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Curated playlist

Recipients of the Order of Lenin

  • Nikita KhrushchevNikita Khrushchev spent four hours in 1956 tearing down Stalin's reputation. He had helped carry out Stalin's purges.
  • Joseph StalinJoseph Stalin once trained to be a Russian Orthodox priest. He later led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death.
  • Fidel CastroFidel Castro's yacht carried eighty-one men toward Cuba, but only nineteen safely reached the mountains.
  • Mikhail GorbachevMikhail Gorbachev refused to declare a state of emergency during the August 1991 coup.
  • Alexei KosyginHenry Kissinger once mistook Alexei Kosygin for the real leader of the Soviet Union.
  • Mikhail SuslovA box of index cards with Lenin quotes launched Mikhail Suslov's Soviet career. Stalin promoted him in 1937.
  • Leonid BrezhnevIn a 2013 Levada Center poll, Russians named Leonid Brezhnev their favorite 20th-century leader.
  • Vyacheslav MolotovFinns named the Molotov cocktail after Vyacheslav Molotov, who called bombing raids food deliveries.
  • Valentin GlushkoValentin Petrovich Glushko was born on the 2nd of September 1908 in Odesa, and by the age of fourteen he was thinking about flight. Novels by Jules Verne had pulled him toward aeronautics. In 1923 he wrote a letter to Konstantin…
  • Yuri AndropovYuri Andropov saw officers strung up from Budapest lampposts. Historian Christopher Andrew says it haunted him.
  • Kim Il SungKim Il Sung stepped off a ship in 1945 as a 33-year-old Soviet captain. He ruled North Korea for more than 45 years.
  • Konstantin ChernenkoSoviet leader Konstantin Chernenko's obituary ran on page two. Page one celebrated his successor, Gorbachev.
  • Lavrentiy BeriaLavrentiy Beria walked out on Stalin's paralyzed body and told everyone not to panic. No doctor came for twelve hours.
  • Lev KuleshovLev Kuleshov showed the same actor's face beside soup, a coffin and a woman. Audiences saw hunger, grief and desire.
  • Alexei LeonovAlexei Leonov's spacesuit swelled in space until he could not fit back inside. He let air out through a valve.
  • Boris YeltsinBoris Yeltsin climbed onto a tank in 1991 to defy a coup. Soldiers sent to crush the protest switched sides.
  • Josip Broz TitoTito once wrote to Stalin: stop sending assassins to murder me. He said five had already been caught.
  • Svetlana SavitskayaSvetlana Savitskaya hid a parachute knife in her school bag at sixteen. Her father found it and encouraged her jumping.
  • Kliment VoroshilovKliment Voroshilov once smashed a platter of food on Stalin's table. He blamed Stalin's purges for Winter War losses.
  • Wojciech JaruzelskiWojciech Jaruzelski declared martial law in Poland on the 13th of December 1981. Later he helped end Communist rule.
  • Dmitri ShostakovichStalin walked out of Dmitri Shostakovich's opera in 1936, and the next day Pravda attacked it.
  • Andrei SakharovAndrei Sakharov built the Soviet Union's most devastating weapon, then spent his life trying to limit its damage.
  • Nikolai PodgornySoviet artists erased Nikolai Podgorny from a 1977 painting of the country's leaders. He had been its head of state.
  • Andrey VyshinskyIn 1917, Andrey Vyshinsky signed an order to arrest Lenin. He later became Stalin's feared state prosecutor.
  • Lev LandauPhysicist Lev Landau was jailed in 1938 over a leaflet comparing Stalinism to Nazism. A letter to Stalin freed him.
  • Maxim GorkyWriter Maxim Gorky visited a Soviet labor camp that had been staged for him, and he did not notice.
  • Sergei EisensteinSergei Eisenstein reached Hollywood in May 1930 and was sent home within five months.
  • Alexander ProkhorovWhile studying ruby in 1957, physicist Alexander Prokhorov realized it could serve as a laser's active medium.
  • Trofim LysenkoTrofim Lysenko, a peasant who learned to read at 13, came to rule Soviet biology. He denied that genes exist.
  • Valentina TereshkovaValentina Tereshkova, a former textile worker, orbited Earth 48 times in 1963. She was 26 and skydived as a hobby.
  • Yuri GagarinYuri Gagarin answered liftoff with one word: Poyekhali, or "Off we go."
  • Valeri PolyakovValeri Polyakov refused a chair after 437 days in space and walked instead. It was a message about Mars.
  • Erich HoneckerErich Honecker voted for his own removal as East Germany's leader. The Politburo ousted him in October 1989.
  • Sergey MikhalkovSergey Mikhalkov wrote a friendly giant policeman for children, then anthems for two countries.
  • Richard SorgeRichard Sorge arrived in Japan as a Nazi journalist while spying for Moscow. German diplomats trusted him for years.
  • Georgy SviridovMillions of Soviet viewers heard Georgy Sviridov's music every evening without knowing his name.

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