December 10 in Russian history. Nobel prize awards.

The 10 December, the day when Alfred Nobel died, for more than 100 years has been the day when Nobel prizes are awarded. For the last five years, there were no Russians among the winners. Here's the list of Russian/Soviet Nobel prize winners:

• Ivan Pavlov, Physiology or Medicine, 1904
• Ilya Mechnikov, Physiology or Medicine, 1908
• Ivan Bunin, Literature, 1933
• Nikolay Semenov, Chemistry, 1956
• Pavel Cherenkov, Physics, 1958
• Boris Pasternak, Literature, 1958 (forced to decline)
• Lev Landau, Physics, 1962
• Aleksandr M. Prokhorov, Physics, 1964
• Nicolay G. Basov, Physics, 1964
• Michail Sholokhov, Literature, 1965
• Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Literature, 1970
• Leonid Kantorovich, Economics, 1975
• Mikhail Gorbachev, Peace, 1990
• Zhores I. Alferov, Physics, 2000
• Alexei A. Abrikosov, Physics, 2003
• Vitaly Ginzburg, Physics, 2003

Some years ago, though, Kommersant newspaper compiled a list of Nobel prize winners with connections to Russia:

Year of award	Category	Name	Relation to Russia (USSR)
1903	Physics	Marie Curie (born Marie Sklodowska)	Born in Warsaw (Russian part of Poland)
1904	Physiology and medicine	Ivan Petrovich Pavlov	Subject of the Russian Empire; later a citizen of the USSR
1905	Literature	Henryk Sienkiewicz	Born in the Russian part of Poland; subject of the Russian Empire
1908	Physiology and medicine	Ilya Ilich Mechnikov	Subject of the Russian Empire
1911	Chemistry	Marie Curie	Born in Warsaw (Russian part of Poland)
1933	Literature	Ivan Alekseevich Bunin	Born in Voronezh (Russian Empire); at the time of the award, a stateless person resident in France
1945	Physiology and medicine	Ernst Boris Chain	Son of a native of Mogileva (Russian Empire, now Belarus)
1952	Physiology and medicine	Selman Abraham Waksman	Born in Priluky (now Ukraine; left the Russian Empire are age 22)
1956	Chemistry	Nikolai Nikolaevich Semenov	Citizen of the USSR
1958	Physics	Igor Evgenevich Tamm	Citizen of the USSR
1958	Physics	Ilya Mikhailovich Frank	Citizen of the USSR
1958	Physics	Pavel Alekseevich Cherenkov	Citizen of the USSR
1958	Literature	Boris Leonidovich Pasternak*	Citizen of the USSR
1960	Physics	Donald Arthur Glaser	Son of a Russian woman (Russian Empire)
1961	Chemistry	Melvin Calvin	Son of Russian immigrants
1962	Physics	Lev Davidovich Landau	Citizen of the USSR
1964	Physics	Nikolai Gennadievich Basov	Citizen of the USSR
1964	Physics	Aleksandr Mikhailovich Prokhorov	Citizen of the USSR
1965	Physiology and medicine	André Michel Lvov	Son of Russian immigrants
1965	Literature	Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov	Citizen of the USSR
1970	Literature	Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn	Citizen of the USSR at the time of the award (later stripped of citizenship and expelled from the country; now a citizen of Russia)
1970	Physiology and medicine	Sir Bernard Katz	Son of Russian immigrants
1971	Economics	Simon Smith Kuznets	Born in Kharkov (Russian Empire, now Ukraine); left the country in 1922
1971	Physics	Dennis Gabor	Great-grandson of a Russian subject
1973	Economics	Vasily (Vasilevich) Leontev	Born in St. Petersburg; left the Soviet Union after graduating from Leningrad University in 1925
1975	Peace Prize	Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov	Citizen of the USSR
1975	Economics	Leonid Vitalevich Kantorovich	Citizen of the USSR
1976	Literature	Saul Bellow	Son of Russian immigrants
1977	Chemistry	Ilya (Romanovich) Prigogine	Born in Moscow (Russian Empire); left Russia at age 4
1977	Physiology and medicine	Andrew Victor Schally	Born in Wilno (Poland; later Vilnius, USSR; now Lithuania
1978	Physics	Petr Leonidovich Kapitsa	Citizen of the USSR
1978	Physiology and medicine	Daniel Nathans	Son of Russian immigrants
1979	Physics	Sheldon Lee Glashow (Glukhovsky)	Son of Russian immigrants
1979	Chemistry	Herbert Brown (Brovarnik)	Son of Russian immigrants
1980	Chemistry	Paul Berg	Son of a Russian immigrant
1981	Physics	Arthur Schawlow	Son of a Riga native (Russian Empire, now Latvia)
1981	Chemistry	Roald Hoffmann (Saffran)	Born in the city of Zloczow (Poland; later Zolochev, USSR; now Zolochiv, Ukraine)
1982	Chemistry	Aaron Klug	Born into a family of Russian natives (Russian Empire)
1982	Physiology and medicine	John Vane	Son of Russian immigrants
1986	Physiology and medicine	Stanley Cohen	Son of Russian immigrants
1987	Literature	Joseph Brodsky	Born in Leningrad (USSR); left the country in 1972
1988	Physiology and medicine	Gertrude Bell Elion	Daughter of Russian emigrants
1990	Physics	Jerome Isaac Friedman	Son of Russian immigrants
1990	Peace Prize	Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev	Citizen of the USSR
1995	Peace Prize	Joseph Rotblat	Born in Warsaw; subject of the Russian Empire until Poland declared independence
2000	Physics	Zhores Ivanovich Alferov	Citizen of Russia
2002	Physiology and medicine	Robert Horwitz	Grandson of a Russian immigrant
2003	Physics	Aleksei Alekseevich Abrikosov	Citizen of Russia and the United States
2003	Physics	Vitaly Lazarevich Ginzburg	Citizen of Russia

March 19 in Russian history

1441: Metropolitan Isidore comes back to Moscow from Florence. Isidore was appointed by the patriarch of Constantinople Joseph II. He convinced the grand knyaz Vasily II in the necessity of the union between the orthodox and catholic churches. In September 1437, he left Moscow with the retinue of 100 people. He had to participate together with other hierarchs of the Greek orthodox church in the ecumenical council of Florence, which was to take place in 1438. During the council, the orthodox hierarchs scrutinized the teaching of the Roman catholic church and concluded that this was an orthodox teaching. On July 6, 1439, they signed the resolution of the council and the Papal bull Laetentur coeli, thus establishing the union between the Greek orthodox church and the Roman catholic church, known as the Union of Florence. Isidore, an active participant of the discussions, was appointed the cardinal-presbyter and the Papal legate in Lithuania, Livonia, Russia and Poland. When he came to Moscow, he read the manifesto of the union in the church and handed to Vasily II a letter from Pope Eugene IV, who asked the Russian tsar to help Isidore to establish a solid and reliable union. Three days later Isidore was detained and sent to the Chudov monastery on the order of Vasily II. In September, half a year later, he fled from the monastery (probably, Vasily II gave him a permission to flee) and went to Tver, then to Lithuania and, at last, to Rome. In 1458 he was appointed the patriarch of Constantinople.

1898: The opening of the Russian museum in St.Petersburg. It was established by the decree of Nicholas II in 1895 and opened three years later. The museum was the first collection of the Russian art: painting, sculpture, furniture, porcelain, embroidery, lace, etc.

1906: The Ministry of Navy of Russia officially recognizes submarines as a special class of ships. Now, this day is the holiday of all sailors of submarines. The first Russian submarines were built in the first half of XVIII century. In 1718 a carpenter Yefim Nikonov sent a letter to Peter I reporting that he can build an underground vessel. The first model was built and successfully tested in 1721. It had a cylindrical wooden hull, covered with leather. The submersion system consisted of a metal "water box", a pump and metal pipes. The water box was filled with water through a number of small holes in special tin plates. It was about 6 meters long and 2 meters in diameter. The second, larger, vessel was finished in 1724, but it was damaged during the launch. After the death of Peter I, the supplies of materials and workforce stopped and in 1728 the Admiralty ordered to stop the works, Nikonov was found guilty in embezzlement in sent into exile to Astrakhan.

In 1786 someone E.Kalyin sent a letter to the Chamber of Commerce, where he said that he had invented a underground vessel. In 1799, S. Romodanovsky from Kremenchug sent an analogous letter. The Academy of Sciences gave a negative response to the proposal, but Romodanovsky built his submarine and invited specialists once again. The submarine worked, but the response was negative again.

In 1829, a political criminal K. Charnovsky proposed a project of a metal submarine. The project included a rotating periscope.

The first real Russian submarine was built in 1834 by an engineer Carl Schilder. It was made of iron, it was 6 meters long, 1.5 meters wide and 1.8 meters high and it was of 16.4 tons displacement. The boat was propelled by four oarsmen. It also sported a periscope. The planned speed was 2.1 kmph, but the real speed was only 0.7 kmph. The boat was armed with an electric mine and rockets, which made the boat the first underground rocket carrier. The second submarine of Schilder was smaller, but not faster.

Ivan Alexandrovsky in 1863 built a submarine with a pneumatic engine, working on the compressed air. This was the first submarine which used compressed air to free the ballast tanks from water for surfacing. The speed was about 1,5 knots. Two years later Alexandrovsky invented a "self-moving mine", named torpedo. Only three years later the Admiralty allowed him to build a torpedo. Unfortunately, Whitehead patented his torpedo in 1866. The torpedo of Alexandrovsky was faster than the Whitehead's (10 knots vs. 7 knots), but the patent law forced the Russian navy to buy the torpedoes from Whitehead. Alexandrovsky developed more projects, including a submarine with the steam engine fueled by oil, but these projects were not implemented.

In 1885, Stefan Drzewiecki builds the first submarine with an electrical engine.

In 1900, the Russian Naval ministry decided to build a submarine which could become a really usable weapon. In May, 1901 the project was ready. The tests started in 1903. In 1904 the submarine was officially named Dolphin. In June 1904, the ship drowned because of negligence of the sailors. And yet, the boat was very good and in 1905 Dolphin participated in the Russo-Japanese war. Since then, the boats were built and used more and more often, eventually leading to the recognition of submarines as a special class of ships.

March 6 in Russian history

1913: Russia begins to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the house of Romanovs. During the celebrations the royal family visited a number of cities especially important in the history of Russia and the royal house: Moscow, Vladimir, Suzdal, Nizhny Novgorod, Yaroslavl and Kostroma, where Mikhail Romanov learned in 1613 that he was elected the new tsar. On the anniversary day, Nikolay II received congratulations from highest statesmen in the Winter Palace. Among these statesmen there was the chairman of the State Duma Mikhail Rodzyanko, who would demand the tsar to abdicate the throne. On that day, after a speech, Rodzyanko presented an icon of Christ to Nikolay II.

1917: Manifesto on the restoration of the independence of Finland. Finland was a part of the Russian empire since 1809, when the "four Estates" of Finland pledged allegiance to the emperor Alexander I and the emperor gave the solemn assurance of sovereign rights, promising to respect the constitutional rights of the Finnish citizens. Since 1890s Russia begins to limit the Finnish autonomy justifying it by the necessity to bring Finnish laws in agreement with the imperial laws. In 1900, a law was adopted which aims to replace the Finnish language with Russian in the state establishments. In 1901, the freedom of assembly in Finland was limited. In 1903, the governor of Finland is granted the extraordinary authority. The police of Finland was autonomous from the Russian police and in 1904 Russian revolutionaries begin terrorist acts in Finland and kill the governor Bobrikov and some other people.

The situation is threatening, but in 1905 Russian government attempts to restore good relations. The authorities of the governor are withdrawn, the constitution of Finland is restored, a new law on elections is adopted by the Finnish parliament, Finnish and Swedish languages are officially proclaimed the state languages. For the first time in the world, the universal suffrage is granted to all citizens, including women.

In 1909, though, things are getting worse again and the parliament is dissolved and only in 1917, after the February revolution and the fall of the monarchy the constitution is restored. The Provisional Government did not plan to give independence to Finland, since it was agreed that this question should be left to the Constituent Assembly. Moreover, the Provisional Government in principle was against the secessions of any kind (and I would support them, to tell you the truth). However, the pro-independence movement gets stronger in Finland and in summer the parliament is dissolved again.