Mykolaiv was a major Jewish centre of Russian Empire in the 19th century. In the 19th century, the Czarist governments had largely banned Jews from living East of the Dnieper River. Mykolaiv is in the area west of the Dnieper, which was where Jews were legally allowed to reside (the Pale of Settlement). The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson (the seventh leader in the Chabad-Lubavitch dynasty) was born in Mykolaiv on 18 April 1902.