The Bolsheviks took their name from the 'majority' at the 1903 party congress — even though on the key dispute, who counted as a party member, Martov's supporters, the future Mensheviks, won the vote.

1903

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The event

• October Revolution1917 · Petrograd. On 25 October (7 November) 1917 the Bolsheviks led by Lenin overthrew the Provisional Government and seized the Winter Palace. The world's first socialist state was born, and the seizure of power was followed by the Russian Civil War.

20th century

More amazing facts

• 1903 · 1961 · 1969 Just 58 years separate the Wright brothers' first flight from Gagarin's, and 66 from the Moon landing — some who saw the first airplanes lived to see the Moon.
• 1903 The Wright brothers' first flight was shorter than a Boeing 747's wingspan: Orville covered 37 metres, while the first jumbo jet's wings spanned about 60.
• 1903 · 1969 Bits of the Wright Flyer have been to the Moon and Mars.
• 1903 Tsiolkovsky published his rocket equation in 1903 — the year the Wright brothers first flew.
• 1903 · 1913 Just ten years after the Wright brothers' first flight, a plane with a toilet took off. Sikorsky's four-engined Ilya Muromets of 1913 also had a heated cabin, a bedroom and electric light.
• 1903 · 1904 In 1904 a physicist debunked a discovery by slipping part of the apparatus into his pocket.

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