The Bolsheviks Confer

One hundred years ago today, plus three, the Bolsheviks kicked off an all-Russia party conference. See what Lenin had to say and find a link to one of the resolutions adopted by the conference here.

Read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

Divided Government

One hundred years ago today, plus three, as the demonstrations of the April Days continued and counter-demonstrations grew up, the Executive Committee of the Soviet met with the ministers of the Provisional Government to try to figure out what to do. Turns out, divided government was no more effective then than it is now.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

April Days in May

One hundred years ago today, plus three, the Julian calendar still prevailing in Petrograd, Foreign Minister Miliukov’s luck began to turn when his note to the British and French demanding the annexation of the Dardanelles (then as now part of Turkey on the geographical boundary between Europe and Asia) turned up in print. For the next three days, tens of thousands of soldiers and workers demonstrated against Miliukov and his policy of annexation.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

May Day in April

One hundred years ago today, plus three, it was still April 18 in Russia, because Russia was still on the Julian (old style) calendar. The soviets celebrated May Day, International Socialist Labor Day, along with the rest of the world anyway. 

Meanwhile Foreign Minister Miliukov, of the bourgeois Cadet party, was pursuing a plot that, when they found out about it, the people didn’t like.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the story from the beginning by following this link.

Lenin’s April Theses

One hundred years ago today, plus three, Lenin read out his April Theses to dumbstruck audiences at party headquarters. Even the Bolsheviks were dumbstruck at the steps Lenin proposed to turn the bourgeois February Revolution into a socialist one.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the story from the beginning by following this link.

At the Finland Station

One hundred years ago today, plus three, Lenin is greeted with flowers when his train arrives at the Finland Station in a western suburb of Petrograd. His remarks on this occasion surprised even the Bolsheviks.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here.

Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link. Or finally, for the whole intellectual history of historical thinking that culminates with Lenin putting the theory of dialectical materialism into action beginning on this day, read To the Finland Station by Edmund Wilson.

Lenin Entrains

One hundred years ago today, plus three, Lenin addressed an interesting problem: how to pass from Switzerland through the lands of one combatant, Germany, to those of its enemy, Russia. The solution was not free from controversy.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the Dual Power here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.