Twenty-five years ago, when the Berlin Wall came tumbling down, it was a time of hope and relief. Since the 1940s we had held our breath, limping from crisis to crisis, hoping that Dr. Strangelove was not hiding in a dark corner, waiting to make his play.

When you're a Soviet dictator, it's rare that you get the chance to tour the US, visiting movie sets, meat freezers, and steel mills, being featured on TV, and laughing at angry farmers. Nikita Khrushchev got that chance 55 years ago. And he made the most of it.

In October 1714 Alexander Menshikov, one of Peter the Great’s closest associates, received a letter from England signed by Sir Isaac Newton himself. Newton informed Menshikov that he had been elected to Britain’s Royal Society.

Two hundred years ago, after Napoleon's downfall, the heads of Europe got together to fashion the new Europe, which they wanted to look rather a lot like the old Europe, except Tsar Alexander wanted some changes.

In October 1604, an army under the command of a man claiming to be Dmitry, son of Ivan IV (the Terrible), crossed the Russian border from Poland. Dmitry – now generally believed to be the impostor Grigory Otrepyev actually succeeded. For a time.

A look back at the oft maligned Nikita Khrushchev, on the 50th anniversary of his ouster.

Late July and early August were busy times in 1914: not only was Russia's own heir apparent celebrating his 10th birthday, the world was devolving into the military chaos of World War I.
 

A second sample from Alexei Bayer's mystery novel Murder at the Dacha. Here, inspector Pavel Matushkin redeems a favor to get some information from a gangster.

July 14, 1896, is celebrated as the birthday of the Russian automobile – on this day, the first Russian-built motorcar with an internal combustion engine was introduced to the public at the Arts Exhibition in Nizhni Novgorod. 
 

Ever wonder why so many Russian Jews ended up in the US? Perhaps it was the educational quotas, or the restrictions on travel and residence, or maybe the rampant anti-Semitism and violence – and all the other miseries chronicled by Jewish writer Isaac Babel.

A century ago this summer, the War to End All Wars began. What were Russians concerned about in 1914? Not war.

There was a time when Smolensk, now so close to Moscow, was a world unto itself.