{{Short description|Russian-Soviet scientist, statesman, revolutionary, geographer and writer}} {{Family name hatnote|Maksimilianovich|[[Krzhizhanovsky]]|lang=Eastern Slavic}} {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2025}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Gleb Krzhizhanovsky | image = Gleb Maksimilianovich Krzhizhanovskiy.jpg | caption = Krzhizhanovsky in 1904 | birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1872|1|24}} | birth_place = [[Samara]], [[Samara Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]] | death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1959|03|31|1872|1|24}} | death_place = [[Moscow Oblast]], [[Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic|Russian SFSR]], [[Soviet Union]] | office = Chairman of the [[Gosplan|State Planning Committee]] | deputy = | term_start = February 1921 | term_end = 11 December 1923 | predecessor = Post established | successor = [[Alexander Tsiurupa]] | office1 = | deputy1 = | term_start1 = 18 November 1925 | term_end1 = 10 November 1930 | predecessor1 = Alexander Tsiurupa | successor1 = [[Valerian Kuybyshev]] | party = [[Russian Social Democratic Labor Party]] (1898–1903) <br />RSDLP ([[Bolsheviks]]) {{nowrap|(1903–1918)}} <br />[[Communist Party of the Soviet Union|Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] (1918–1959) | occupation = Scientist, translator, writer | awards = [[Hero of Socialist Labour]] | premier = [[Vladimir Lenin]] | premier1 = [[Alexei Rykov]] | native_name = {{nobold|Глеб Кржижановский}} | resting_place = [[Kremlin Wall Necropolis]] | alma_mater = [[Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology]] | spouse = {{marriage|[[Zinaida Nevzorova]]|1899|1948|end=death}} }} '''Gleb Maksimilianovich Krzhizhanovsky''' ({{langx|ru|Глеб Максимилианович Кржижановский}}; 24 January [<nowiki/>[[Old Style and New Style dates|O.S.]] 12 January] 1872 – 31 March 1959) was a [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] scientist, statesman, revolutionary, [[Old Bolshevik]], and state figure as well as a geographer and writer.<ref name="Lenin Internet Archive (2005).">{{cite web|last1=Krzhizhanovsky, Gleb Maximilianovich|title=V. I. Lenin 33 To: G. M. KRZHIZHANOVSKY|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1902/may/06gmk.htm|website=Marxist.Org|access-date=27 September 2015}}</ref><ref name=Prib />
Born to the family of a [[Russian nobility|nobleman]] of [[Polish people|Polish]] descent (Polish surname: [[Krzyżanowski]]), he became the longtime chairman of the [[Gosplan]] and director of the [[GOELRO]], an [[Academician]] of [[Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union]] (1929) and a [[Hero of Socialist Labour]] (1957).
==Life and career== Krzhizhanovsky was born in 1872 to an intellectual family in [[Samara]]. In 1889 he moved to [[Saint Petersburg]], where he attended the [[Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology]], becoming involved in [[Marxism|Marxist]] circles in 1891.<ref name=Prib>{{cite web|title=Birthday anniversary of Gleb M. Krzhizhanovsky, founder of the Power Engineering Institute under the Academy of Sciences of the USSR|url=https://www.prlib.ru/en-us/History/Pages/Item.aspx?itemid=980|publisher=Presidential Library}}</ref> He was a close friend and colleague of [[Vladimir Lenin|Lenin]], with whom he edited the newspaper ''Rabotnik'' ('The Worker') and, in 1895, he was a co-founder, with Lenin, of the [[League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class]].<ref>Tony Cliff (1986) ''Lenin: Building the Party 1893–1914''. London, Bookmarks: 52–59</ref>
He was arrested with Lenin and others in a police round up of the Union of Struggle in December 1895, and spent 17 months in [[Butyrka prison]], where he wrote the Russian text of the [[Polish people|Polish]] revolutionary song ''[[Whirlwinds of Danger|Warszawianka]]'' and the Ukrainian song ''[[Rage, Tyrants]]''.<ref name="Kozłowski">{{cite book |author1=Józef Kozłowski |title=Śpiewy proletariatu polskiego |trans-title=Songs of the Polish Proletariat |year=1977 |publisher=Polskie Wydawnictwo Muzyczne |pages=74–79|language=pl}}</ref> Afterwards, he was exiled to [[Minusinsk]], in Siberia, near enough to Lenin's place of exile for them to stay in touch.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Krupskaya |first1=Nadezhda (Lenin's widow) |title=Memories of Lenin |date=1970 |publisher=Panther |location=London |page=39}}</ref> In 1899, he married [[Zinaida Nevzorova]], a fellow Marxist who had shared his time in exile. They settled in Samara, where he worked as a railroad engineer, and they handled distribution of the newspaper ''[[Iskra]]'', founded by Lenin, using the aliases 'Clair' and 'The Snail'.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Krupskaya |title=Memories |page=70}}</ref>
In 1903, Krzhizhanovsky was a member of the organising committee for the [[2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party]] (RSDLP), in Brussels, at which the party split between the [[Bolsheviks|Bolshevik]] and [[Mensheviks|Menshevik]] factions, and was elected in his absence to its Central Committee. He travelled to Geneva afterwards hoping to reunite the two factions, but realised that mutual hostility had risen to such a pitch that it was no longer possible.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Krupskaya |title=Memories |pages=90, 95}}</ref> In 1904–5 he was involved in organising the [[3rd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party|3rd Congress]] of the [[Russian Social Democratic Labor Party]].<ref name="Prib" />
[[File:The Soviet Union 1972 CPA 4087 stamp (Gleb Krzhizhanovsky (1872-1959), Scientist and Co-worker with Lenin (Birth Centenary)).jpg|thumb|200px|Soviet Stamp commemorating Gleb Krzhizhanovsky on the 100th anniversary of his birth, 1972]] Krzhizhanovsky withdrew from revolutionary activity after the failure of the [[1905 Russian Revolution|1905 Revolution]]. In 1910 he oversaw the construction of a [[power station]] near Moscow and proposed the idea of a [[Hydroelectricity|hydroelectric plant]] in [[Saratov]]. After the [[February Revolution]] in 1917, he was appointed director of the fuel section of the Moscow Soviet. Later, he was director of an electric transmission station near Moscow.
Krzhizhanovsky returned to prominence in January 1920, when, with Lenin's encouragement, he published an article in ''[[Pravda]]'' on entitled 'Tasks of Electrification of Industry'.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Carr |first1=E. H. |title=The Bolshevik Revolution, volume 2 |date=1966 |publisher=Penguin |location=Hardmonsworth, Middlesex |page=369}}</ref> In February, he was appointed head of [[GOELRO plan|Goelro]], the hundred strong commission charged with putting into practice Lenin's latest slogan – "Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the whole country.' When [[Gosplan]] was created, in 1921, with Goelro as one its sub-committees, Krzhizhanovsky was appointed its first chairman. He was a member of the [[Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union]] in 1924–1939.
In 1929–39 he was vice-president of the [[Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union]]. He supervised the cleansing of the academy from "bourgeois specialists" and the work "to fulfill the tasks of the party and the government on bringing the activity of the Academy of Sciences closer to the demands of the socialist economy." In 1930–39, he was head of the Energy Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences.<ref>{{cite web |title=Глеб Максимилианович Кржижановский |url=https://www.hrono.ru/biograf/bio_k/krzhizha.php |website=Khonos |access-date=26 April 2021}}</ref> Krzhizhanovsky was appointed to the editorial board of the ''[[Great Soviet Encyclopedia]]'', contributing several articles concerning electricity and planning.<ref name="Prib" />
Krzhizhanovsky died in Moscow in 1959. He was cremated and the ashes were placed in an urn in the [[Kremlin Wall Necropolis]] on [[Red Square]] in Moscow.
== References == {{Commons category|Gleb Krzhizhanovskiy}} {{reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Krzhizhanovsky, Gleb}} [[Category:1872 births]] [[Category:1959 deaths]] [[Category:Politicians from Samara]] [[Category:Scientists from Samara]] [[Category:People from Samarsky Uyezd]] [[Category:People from the Russian Empire of Polish descent]] [[Category:All-Russian Central Executive Committee members]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 13th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 14th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 15th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 16th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] [[Category:Members of the Central Committee of the 17th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)]] [[Category:Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union members]] [[Category:Full Members of the USSR Academy of Sciences]] [[Category:First convocation members of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union]] [[Category:Russian Social Democratic Labour Party members]] [[Category:Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology alumni]] [[Category:Heroes of Socialist Labour]] [[Category:Recipients of the Order of Lenin]] [[Category:Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour]] [[Category:Old Bolsheviks]] [[Category:Soviet economists]] [[Category:Soviet people of Polish descent]] [[Category:Russian people of German descent]] [[Category:Burials at the Kremlin Wall Necropolis]] [[Category:19th-century scientists from the Russian Empire]] [[Category:Chairman of Gosplan]]