End of an Era

Author: Linda DeLaine
Website: RL Online
Department:
Page: 0   ( 0) pages

Summary: The presidency and life of former President Boris Yeltsin who resigned on December 31, 1999.

Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was born on February 1, 1931, in the little village of Butka, Talitsky district of Sverdlovsk oblast. Hailing from peasant stock, his father, Nikolai, was a laborer who served three years in Stalin's Gulag (1934 - 37) for, alleged, anti-Communist sentiments. Yeltsin's mother, Klavdiya, did sewing to make extra money for the family.

Yeltsin grew up in a harsh environment and poverty. Always a strong and determined individual, he was once expelled from school for fighting with one of his teachers. When Yeltsin was 11 years old, Yeltsin lost his left thumb and forefinger when he attempted to take apart a grenade he and some friends had stolen from a warehouse. Yetlsin graduated from Pushkin High School in Perm region and continued on to college.

Yeltsin earned an engineering degree in civil construction, in 1955, from Kirov Polytechnic Institute. While attending the Institute, he met his future wife, Naina Girina. They have two daughters; Yelena, who was born in 1957 and Tatyana born in 1959. From 1955 to 1968, Yeltsin worked as a construction engineer.

In his youth, Yeltsin was considered a radical. He joined the Communist party in 1961, at age 30. This was during the years of Nikita Khrushchev's anti-Stalin reforms.Yelstin became the secretary of the Sverdlovsk oblast's Communist Party in 1968.

Yeltsin was on his way to a career in politics and served in the following offices:
1976 - 1985: member of the Presidium USSR Supreme Soviet and moved his family to Moscow.
1985 - 1987: First secretary, Moscow City Party Committee
1987 - 1989: First deputy chairman, State Construction Committee
1989: elected to the Congress of People’s Deputies
1990: Speaker of the Congress
1991: President, Russian Republic
1996: Elected to second term as President
1999: Resigned presidency on Dec. 31st. 1991

Yeltsin was very outspoken against President Gorbachev's reforms as being too slow. He led the resistance, during the coup of August, 1991, and reminded many of Lenin as he struck a pose atop a tank to deliver his speech to the crowds of people.

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Boris Yeltsin is the author of The Struggle for Russia and other books including:

Putsch; Three Days That Collapsed the Empire

Midnight Diaries