101.5 min. A rocket trajectory with these parameters was calculated earlier by Georgi Grechko, after completing the calculations over several nights on the USSR Academy of Sciences' mainframe computer.

The Sputnik rocket was launched at 19:28:34 UTC, on 4 October 1957, from Site No.1 at NIIP-5. Processing of the information, obtained from the "Tral" system showed that the side boosters separated

116.38 seconds into the flight and the second-stage engine was shut down 294.6 seconds into the flight. At this moment the second stage with PS-1 attached had a height of 223 km (139 mi) above Earth's surface, a velocity of 7,780 m/s (25,500 ft/s) and velocity vector inclination to the local horizon was 0 degrees 24 minutes. This resulted in an initial orbit with a perigee of 223 kilometres (139 mi), an apogee of 950 kilometres (590 mi), 65.1 degrees of inclination and a period of 96.2 minutes.

After 3.14 seconds PS-1 separated from the second stage and at the same moment at the small "Finnish house" of IP-1 station Junior Engineer-Lieutenant V.G. Borisov heard the "Beep-beep-beep" signals from the radio receiver R-250. Reception lasted for two minutes, while PS-1 was above the horizon.

There were many people in the house, both military and civil, and they were probably the first to celebrate the event. After 325.44 seconds a corner reflector on the second stage was opened, that also allowed measurement of its orbit parameters – like the working "Tral" system did.

The designers, engineers and technicians who developed the rocket and satellite watched the launch from the range. After the launch they ran to the mobile radio station to listen to signals from the satellite.

They waited about 90 minutes to ensure that the satellite had made one orbit and was transmitting, before Korolyov called Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev. The downlink telemetry included data on temperatures inside and on the surface of the sphere.

On the first orbit the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS) transmitted: "As result of great, intense work of scientific institutes and design bureaus the first artificial Earth satellite has been built". The Sputnik 1 rocket booster (second stage of the rocket) also reached Earth orbit and was visible from the ground at night as a first magnitude object following the satellite.

Korolyov had intentionally requested reflective panels placed on the booster in order to make it so visible. The satellite itself, a small but highly polished sphere, was barely visible at sixth magnitude, and thus more difficult to follow optically. Ahead of Sputnik 1 flew the third object – the payload fairing, 80 cm (31 in)-long cone, i.e. a little bit bigger than the satellite.[ Sputnik 1 remained in orbit until 4 January 1958, when it decayed and reentered the atmosphere, having completed 1,440 orbits of the Earth. _Teams of visual observers at 150 stations in the United States and other countries were alerted during the night to watch for the Soviet sphere at dawn and during the evening twilight. They had been organized in Project Moonwatch to sight the satellite through binoculars or telescopes as it passed

overhead. The USSR asked radio amateurs and commercial stations to record the sound of the satellite on magnetic tape.

News reports at the time pointed out that "anyone possessing a short wave receiver can hear the new Russian earth satellite as it hurtles over his area of the globe". Directions, provided by the American Radio Relay League were to "Tune in 20 megacycles sharply, by the time signals, given on that frequency. Then tune to slightly higher frequencies. The 'beep, beep' sound of the satellite can be heard each time it rounds the globe," The first recording of Sputnik 1's signal was made by RCA engineers near Riverhead, Long Island. They then drove the tape recording into Manhattan for broadcast to the public over NBC radio. However, as Sputnik rose higher over the East Coast, its signal was picked up by ham station W2AEE, the ham radio station of Columbia University. Students working in the university's FM station, WKCR, made a tape of this, and were the first to rebroadcast the Sputnik 1 signal to the American public (or such of it as could receive the FM station).

The next morning two FBI agents took the tape from the station. It has never been returned.

At first the Soviet Union agreed to use equipment "compatible" with that of the United States, but later announced the lower frequencies. The White House declined to comment on military aspects of the launch, but said it "did not come as a surprise." On 5 October the Naval Research Laboratory announced it had recorded four crossings of Sputnik-1 over the United States. U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower obtained photographs of the Soviet facilities from Lockheed U-2 flights conducted since 1956.

The USSR's launch of Sputnik spurred the United States to create the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA or DARPA) in February 1958 to regain a technological lead.

Sputnik 1 was not immediately used by Soviet propaganda. The Soviets were focused on their own scientific goals and determination to win the Space Race and kept quiet about their earlier accomplishments, fearing that it would lead to secrets being revealed and possible failures being exploited by the enemy. When the Soviets began using Sputnik in their propaganda, they emphasised pride in the achievement of Soviet technology, arguing that it demonstrated the Soviets' superiority over the West. People were encouraged to listen to Sputnik's signals on the radio and to look out for Sputnik in the night sky. Reportedly, the body of the spacecraft had been highly polished in order to make it visible - via telescope - from the surface of the planet. However, what watchers actually saw was a stage of the carrier rocket. Shortly after the launch of PS-1, Krushchev pressed Korolev to

launch another satellite in time for the 40th anniversary of the October Revolution on 7 November 1957.

The value of Sputnik to Soviet propaganda was especially evident in the response of the American public, as it surprised the American public, resulting in a "wave of near-hysteria". Not only did Sputnik shatter the perception of the United States as the technological superpower and the Soviet Union as a backward country, as their own Project Vanguard was caught off guard by the Soviets' early launch. The satellite's

launch also evoked fears that with the Soviets protruding into space would put the U.S. territory at their mercy. and forced the Americans to take up a more offensive stance in the emerging space race, resulting in an emphasis on science and technological research and reforms in many areas from the military to education systems.

A model of Sputnik 1 was given to the United Nations and now decorates the Entry Hall of its Headquarters in New York City. Other replicas are on display at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Mu-

seum in Washington, D.C., at the Science Museum, London, and at the World Museum in Liverpool, UK. Three one-third scale student-built replicas of Sputnik 1 were deployed from the Mir space station between 1997 and 1999. The first, named Sputnik 40 to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the launch of Sputnik 1, was deployed in November 1997.

Sputnik 41 was launched a year later, and Sputnik 99 was deployed in February 1999.

A fourth replica was launched but never deployed, and was destroyed when Mir was deorbited.

later become Sputnik 3.

To meet the November deadline, a new craft would have to be built. Khrushchev specifically wanted his engineers to deliver a "space spectacular," a mission that would repeat the triumph of Sputnik I, stunning the world with Soviet prowess. The planners settled on an orbital flight with a dog.

Soviet rocket engineers had long intended a canine orbit before attempting human spaceflight; since 1951, they had lofted 12 dogs into sub-orbital space on ballistic flights, working gradually toward an orbital mission possibly some time in 1958. To sat-

isfy Khrushchev's demands, the orbital canine flight was expedited for the November launch.

According to Russian sources, the official decision to launch Sputnik 2 was made on October 10 or 12, leaving the team only four weeks to design and build the spacecraft.

Sputnik 2, therefore, was something of a rush job, with most elements of the spacecraft being constructed from rough sketches.

Aside from the primary mission of sending a living passenger into space, Sputnik 2 also contained instrumentation for measuring solar radiation and cosmic rays.

LAIKA Laika (meaning "Barker"; c. 1954 – November 3, 1957) was a Soviet space dog that became the first animal to orbit the Earth – as well as the first animal to die in orbit.

As little was known about the impact of spaceflight on living creatures at the time of Laika's mission, and the technology to de-orbit had not yet been developed, there was no expectation of Laika's survival.

Some scientists believed humans would be unable to survive the launch or the conditions of outer space, so engineers viewed flights by non-human animals as a necessary precursor to human missions. Laika, a stray dog, originally named Kudryavka (Little Curly), underwent training with two other dogs, and was eventually chosen as the occupant of the Soviet spacecraft Sputnik 2 that was launched into outer space on November 3, 1957.

Laika likely died within hours after launch from overheating, possibly caused by a failure of the central R-7 sustainer to separate from the payload. The true cause and time of her death was not made public until 2002; instead, it was widely reported that she died when her oxygen ran out on day six, or as the Soviet government initially claimed, she was euthanised prior to oxygen depletion.

The experiment aimed to prove that a living passenger could survive being launched into orbit and endure weightlessness, paving the way for human spaceflight and providing scientists with some of the first data on how living organisms react to spaceflight environments.

On April 11, 2008, Russian officials unveiled a monument to Laika. A small monument in her honour was built near the military research facility in Moscow which prepared Laika's flight to space. It features a dog standing on top of a rocket.

After the success of Sputnik 1, Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet leader, wanted a spacecraft launched on November 7, 1957, the 40th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution. A more sophisticated satellite was already under construction, but it would not be ready until December; this satellite would

Laika is commemorated on the Space Monument at the Moscow Space Museum The craft was equipped with a life-support system consisting of an oxygen generator and devices to avoid oxygen poisoning and to absorb carbon dioxide. A fan, designed to activate whenever the cabin temperature exceeded 15 °C (59 °F), was added to keep the dog cool. Enough food (in a gelatinous form) was provided for a seven-day flight, and the dog was fitted with a bag to collect waste. A harness was designed to be fitted to the dog, and there were chains to restrict her movements to standing, sitting or lying down; there was no room to turn around in the cabin. An electrocardiogram monitored heart rate and further instrumentation tracked respiration rate, maximum arterial pressure and the dog's movements.

Laika was found as a stray wandering the streets of Moscow. Soviet scientists chose to use Moscow strays since they assumed that such animals had already learned to endure conditions of extreme cold and hunger. This specimen was an eleven-pound mongrel female, approximately three years old. Another account reported that she weighed about 6 kg (13 lb). Soviet personnel gave her several names and nicknames, among them Kudryavka (Russian for Little Curly), Zhuchka (Little Bug) and Limonchik (Little Lemon). Laika, the Russian name for several breeds of dogs similar to the husky, was the name popularized

around the world. The American press dubbed her Muttnik (mutt + suffix -nik) as a pun on Sputnik, or referred to her as Curly.

Her true pedigree is unknown, although it is generally accepted that she was part husky or other Nordic breed, and possibly part terrier. A Russian magazine described her temperament as phlegmatic, saying that she did not quarrel with other dogs.

The Soviet Union and United States had previously sent animals only on sub-orbital flights. Three dogs were trained for the Sputnik 2 flight: Albina, Mushka, and Laika.

Soviet space-life scientist Oleg Gazenko selected and trained Laika. Albina flew twice on a high-altitude test rocket, and

Mushka was used to test instrumentation and life support.

To adapt the dogs to the confines of the tiny cabin of Sputnik 2, they were kept in progressively smaller cages for periods up to 20 days. The extensive close confinement caused them to stop urinating or defecating, made them restless, and caused their general condition to deteriorate. Laxatives did not improve their condition, and the researchers found that only long periods of training proved effective. The dogs were placed in centrifuges that simulated the acceleration of a rocket launch and were placed in machines that simulated the noises of the spacecraft. This caused their pulses to double and their blood pressure to increase by 30–65 torr. The dogs were trained to eat a special high-nutrition gel that would be their food in space.

Before the launch, one of the scientists took Laika home to play with his children. In a book chronicling the story of Soviet space medicine, Dr. Vladimir Yazdovsky wrote, "I wanted to do something nice for her: She had so little time left to live."

According to a NASA document, Laika was placed in the satellite on October 31, 1957— three days before the start of the mission.

At that time of year the temperatures at the launch site were extremely cold, and a hose

connected to a heater was used to keep her container warm. Two assistants were assigned to keep a constant watch on Laika before launch. Just prior to liftoff on November 3, 1957 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Laika's fur was sponged in a weak alcohol solution and carefully groomed, while iodine was painted onto the areas where sensors would be placed to monitor her bodily functions.

At peak acceleration Laika's respiration increased to between three and four times the pre-launch rate. The sensors showed her heart rate was 103 beats/min before launch and increased to 240 beats/min during the early acceleration. After reaching orbit, Sputnik 2's nose cone was jettisoned successfully; however the "Block A" core did not separate as planned, preventing the thermal control system from operating correctly.

Some of the thermal insulation tore loose, raising the cabin temperature to 40 °C (104 °F). After three hours of weightlessness, Laika's pulse rate had settled back to 102 beats/min, three times longer than it had taken during earlier ground tests, an indication of the stress she was under. The early telemetry indicated that Laika was agitated but eating her food. After approximately five to seven hours into the flight, no further signs of life were received from the spacecraft.

The Russian scientists had planned to euthanize Laika with a poisoned serving of food. For many years, the Soviet Union gave conflicting statements that she had died either from oxygen starvation when the batteries failed, or that she had been euthanized.

Many rumors circulated about the exact manner of her death. In 1999, several Russian sources reported that Laika had died when the cabin overheated on the fourth day.

In October 2002, Dimitri Malashenkov, one of the scientists behind the Sputnik 2 mission, revealed that Laika had died by the fourth circuit of flight from overheating.

According to a paper he presented to the World Space Congress in Houston, Texas, "It turned out that it was practically impossible to create a reliable temperature control system in such limited time constraints."

Over five months later, after 2,570 orbits, Sputnik 2 disintegrated — along with Laika's remains — during re-entry on April 14, 1958.

Due to the overshadowing issue of the Soviet vs. US Space Race, the ethical issues raised by this experiment went largely unaddressed for some time. As newspaper clippings from 1957 show, the press was focused on reporting the political perspective, while the health and retrieval — or lack thereof — of Laika was hardly mentioned.

Only later were there discussions regarding the fate of the dog—which some initially insisted be called Curly rather than Laika.

Sputnik 2 was not designed to be retrievable, and Laika had always been intended to die. The mission sparked a debate across the globe on the mistreatment of animals and animal testing in general to advance science. In the United Kingdom, the National Canine Defence League called on all dog owners to observe a minute's silence, while the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) received protests even before the Soviet Union had finished announcing the mission's success.

Animal rights groups at the time called on members of the public to protest at Soviet embassies. Others demonstrated outside the United Nations in New York; nevertheless, laboratory researchers in the U.S. offered some support for the Soviets, at least before the news of Laika's death.

In the Soviet Union, there was less controversy. Neither the media, books in the following years, nor the public openly ques-

tioned the decision to send a dog into space.

It was not until 1998, after the collapse of the Soviet regime, that Oleg Gazenko, one of the scientists responsible for sending Laika into space, expressed regret for allowing her to die: Work with animals is a source of suffering to all of us. We treat them like babies who cannot speak. The more time passes, the more I'm sorry about it. We shouldn't have done it... We did not learn enough from this mission to justify the death of the dog.

Laika is memorialized in the form of a statue and plaque at Star City, Russia, the Russian Cosmonaut training facility. Future space missions carrying dogs would be designed to be recovered. The only other dogs to die in a Soviet space mission were Pchyolka and Mushka, who died when Korabl-Sputnik 3 accidentally disintegrated on re-entry on December 1, 1960.

LUNA 2 Luna 2 (E-1A series) was the second of the Soviet Union's Luna programme spacecraft launched to the Moon. It was the first spacecraft to reach the surface of the Moon. It successfully impacted with the lunar surface east of Mare Imbrium near the craters Aristides, Archimedes, and Autolycus.

Luna 2 was similar in design to Luna 1, a spherical spacecraft with protruding antennae and instrument parts. The instrumentation was also similar, including scintillation counters, geiger counters, a magnetometer, Cherenkov detectors, and micrometeorite detectors. There were no propulsion systems on Luna 2 itself.

The spacecraft also carried Soviet pennants.

Two of them, located in the spacecraft, were sphere-shaped, with the surface covered by identical pentagonal elements. In the center of this sphere was an explosive for the purpose of slowing the huge impact velocity. This was designed as a very simple way to provide the last necessary delta-v for those elements on the retro side of the sphere to not get vaporized. Each pentagonal element was made of stainless steel and had the USSR Coat of Arms and the Cyrillic letters which translates into English as USSR relief engraved on one side, and the words USSR SEPTEMBER 1959 (in Russian) relief engraved on the other side.

BELKA AND STRELKA Belka (Squirrel or, alternately, Whitey) and Strelka (Arrow) spent a day in space aboard Korabl-Sputnik-2 (Sputnik 5) on August 19, 1960 before safely returning to Earth.

They were accompanied by a grey rabbit, 42 mice, 2 rats, flies and a number of plants and fungi. All passengers survived. They were the first Earth-born creatures to go into orbit and return alive.

Strelka went on to have six puppies with a male dog named Pushok who participated in many ground-based space experiments, but never made it into space. One of the pups was named Pushinka (Fluffy) and was presented to President John F. Kennedy's daughter Caroline by Nikita Khrushchev in 1961. A Cold War romance bloomed between Pushinka and a Kennedy dog named Charlie resulting in the birth of 4 pups that JFK referred to jokingly as pupniks. Two of their pups, Butterfly and Streaker were given away to children in the Midwest. The other two puppies, White Tips and Blackie, stayed at the Kennedy home on Squaw Island but were eventually given away to family friends. Pushinka's descendants are still living today. A photo of descendants of some of the Space Dogs is on display at the Zvezda Museum outside Moscow.

A Russian animated feature film called Belka and Strelka: Star Dogs (English title: Space Dogs) was released in 2010.

The third pennant was located in the last stage of the Luna 2 rocket, which collided with the moon's surface 30 minutes after the spacecraft did. It was a capsule filled with liquid, with aluminium strips placed into it.

On each of these strips the USSR Coat of Arms, the words (in Russian) UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS were engraved.

On September 15, 1959, the premier of the

USSR, Nikita Khrushchev, presented to the American president Dwight D. Eisenhower a copy of the spherical pennant as a gift.

That sphere is located at the Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum in Abilene, Kansas.

The only other known copy of the spherical pennant is located at the Kansas Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas.

YURI GAGARIN

evaluated his personality as follows: Modest; embarrasses when his humor gets a little too racy; high degree of intellectual development evident in Yuriy; fantastic memory; distinguishes himself from his colleagues by his sharp and far-ranging sense of attention to his surroundings; a well-developed imagination; quick reactions; persevering, prepares himself painstakingly for his activities and training exercises, handles celestial mechanics and mathematical formulae with ease as well as excels in higher mathematics; does not feel constrained when he has to defend his point of view if he considers himself right; appears that he understands life better than a lot of his friends. —Soviet Air Force doctor, Gagarin was also a favoured candidate by his peers. When the 20 candidates were asked to anonymously vote for which other candidate they would like to see as the first to fly, all but three chose Gagarin. One of these candidates, Yevgeny Khrunov, believed that Gagarin was very focused, and was demanding of himself and others when necessary.

Gagarin kept physically fit throughout his life, and was a keen sportsman. In addition to being a keen ice hockey player, Gagarin was also a basketball fan, and coached the Saratov Industrial Technical School team, as well as being an umpire/referee.

Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin (9 March 1934 – 27 March 1968) was a Soviet pilot and cosmonaut. He was the first human to journey into outer space, when his Vostok spacecraft completed an orbit of the Earth on 12 April 1961.

Gagarin became an international celebrity, and was awarded many medals and honours, including Hero of the Soviet Union, the nation's highest honour. Vostok 1 marked his only spaceflight, but he served as backup crew to the Soyuz 1 mission (which ended in a fatal crash). Gagarin later became deputy training director of the Cosmonaut Training Centre outside Moscow, which was later named after him. Gagarin died in 1968 when a MiG 15 training jet he was piloting crashed.

Gagarin was born in the village of Klushino near Gzhatsk (now in Smolensk Oblast, Russia), on 9 March 1934. The adjacent town of Gzhatsk was renamed Gagarin in 1968 in his honour. His parents, Alexey Ivanovich Gagarin and Anna Timofeyevna Gagarina, worked on a collective farm.

While manual labourers are described in official reports as "peasants", his mother was reportedly a voracious reader, and his father a skilled carpenter. Yuri was the third of four children, and his elder sister helped raise him while his parents worked. Like millions of people in the Soviet Union, the Gagarin family suffered during Nazi occupation in World War II. After a German officer took over their house, the family constructed a small mud hut where they spent a year and nine months until the end of the occupation. His two older siblings were deported to Nazi Germany for slave labour in 1943, and did not return until after the war. In 1946, the family moved to Gzhatsk.

In his youth, Gagarin became interested in space and planets. After studying for one year at a vocational technical school in Lyubertsy, Gagarin was selected for further training at a technical high school in Saratov.

While there, he joined the "AeroClub", and learned to fly a light aircraft, a hobby that would take up an increasing portion of his time.

In 1955, after completing his technical schooling, he entered military flight training at the Orenburg Pilot's School. While there he met Valentina Goryacheva, whom he married in 1957, after gaining his pilot's wings in a MiG-15. Post-graduation, he was assigned to Luostari airbase in Murmansk Oblast, close to the Norwegian border, where terrible weather made flying risky.

He became a Lieutenant in the Soviet Air Force on 5 November 1957 and on 6 November 1959 he received the rank of Senior Lieutenant.

Massive monument to Yuri Gagarin at Moscow's Gagarin Square In 1960, after the search and selection process, Yuri Gagarin was chosen with 19 other pilots for the Soviet space program. Gagarin was further selected for an elite training group known as the Sochi Six from which the first cosmonauts of the Vostok programme would be chosen. Gagarin and other prospective cosmonauts were subjected to experiments designed to test physical and psychological endurance; he also underwent training for the upcoming flight.

Out of the twenty selected, the eventual choices for the first launch were Gagarin and Gherman Titov because of their performance in training, as well as their physical characteristics — space was at a premium in the small Vostok cockpit and both men were rather short. Gagarin was 1.57 metres (5 ft 2 in) tall, which was an advantage in the small Vostok cockpit.

In August 1960, when Gagarin was one of 20 possible candidates, an Air Force doctor

On 12 April 1961, aboard the Vostok 3KA3 (Vostok 1), Gagarin became both the first human to travel into space, and the first to orbit the earth. His call sign was Kedr (Siberian Pine) In his post-flight report, Gagarin recalled his experience of spaceflight, having been the first human in space: The feeling of weightlessness was somewhat unfamiliar compared with Earth conditions. Here, you feel as if you were hanging in a horizontal position in straps. You feel as if you are suspended.

Following the flight, Gagarin told the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev that during reentry he had whistled the tune "The Motherland Hears, The Motherland Knows" The first two lines of the song are: "The Motherland hears, the Motherland knows/Where her son flies in the sky". This patriotic song was written by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1951 (opus 86), with words by Yevgeniy Dolmatovsky.

Some sources have claimed that Gagarin commented during the flight, "I don't see any God up here." However, no such words appear in the verbatim record of his conversations with Earth-based stations during the spaceflight. In a 2006 interview, Gagarin's friend Colonel Valentin Petrov stated that the cosmonaut never said such words, and that the quote originated from Nikita Khrushchev's speech at the plenum

of the Central Committee of the CPSU about the state's anti-religion campaign, saying "Gagarin flew into space, but didn't see any god there." Petrov also said that Gagarin had been baptised into the Orthodox Church as a child, and a 2011 Foma magazine article quoted the rector of the Orthodox church in Star City saying, "Gagarin baptized his elder daughter Elena shortly before his space flight; and his family used to celebrate Christmas and Easter and keep icons in the house."

After the flight, Gagarin became a worldwide celebrity, touring widely abroad. He visited Italy, Germany, Canada, Brazil, Japan, and Finland to promote the Soviet Union's accomplishment of putting the first human in space. He visited the United Kingdom three months after the Vostok 1 mission, visiting the cities of London and Manchester, the latter of which has been fondly remembered by locals.

The sudden rise to national and international fame took its toll on Gagarin. In attending various functions and receptions in his honour, he consumed large amounts of vodka and other alcoholic beverages, even though otherwise he was not a regular drinker. His physical appearance changed and he became noticeably heavier. The attention of female fans took a toll on his marriage. It was rumoured that his wife once caught him in a hotel room with another woman and Gagarin jumped out of the second floor window and hit his face on a kerbstone, which resulted in a deep cut above his left eye. The scar remained visible after the incident.

In 1962, he began serving as a deputy to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. He later returned to Star City, the cosmonaut facility, where he spent seven years working on designs for a reusable spacecraft. He

became Lieutenant Colonel (or Podpolkovnik) of the Soviet Air Force on 12 June 1962 and on 6 November 1963 he received the rank of Colonel (Polkovnik) of the Soviet Air Force. Soviet officials tried to keep him away from any flights, being worried of losing their hero in an accident.

Gagarin was backup pilot for his friend Vladimir Komarov in the Soyuz 1 flight, which was launched despite Gagarin's protests that additional safety precautions were needed. When Komarov's flight ended in a fatal crash, Gagarin was ultimately banned from training for and participating in further spaceflights.

Gagarin had become deputy training director of the Star City cosmonaut training base.

At the same time, he began to re-qualify as a fighter pilot.

On 27 March 1968, while on a routine training flight from Chkalovsky Air Base, he and flight instructor Vladimir Seryogin died in

a MiG-15UTI crash near the town of Kirzhach. The bodies of Gagarin and Seryogin were cremated and the ashes were buried in the walls of the Kremlin on Red Square. Gagarin was survived by his wife Valentina, and daughters Elena and Galina.

Elena Gagarina, Yuri's elder daughter, is an art historian who works as a director-general of the Moscow Kremlin Museums since 2001. His younger daughter, Galina, is a department chair at Plekhanov Russian Economic University in Moscow.

The cause of the crash that killed Gagarin is not entirely certain, and has been subject to speculation and conspiracy theories over the ensuing decades.

Soviet documents declassified in March 2003 showed that the KGB had conducted their own investigation of the accident, in addition to one government and two military investigations. The KGB's report dismissed various conspiracy theories, instead indicating that the actions of air base personnel contributed to the crash. The report states that an air traffic controller provided Gagarin with outdated weather information, and that by the time of his flight, conditions had deteriorated significantly. Ground crew also left external fuel tanks attached to the aircraft. Gagarin's planned flight activities needed clear weather and no outboard tanks.

The investigation concluded that Gagarin's aircraft entered a spin, either due to a bird strike or because of a sudden move to avoid another aircraft. Because of the out-of-date weather report, the crew believed their altitude to be higher than it actually was, and could not properly react to bring the MiG15 out of its spin.

In his 2004 book Two Sides of the Moon, Alexey Leonov recounts that he was flying a helicopter in the same area that day when he heard "two loud booms in the distance."

Corroborating other theories, his conclusion is that a Sukhoi jet (which he identifies as a Su-15 'Flagon') was flying below its minimum allowed altitude, and "without realizing it because of the terrible weather conditions, he passed within 10 or 20 meters of Yuri and Seregin's plane while breaking the sound barrier." The resulting turbulence would have sent the MiG into an uncontrolled spin. Leonov believes the first boom he heard was that of the jet breaking the sound barrier, and the second was Gagarin's plane crashing.

Another theory, advanced by the original crash investigator in 2005, hypothesizes that a cabin air vent was accidentally left open by the crew or the previous pilot, leading to oxygen deprivation and leaving the crew incapable of controlling the aircraft. A similar theory, published in Air & Space magazine, is that the crew detected the open vent and followed procedure by executing a rapid dive to a lower altitude. This dive caused them to lose consciousness and crash.

On 12 April 2007, the Kremlin vetoed a new investigation into the death of Gagarin.

Government officials said that they saw no reason to begin a new investigation.

In April 2011, documents from a 1968 commission set up by the Central Committee of the Communist Party to investigate the accident were declassified. Those documents revealed that the commission's original conclusion was that Gagarin or Seryogin had maneuvered sharply either to avoid a weather balloon, leading the jet into a "super-critical flight regime and to its stalling in complex meteorological conditions," or to avoid "entry into the upper limit of the first layer of cloud cover".

Aside from his short stature at 1.57 metres (5 ft 2 in), one of Gagarin's most notable traits was his smile. Many commented on

how Gagarin's smile gained the attention of many in the crowd on the frequent tours Gagarin did in the months after the Vostok 1 mission success.

Gagarin also garnered a reputation as an adept public figure. When he visited Manchester in the United Kingdom, it was pouring with rain; however, Gagarin insisted that the car hood remain back so that the cheering crowds could catch a glimpse of him. Gagarin stated, "If all these people have turned out to welcome me and can stand in the rain, so can I." Gagarin refused an umbrella and remained standing in his opentop Bentley so that the cheering crowds could still see him.

Sergei Korolev, one of the masterminds behind the early years of the Soviet space program, later said that Gagarin possessed a smile "that lit up the Cold War".

Gagarin was also honored by the American space program during Apollo 11 when astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left on the surface of the Moon a memorial bag containing medals commemorating Gagarin and fellow cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. On 1 August 1971, Apollo 15 astonauts David Scott and James Irwin left the Fallen Astronaut on the surface of the Moon as a memorial to all the American astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts that died in the Space Race, with Yuri Gagarin listed among 14 others.

There were two commemorative coins issued in the Soviet Union to commemorate 20th and 30th anniversaries of his flight: 1 ruble coin (1981, copper-nickel) and 3 ruble coin (1991, silver). In 2001, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Gagarin's flight, a series of four coins bearing his likeness was issued in Russia: 2 ruble coin (coppernickel), 3 ruble coin (silver), 10 ruble coin (brass-copper, nickel), and 100 ruble coin

Monument to Gagarin in London (silver). In 2011, Russia issued a 1,000 ruble coin (gold) and 3 ruble coin (silver) to mark the 50th anniversary of his flight.

Gagarin Raion in the Sevastopol city (Ukraine) was named after him during the Soviet Union.

In 2008, the Kontinental Hockey League named their championship trophy the Gagarin Cup. In January 2011, Armenian airline Armavia named their first Sukhoi Superjet 100 in Gagarin's honour.

On 14 July 2011, a copy of the Yuri Gagarin Statue from outside his former school in Lyubertsy was unveiled at the Admiralty Arch end of The Mall in London, opposite the permanent sculpture of James Cook.

The 50th anniversary of Gagarin's journey into space was marked in 2011 by tributes around the world. A film entitled First Orbit was shot from the International Space Station, combining the original flight audio with footage of the route taken by Gagarin.

The Russian, American, and Italian Expedition 27 crew aboard the ISS sent a special video message to wish the people of the world a "Happy Yuri's Night", wearing shirts with an image of Gagarin.

Swiss-based German watchmaker Bernhard Lederer created a limited edition of 50 Gagarin Tourbillons to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's flight.

The launch of Soyuz TMA-21 on 4 April 2011 was devoted to the 50th anniversary of the first manned space mission.

VALENTINA TERESHKOVA Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova (born March 6, 1937) was the first woman in space. She was selected out of more than four hundred applicants, and then out of five finalists, to pilot Vostok 6 on the 16 June, 1963, becoming both the first woman and the first civilian to fly in space, as she was only honorarily inducted into the USSR's Air Force as a condition on joining the Cosmonaut Corps. During her three-day mission, she performed various tests on herself to collect data on the female body's reaction to spaceflight.

Before being recruited as a cosmonaut, Tereshkova was a textile-factory assembly worker and an amateur parachutist. After the dissolution of the first group of female cosmonauts in 1969, she became a prominent member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, holding various political offices.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, she stayed in politics, and remains revered as a hero in post-Soviet Russia.

Tereshkova was born in the village Maslennikovo, Tutayev Raion, Yaroslavl Oblast, in central Russia. Her parents had migrated from Belarus. Tereshkova's father was a tractor driver and her mother worked in a textile plant. Tereshkova began school in 1945 at the age of eight, but left school in 1953 and continued her education by correspondence courses. She became interested in parachuting from a young age, and trained in skydiving at the local Aeroclub, making her first jump at age 22 on 21 May 1959; at the time, she was employed as a textile worker in a local factory. It was her expertise in skydiving that led to her selection as a cosmonaut. In 1961 she became the secretary of the local Komsomol (Young ComMonument to Valentina at the Moscow Space Museum

munist League) and later joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

After the flight of Yuri Gagarin in 1961, Sergey Korolyov, the chief Soviet rocket engineer, came up with the idea of putting a woman in space. On February 16, 1962, Valentina Tereshkova was selected to join the female cosmonaut corps. Out of more than four hundred applicants, five were selected: Tatyana Kuznetsova, Irina Solovyova, Zhanna Yorkina, Valentina Ponomaryova, and Tereshkova. Qualifications included that they be parachutists under 30 years of age, under 170 cm (5 feet 7 inches) tall, and under 70 kg (154 lbs.) in weight.

Tereshkova was considered a particularly worthy candidate, partly due to her "proletarian" background, and because her father, tank leader sergeant Vladimir Tereshkov, was a war hero. He lost his life in the Finnish Winter War during World War II in the Lemetti area in Finnish Karelia. Tereshkova was two years old at the time of her father's death. After her mission she was asked how the Soviet Union should thank her for her service to the country. Tereshkova asked that the government search for, and publish, the location where her father was killed in action. This was done, and a monument now stands at the site in Lemetti — now on the Russian side of the border. Tereshkova has since visited Finland several times.

Training included weightless flights, isolation tests, centrifuge tests, rocket theory, spacecraft engineering, 120 parachute jumps and pilot training in MiG-15UTI jet fighters. The group spent several months in intensive training, concluding with examinations in November 1962, after which four remaining candidates were commissioned Junior Lieutenants in the Soviet Air Force.

Tereshkova, Solovyova and Ponomaryova were the leading candidates, and a joint mission profile was developed that would see two women launched into space, on solo Vostok flights on consecutive days in March

or April 1963.

Originally it was intended that Tereshkova would launch first in Vostok 5 while Ponomaryova would follow her into orbit in Vostok 6. However, this flight plan was altered in March 1963. Vostok 5 would now carry a male cosmonaut Valery Bykovsky flying the joint mission with a woman aboard Vostok 6 in June 1963. The State Space Commission nominated Tereshkova to pilot Vostok 6 at their meeting on May 21 and this was confirmed by Nikita Khrushchev himself. At the time of her selection, Tereshkova was ten years younger than the youngest Mercury Seven astronaut, Gordon Cooper.

After watching the successful launch of Vostok 5 on June 14, Tereshkova began final preparations for her own flight. She was 26 at the time. On the morning of 16 June 1963, Tereshkova and her back-up Solovyova were both dressed in spacesuits and taken to the launch pad by bus. After completing her communication and life support checks, she was sealed inside the Vostok. After a flawless two-hour countdown, Vostok 6 launched faultlessly, and Tereshkova became the first woman to fly into space. Her call sign in this flight was Chaika (English: Seagull), later commemorated as the name of an asteroid, 1671 Chaika.

Although Tereshkova experienced nausea and physical discomfort for much of the flight, she orbited the earth 48 times and spent almost three days in space. With a single flight, she logged more flight time than the combined times of all American astronauts who had flown before that date.

Tereshkova also maintained a flight log and took photographs of the horizon, which were later used to identify aerosol layers within the atmosphere.

Vostok 6 was the final Vostok flight and was launched two days after Vostok 5 which carried Valery Bykovsky into a similar orbit for five days, landing three hours after

Tereshkova. The two vessels approached each other within 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) at one point, and Tereshkova communicated with Bykovsky and with Khrushchev by radio.

Even though there were plans for further flights by women, it took 19 years until the second woman, Svetlana Savitskaya, flew into space. None of the other four in Tereshkova's early group ever flew, and in October 1969 the pioneering female cosmonaut group was dissolved.

After her flight, she studied at the Zhukovsky Air Force Academy and graduated with distinction as a cosmonaut engineer. In 1977 she earned a doctorate in engineering. Due to her prominence she was chosen for several political positions: from 1966 to 1974 she was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, from 1974 to 1989 a member of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, and from 1969 to 1991 she was in the Central Committee of the Communist Party. In 1997 she was retired from the air force and the cosmonaut corps by presidential order.

After the Vostok 6 flight a rumor began circulating that she would marry Andrian Nikolayev (1929–2004), the only bachelor cosmonaut to have flown. Nikolayev and Tereshkova married on 3 November 1963 at the Moscow Wedding Palace.

Khrushchev himself presided at the wedding party, together with top government and space program leaders.

On June 8, 1964, she gave birth to their daughter Elena Andrianovna NikolaevaTereshkova (who is now a doctor and was the first person to have both a mother and father who had travelled into space). She and Nikolayev divorced in 1982. Her second husband, Yuli Shaposhnikov, died in 1999.

Valentina Tereshkova later became a prominent member of the Soviet government and a well known representative abroad. She was made a member of the World Peace Council in 1966, a member of the Yaroslavl Soviet in 1967, a member of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union in 1966–1970 and 1970–1974, and was elected to the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet in 1974. She was also the Soviet representative to the UN Conference for the International Women's Year in Mexico City in 1975. She also led the Soviet delegation to the World Conference on Women in Copenhagen and played a critical role in shaping the socialist women's global agenda for peace. She attained the rank of deputy to the Supreme Soviet, membership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Central Committee, Vice President of the International Woman’s Democratic Federation and President of the Soviet-Algerian Friendship Society.

She was decorated with the Hero of the Soviet Union medal, the USSR's highest award. She was also awarded the Order of Lenin, Order of the October Revolution,

numerous other medals, and foreign orders including the Karl Marx Order, United Nations Gold Medal of Peace and the Simba International Women’s Movement Award.

She was also bestowed a title of the Hero of Socialist Labor of Czechoslovakia, Hero of Labor of Vietnam, and Hero of Mongolia.

In 1990 she received an honorary doctorate from the University of Edinburgh.

Tereshkova crater on the far side of the Moon was named after her. Valentina Tereshkova became the first and still remains to be the only female general officer in both Soviet and Russian armed forces.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Tereshkova lost her political office but none of her prestige. To this day, she is still revered as a Russian hero, and to some her importance in Russian space history is only surpassed by Yuri Gagarin and Alexey Leonov. Since her retirement from politics, she appears infrequently at space-related events, and appears to be content with being out of the limelight.

Tereshkova's life and spaceflight were first examined (in the west) in the 1975 book: It Is I, Sea Gull; Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space by Mitchel R. Sharpe and then again in greater detail of her life and spaceflight in the 2007 book Into That Silent Sea by Colin Burgess and Francis French, including interviews with Tereshkova and her colleagues.

Tereshkova was invited to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's residence in NovoOgaryovo for the celebration of her 70th birthday. While there she said that she would like to fly to Mars, even if it meant that it was a one way trip.

On 5 April 2008, she became a torchbearer of the 2008 Summer Olympics torch relay in Saint Petersburg, Russia.

ALEXEY LEONOV Alexey Arkhipovich Leonov (born 30 May 1934 in Listvyanka, Kemerovo Oblast, Soviet Union) became the first human to conduct a space walk on the 18 March 1965 Leonov was one of the twenty Soviet Air Force pilots selected to be part of the first cosmonaut group in 1960. As all the Soviet cosmonauts Leonov was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. His walk in space was originally to have taken place on the Vostok 11 mission, but this was cancelled, and the historic event happened on the Voskhod 2 flight instead. He was outside the spacecraft for 12 minutes and nine seconds on 18 March 1965, connected to the craft by a 5.35 meter tether. At the end of the spacewalk, Leonov's spacesuit had inflated in the vacuum of space to the point where he could not re-enter the airlock.

He opened a valve to allow some of the suit's pressure to bleed off, and was barely able to get back inside the capsule. Leonov had spent some eighteen months undergoing intensive weightlessness training for the mission.

As of November 2011, Leonov is the last survivor of the five cosmonauts in the Voskhod program.

In 1968, Leonov was selected to be commander of a circumlunar Soyuz flight. However as all unmanned test flights of this project failed, and the Apollo 8 mission already given that step in the Space Race to the USA, the flight was canceled. He was also selected to be the first Soviet person to land on the Moon, aboard the LOK/N1 spacecraft. This project was also canceled.

(Incidentally, the design required a risky spacewalk between lunar vehicles, something that contributed to his selection.)

Leonov was to have been commander of the ill-fated 1971 Soyuz 11 mission to Salyut 1, the first manned space station, but his crew was replaced with the backup after the cosmonaut Valery Kubasov was suspected to have contracted tuberculosis.

Leonov was to have commanded the next mission to Salyut 1, but this was scrapped after the deaths of the Soyuz 11 crew members, and the space station was lost. The next two Salyuts (actually the military Almaz station) were lost at launch or failed soon after, and Leonov's crew stood by. By the time Salyut 4 reached orbit Leonov had been switched to a more prestigious project.

Leonov's second trip into space was similarly significant: he commanded the Soviet half of the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz mission Soyuz 19 - the first joint space mission between the Soviet Union and the United States.

From 1976 to 1982, Leonov was the commander of the cosmonaut team ("Chief Cosmonaut"), and deputy director of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, where

he oversaw crew training. He also edited the cosmonaut newsletter Neptune. He retired in 1991.

Leonov is an accomplished artist whose published books include albums of his artistic works and works he did in collaboration with his friend Andrei Sokolov. Leonov has taken colored pencils and paper into space, where he has sketched the Earth and drawn portraits of the Apollo astronauts who flew with him during the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. Arthur C. Clarke wrote in his notes to 2010: Odyssey Two that, after a 1968 screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Leonov pointed out to him that the alignment of the Moon, Earth, and Sun shown in the opening is essentially the same as that in Leonov's 1967 painting Near the Moon, although the painting's diagonal framing of the scene was not replicated in the film.

Clarke kept an autographed sketch of this painting - which Leonov made after the screening, hanging on his office wall.

Story of the Cold War Space Race, it was published in 2006. Neil Armstrong and Tom Hanks both wrote introductions to the book.

Leonov was also a contributor to the 2007 book Into That Silent Sea by Colin Burgess and Francis French, which describes his life and career in space exploration.

Arthur C. Clarke's novel 2010: Odyssey Two was dedicated to Leonov and Andrei Sakharov; the fictional spaceship Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov in the book was named after him.

Alexey Leonov was decorated twice as the Hero of the Soviet Union (March 23, 1965 and 1975). He was also awarded the Order of Lenin, Order of the Red Star, numerous medals and foreign orders. He bears the title of the Hero of Socialist Labor of Bulgaria and Hero of Vietnam.

Leonov wore a Russian Poljot "FMWF Strela" chronograph during his historic first space walk.

At an Apollo-Soyuz Test Project press conference, Leonov stated (in English) that, while in the United States for ASTP training, he wanted to visit Hollywood, because he had aspirations of being a movie star.

In 2001, he was a vice president of Moscow-based Alfa Bank and an advisor to the first deputy of the Board.

In 2004, Leonov and former American astronaut David Scott began work on a dual biography / history of the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union. Titled Two Sides of the Moon: Our

Leonov, along with Rusty Schweickart, Vitaly Sevastyanov and Georgi Grechko established the Association of Space Explorers in 1984. Membership is open to all people who have flown in outer space.

In the Star Trek novel Destiny: Gods of Night there is a ship named the U.S.S. Alexey Leonov, which sacrifices itself to save the planet Korvat from the Borg.

SALYUT 1 Salyut 1 (DOS-1) was the first space station of any kind, launched by the USSR on April 19, 1971. It was launched unmanned using a Proton-K rocket. Its first crew came later in Soyuz 10, but was unable to dock completely; its second crew launched in Soyuz 11 and remained on board for 23 days. A pressure-equalization valve in the Soyuz 11 reentry capsule opened prematurely when the crew was returning, killing all three. Following the accident, missions were temporarily suspended and the station was burned in the atmosphere purposely after a total of 6 months in orbit.

At launch, the announced purpose of Salyut was to test the elements of the systems of a space station and to conduct scientific research and experiments. The craft was described as being 20 m in length, 4 m in maximum diameter, and 99 m_ in interior space with an on-orbit dry mass of 18,425 kg. Of its several compartments, three were pressurized (100 m_ total), and two could be entered by the crew.[ The transfer compartment was to connect directly with Soyuz. The docking cone had a 2 m front diameter and a 3 m aft diameter.[ The second, and main, compartment was about 4 m in diameter. Televised views showed enough space for eight big chairs (seven at work consoles), several control panels, and 20 portholes (some obstructed by instruments).[ The third pressurized compartment contained the control and communications equipment, the power supply, the life support system, and other auxiliary equipment.

The fourth, and final, unpressurized compartment was about 2 m in diameter and contained the engine installations and associated control equipment. Salyut had buffer chemical batteries, reserve supplies of oxygen and water, and regeneration systems.

Externally mounted were two double sets of solar cell panels that extended like wings from the smaller compartments at each end, the heat regulation system's radiators, and orientation and control devices.[ Salyut 1 was modified from one of the Almaz airframes. The unpressurized service module was the modified service module of a Soyuz craft.

The astrophysical Orion 1 Space Observatory designed by Grigor Gurzadyan of Byurakan Observatory in Armenia, was installed in Salyut 1. Ultraviolet spectrograms of stars were obtained with the help of a mirror telescope of the Mersenne system and a spectrograph of the Wadsworth system using film sensitive to the far ultraviolet. The dispersion of the spectrograph was 32 Å/mm (3.2 nm/mm), while the resolution of the spectrograms derived was about

5 Å at 2600 Å (0.5 nm at 260 nm). Slitless spectrograms were obtained of the stars Vega and Beta Centauri between 2000 and 3800 Å (200 and 380 nm). The telescope

was operated by crew member Viktor Patsayev, who became the first man to operate a telescope outside the Earth’s atmosphere.

MIR

creating history's largest spacecraft, with a combined mass of 250 tons.

Magnificent to behold through the windows of a space shuttle, the 100-ton Mir was as big as six schoolbuses. Inside, it looked more like a cramped labyrinth, crowded with hoses, cables and scientific instruments as well as articles of everyday life, such as photos, children's drawings, books and a guitar. It commonly housed three crewmembers, but it sometimes supported as many as six, for up to a month. Except for two short periods, Mir was continuously occupied until August 1999.

The journey of the 15-year-old Russian space station ended March 23, 2001, as Mir re-entered the Earth's atmosphere near Nadi, Fiji, and fell into the South Pacific.

Mir means "peace" and "community" in Russian. The Mir space station (above) contributed to world peace by hosting international scientists and American astronauts. It also supported a community of humans in orbit and symbolized the commonwealth of the Russian people.

Mir was constructed in orbit by connecting different modules, each launched separately from 1986 to 1996. During the Shuttle-Mir Program, Russia's Mir combined its capabilities with America's space shuttles.

The orbiting Mir provided a large and livable scientific laboratory in space. The visiting space shuttles provided transportation and supplies, as well as temporary enlargements of living and working areas,

THE MOSCOW METRO Without doubt the best way to get around Moscow is to use the underground Metro system. Any traveller can be from one end of this massive city to the other in a matter of minutes. Don’t think for one minute that this can be compared to any other underground transport system in the world as many of the stations are more like art galleries complete with works of art and chandeliers! he Moscow Metro is a rapid transit system serving Moscow and the neighbouring town of Krasnogorsk. Opened in 1935 with one 11-kilometre (6.8 mi) line and 13 stations, it was the first underground railway system in the Soviet Union. As of 2011, the Moscow Metro has 185 stations and its route length is 305.7 kilometres (190.0 mi). The system is mostly underground, with the deepest section 84 metres (276 ft) below ground at the Park Pobedy station. The Moscow Metro is the world's second-most-heavilyused rapid transit system, after Tokyo's twin subway.

T

The Moscow Metro is a state-owned enterprise. Its total length is 305.5 km (189.8 mi) and consists of 12 lines and 185 stations. The average daily passenger traffic is 6.6 million. Ridership is highest on weekdays (when the Metro carries over 7 million passengers per day) and lower on weekends. Each line is identified according to an alphanumeric index (usually consisting of a number), a name and a colour. Voice announcements refer to the lines by name. A male voice announces the next station when traveling towards the centre of the city, and a female voice when going away from it. On the circle line the clockwise direction has a male announcer for the stations, while the counter-clockwise direction has a female announcer. The lines are also assigned specific colours for maps and signs. Naming by colour is frequent in colloquial usage, except for the very similar shades of green assigned to the Kakhovskaya Line (route 11), the Zamoskvoretskaya Line (route 2), the LyublinskoDmitrovskaya Line (route 10) and the Butovskaya Line (route L1).

The system operates in an enhanced spoke-hub distribution paradigm, with the majority of rail lines running radially from the centre of Moscow to the outlying areas. The Koltsevaya Line (route 5) forms a 20-kilometre (12 mile) long ring which enables passenger travel between these spokes. Signs showing the stations that can be reached in a given direction are in each station. A complete map is also on each station both inside and outside. Most of the stations and lines are underground, but some lines have at-grade and elevated sections. The Filyovskaya Line is notable for being the only line with most of its route at grade.

The Moscow Metro is open from about 05:30 until 01:00. The precise opening time varies at different stations according to the arrival of the first train, but all stations close their entrances simultaneously at 01:00 for maintenance. The minimum interval between trains is 90 seconds, during the morning and evening rush hours.

The first plans for a metro system in Moscow date back to the Russian Empire but were postponed by World War I, the October Revolution and the Russian Civil War. In 1923, the Moscow City Council formed the Underground Railway Design Office at the Moscow Board of Urban Railways. It carried out preliminary studies, and by 1928 had developed a project for the first route from Sokolniki to the city centre. At the same time, an offer was made to German company Siemens Bauunion to submit its own project for the same route. In June 1931, the decision to begin construction of the Moscow Metro was made by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. In January 1932 the plan for the first lines was approved, and on March 21, 1933 the Soviet government approved a plan for 10 lines with a total route length of 80 km.

The first lines were built using the Moscow general plan designed

by Lazar Kaganovich in the 1930s, and the Metro was named after him until 1955 (Metropoliten im. L.M. Kaganovicha).

The Moscow Metro construction engineers consulted with their counterparts from the London Underground, the world's oldest metro system. Partly because of this connection, the design of Gants Hill tube station (although not completed until much later) is reminiscent of a Moscow Metro Station.

The first line, from Okhotny Ryad to Smolenskaya, was opened to the public on 15 May 1935 at 07:00. It was 11 kilometres (6.8 mi) long and included 13 stations. The line connected Sokolniki and Park Kultury. The latter branch was extended westwards to a new station (Kiyevskaya) in March 1937, the first Metro line crossing the Moskva River over the Smolensky Metro Bridge.

The second stage was completed before the war. In March 1938, the Arbatskaya branch was split and extended to the Kurskaya station (now the dark-blue Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya Line). In September 1938, the Gorkovskaya Line opened between Sokol and Teatralnaya. Here the architecture was based on that of the most popular stations in existence (Krasniye Vorota, Okhotnyi Ryad and Kropotkinskaya); while following the popular art-deco style, it was merged with socialist themes. The first deep-level Column station Mayakovskaya was built at the same time.

Building work on the third stage was delayed (but not interrupted) during World War II, and two Metro sections were put into service; Teatralnaya–Avtozavodskaya (three stations, crossing the Moskva River through a deep tunnel) and Kurskaya–Partizanskaya (four stations) were inaugurated in 1943 and 1944 respectively. War motifs replaced socialist visions in the architectural design of these stations. During the Siege of Moscow in the fall and winter of 1941, Metro stations were used as air-raid shelters; the Council of Ministers moved its offices to the Mayakovskaya platforms, where Stalin made public speeches on several occasions. The Chistiye Prudy station was also walled off, and the headquarters of the Air Defence established there.

After the war construction began on the fourth stage of the Metro, which included the Koltsevaya Line, a deep part of the ArbatskoPokrovskaya line from Ploshchad Revolyutsii to Kievskaya and a surface extension to Pervomaiskaya during the early 1950s. The decoration and design characteristic of the Moscow Metro is considered to have reached its zenith in these stations. The Koltsevaya Line was first planned as a line running under the Garden Ring, a wide avenue encircling the borders of Moscow's city centre. The first part of the line – from Park Kultury to Kurskaya (1950) – follows this avenue. Plans were later changed and the northern part of the ring line runs 1–1.5 kilometres (0.62–0.93 mi) outside the Sadovoye Koltso, thus providing service for seven (out of nine) rail terminals. The next part of the Koltsevaya Line opened in 1952 (Kurskaya–Belorusskaya), and in 1954 the ring line was completed.

The beginning of the Cold War led to the construction of a deep section of the Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya Line. The stations on this line were planned as shelters in the event of nuclear war. After finishing the line in 1953 the upper tracks between Ploshchad Revolyutsii and Kiyevskaya were closed, and later reopened in 1958 as a part of the Filyovskaya Line. In the further development of the Metro the term "stages" was not used any more, although sometimes the stations opened in 1957–1959 are referred to as the "fifth stage".

During the late 1950s the architectural extravagance of new Metro stations was toned down, and decorations at some stations (such as VDNKh and Alexeyevskaya) were simplified by comparison with the original plans. This was done on the orders of Nikita Khrushchev, who favoured more spartan decoration. A typical layout (which quickly became known as Sorokonozhka–"centipede", from early designs with 40 concrete columns in two rows) was developed for all new stations and the stations were built to look almost identical, differing from each other only in colours of the marble and ceramic tiles. Most stations were built with simpler, less-costly technology; this was not always appropriate, and resulted in utilitarian design. For example, walls with cheap ceramic tiles were susceptible to train vibration and some tiles eventually fell off. It was not always possible to replace the missing tiles with the ones of the same color, which eventually led to variegated parts of the walls. Not until the mid-1970s was the architectural extravagance restored and original designs again popular. However, the newer design of "centipede" stations (with 26 more-widely-spaced columns) continued to dominate.

The Moscow Metro was one of the USSR’s most extravagant architectural projects. Stalin ordered the metro’s artists and architects to design a structure that embodied svet (radiance or brilliance) and svetloe budushchee (a radiant future). With their reflective marble walls, high ceilings and grandiose chandeliers, many Moscow Metro stations have been likened to an "artificial underground sun". This underground communist paradise reminded its riders that Stalin and his party had delivered something substantial

to the people in return for their sacrifices. Most importantly, proletarian labor produced this svetloe budushchee.

Stalin developed a cult of personality through various methods of political and cultural propaganda. This propaganda effort was a concerted effort to encourage Soviet citizens to deify Stalin. Stalin referred to himself as "the god of the sun" because the sun is the source of all life, symbolizing a radiant future, eternal life and happiness. It was crucial that Stalin associate himself with the sun god, because the Communist Party’s power hinged on its promise to the people that the party could provide all that the sun symbolized.

The metro design’s emphasis on verticality was a reinforcement of Stalin's deification. He directed his architects to design structures which would encourage citizens to look up, admiring the station’s art (as if they were looking up to admire the sun and—by extension—him as a god. Another aspect of the apotheosis propaganda was the metro’s electrification; the Moscow Metro's chandeliers are one of the most beautiful and technologically-advanced aspects of the project.

The chief lighting engineer was Abram Damsky, a graduate of the Higher State Art-Technical Institute in Moscow. By 1930 he was a chief designer in Moscow’s Elektrosvet Factory, and during World War II was sent to the Metrostroi (Metro Construction) Factory as head of the lighting shop. Damsky recognized the importance of efficiency, as well as the potential for light as an expressive form.

His team experimented with different materials (most often cast bronze, aluminum, sheet brass, steel, and milk glass) and methods to optimize the technology. Damsky’s discourse on "Lamps and Architecture 1930–1950" describes in detail the epic chandeliers installed in the Kaluzhskaia (now called the Oktiabrskaia) Station and the Taganskaia Station: The Kaluzhskaya Station was designed by the architect [Leonid] Poliakov. Poliakov’s decision to base his design on a reinterpretation of Russian classical architecture clearly influenced the concept of the lamps, some of which I planned in collaboration with the architect himself. The shape of the lamps was a torch – the torch of victory, as Poliakov put it... The artistic quality and stylistic unity of all the lamps throughout the station’s interior made them perhaps the most successful element of the architectural composition. All were made of cast aluminum decorated in a black and gold anodized coating, a technique which the Metrostroi factory had only just mastered. The Taganskaia Metro Station on the Ring Line was designed in...quite another style by the architects K.S. Ryzhkov and A. Medvedev... Their subject matter dealt with images of war and victory...The overall effect was one of ceremony, perhaps even lavish to excess. In the platform halls the blue ceramic bodies of the chandeliers played a more modest role, but still emphasised the overall expressiveness of the lamp."

This is an example of how the artistic composition of the Moscow Metro incorporated the Communist Party’s propaganda messages.

The work of Abram Damsky facilitated the dissemination of this propaganda, so the people would associate the party with svetloe

budushchee.

Stalin's First Five-Year Plan (1928–1932) facilitated rapid industrialisation to build a socialist motherland. The plan was ambitious, seeking to reorient an agrarian society towards industrialism. It was Stalin's fanatical energy, large-scale planning, and ambitious resource allocation that kept up industrialisation's punishing pace. The First Five-Year Plan was instrumental in the completion of the Moscow Metro; without industrialisation, the Soviet Union would not have had the raw materials necessary for the project. For example, steel was a main component of many subway stations. Before industrialisation, it would have been impossible for the Soviet Union to produce enough steel to incorporate it into the metro's design; in addition, a steel shortage would have limited the size of the subway system and its technological advancement.

The Moscow Metro furthered the construction of a socialist Soviet Union because the project accorded with Stalin's Second Five-Year Plan. The Second Plan focused on urbanisation and the development of social services. The Moscow Metro was necessary to cope with the influx of peasants who migrated to the city during the 1930s; Moscow's population grew to 3.6 million in 1933 from 2.16 million in 1928. The Metro also bolstered Moscow's shaky infrastructure the its communal services, which hitherto were nearly nonexistent.

The Communist Party had the power to mobilise; because the party was a single source of control, it could focus its resources and inspire its people. The most notable example of mobilisation in the Soviet Union occurred during World War II. The country also mobilised in order to complete the Moscow Metro with unprecedented speed. A main motivation of the mobilization was to overtake the West and prove that a socialist metro could surpass capitalist designs. It was especially important to the Soviet Union that socialism succeed industrially, technologically, and artistically in the 1930s, since capitalism was at a low ebb during the Great Depression.

The person in charge of Metro mobilization was Lazar Kaganovich.

A prominent Party member, he assumed control of the project as chief overseer. Kaganovich was nicknamed the "Iron Commissar"; he shared Stalin's fanatical energy, dramatic oratory flare, and ability to keep workers building quickly with threats and punishment. He was determined to realise the Moscow Metro, regardless of cost.

Without Kaganovich's managerial ability, the Moscow Metro might have met the same fate as the Palace of the Soviets: failure.

This was a comprehensive mobilisation; the project drew resources and workers from the entire Soviet Union. In his article, archeologist Mike O'Mahoney describes the scope of Metro mobilisation: A specialist workforce had been drawn from many different regions, including miners from the Ukrainian and Siberian coalfields and construction workers from the iron and steel mills of Magnitogorsk, the Dniepr hydroelectric power station, and the Turkestan-Siberian railway... materials used in the construction of the metro included iron from Siberian Kuznetsk, timber from northern Russia, cement from the Volga region and the norther Caucasus, bitumen from Baku, and marble and granite from quarries in Karelia, the Crimea, the Caucasus, the Urals, and the Soviet Far East.

Skilled engineers were scarce, and unskilled workers were instrumental to the realisation of the metro. The Metrostroi (the organisation responsible for the Metro's construction) conducted massive recruitment campaigns. It printed 15,000 copies of Udarnik metrostroia (Metrostroi Shock Worker, its daily newspaper) and 700 other newsletters (some in different languages) to attract unskilled laborers. Kaganovich was closely involved in the recruit-

ment campaign, targeting the Komsomol generation because of its strength and youth.

The completion of the Moscow Metro was important, because the party used it as a means to build a socialist society. The Metro was perhaps the Soviet Union’s most effective social-engineering tool not only due to the project’s scale, but also because Socialist Realism (the movement according to which the Metro was designed and built) was an instrument for such experimentation. Socialist Realism was in fact a method, not a style. This method was influenced by Nikolay Chernyshevsky, Lenin’s favorite 19th-century nihilist, who stated that "art is no use unless it serves politics".

This maxim explains why the stations combined aesthetics, technology and ideology. Any plan which did not incorporate all three areas cohesively was rejected. Without this cohesion, the Metro would not reflect Socialist Realism. If the Metro did not utilize Socialist Realism, it would fail to illustrate Stalinist values and transform Soviet citizens into socialists. Anything less than Socialist Realism’s grand artistic complexity would fail to inspire a long-lasting, nationalistic attachment to Stalin’s new society.

The first 13 stations of the Moscow Metro opened on May 15, 1935, a day which was celebrated as a technological and ideological victory for socialism (and, by extension, Stalinism). 285,000 people rode the Metro at its debut, and its design was greeted with pride; street celebrations included parades, plays and concerts. The Bolshoi Theatre presented a choral performance by 2,200 Metro workers; 55,000 colored posters (lauding the Metro as the busiest and fastest in the world) and 25,000 copies of "Songs of the Joyous Metro Conquerors" were distributed. This publicity barrage, produced by the Soviet government, stressed the superiority of the Moscow Metro over all other metros in capitalist societies and the Metro's role as a prototype for the Soviet future. In reality, the Moscow Metro averaged 29 miles per hour (47 km/h) and could not exceed 45 miles per hour (72 km/h). In comparison, New York City Subway trains averaged 25 miles per hour (40 km/h) and had a top speed of 45 miles per hour (72 km/h). While the celebration was an expression of popular joy it was also an effective propaganda display, legitimizing the Metro and declaring it a success.

It has been alleged that a second and deeper metro system codenamed "D-6", designed for emergency evacuation of key city personnel in case of nuclear attack during the Cold War, exists under military jurisdiction. It is believed that it consists of a single track connecting the Kremlin, chief HQ (General Staff–Genshtab), Lubyanka (FSB Headquarters), the Ministry of Defence and several other secret installations. There are alleged to be entrances to the system from several civilian buildings, such as the Russian State Library, Moscow State University (MSU) and at least two stations of the regular Metro. It is speculated that these would allow for the evacuation of a small number of randomly chosen civilians, in addition to most of the elite military personnel. A suspected junction

IZMAILOVO MARKET

No trip to Moscow is complete without picking up your traditional souvenir however your problem will be what to get? Will it be a Russian doll, hat, Soviet item, Russian jewellery box or figure of Lenin? There are plenty of stalls at tourist hotspots which are, surprisingly, quite cheap. However the must go place for any visitor is the Izmailovo Market where you can pick up anything from an AK-47 to ten million Russian Dolls! zmailovo Market is your one-stop souvenir venue in Moscow.

Hundreds of vendors selling everything from novel souvenirs to expensive jewellery will tempt. Your first trip to Izmailovo Market will leave you a little dazzled, so either plan a full day of shopping there or come back at a later date to make your purchases.

The Market has a ground level and two upper levels. The ground level is where the folk art and other typical Russian souvenirs are sold. The next level up will have you sorting through old spoons, obsolete camera equipment, and other odds and ends. The third tier of the market contains some hardcore antiques dealers as well as original artwork. The latter is great for browsing but not so good for your wallet.

It is located near Izmaylovsky Park. You can take the metro (Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya Line, which is dark blue or purple on the metro map) to the station of the same name, get off there, and ask any local to point you in the direction of the market. It's easy to spot with its wooden-fortress-like encasement and crowds of sated shopper milling back to the metro. If you decide to stay at any of the Izmailovo Hotels then it is just next door.

You can go to Izmailovo Market any day of the week, but some vendors only show up on weekends, so you may find you have the best selection then. The best times to go are on Saturday, from 10am to 6pm or Sunday from 10am to around 3. Different guides may suggest other hours of operation, but you'll be guaranteed to find what you want on these days and times.

A Word of Caution: Some vendors will exaggerate the quality of their wares. A "wolf fur" hat might be merely rabbit, or a piece of Soviet military history might be a low-grade reproduction.

Examine what you want to purchase closely, and only buy after you have familiarised yourself with other vendors' wares.

While some of the sales people are just out to make a quick ruble, some of the other vendors are truly a delight to talk to. Often, these people make their products themselves or contribute to a family business. It is a joy to chat with these people who lovingly wrap I myself have made plenty of friends at this market over the years their little treasures so that you can take them home safely. Not and it's always a joy to get back to see them. I arrange trips to only will they sell you their painted folk art or embroidered aprons, Moscow twice each year and if you're interested in coming along but they will give you a story to accompany each, making the then simply contact me on Facebook where I have an open profile or use any of the contact details at the start of this book. souvenirs all the more special.

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