Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin (; ; February 1, 1931 – April 23, 2007) was the first President of Russia and the country's first elected leader. He served from 1991 to 1999.
Yeltsin was born in a small village near the Ural Mountains on February 1, 1931. As a boy, he lost two fingers from his left hand after he and his friends played with grenades they had stolen from an army store. Yeltsin worked as a builder, then joined the Communist Party in 1961. He was the leader of the city of Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) during the 1970s. One of the things he did was demolish the building where Nicholas II and his family were shot.
In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev made Yeltsin the leader of the city of Moscow. Yeltsin became one of the more liberal members of Gorbachev's government, and he often complained that Gorbachev's reforms were not doing enough. Eventually, in 1987, he had an argument with Gorbachev and ended up being kicked out. Yeltsin then became determined to get revenge. After Russia's elections in 1989, Yeltsin became leader of the Russian Parliament. It was his idea to create the office of President of Russia in the first place.
Yeltsin became the first elected leader of Russia in 1991. He won 57% of the vote. Two months later, Yeltsin became a hero across Russia when he helped stop an attack on the government in Moscow. Later that year, the Soviet Union collapsed as Russia and all 14 other divisions made themselves independent. Yeltsin won support from the United States and Europe when he promised to bring capitalism and democracy to Russia, but the 1990s were difficult times for Russia and Yeltsin was an unpopular leader while President.
In 1993, the Russian Parliament tried to remove Yeltsin from power after he tried to hold early elections. The problem got so bad that Yeltsin ended up using tanks to attack the Russian Parliament building. After he stopped Parliament, Yeltsin ruled as a dictator for a few months until a new constitution was approved by voters.
Throughout the rest of his time as President, Russia would be affected by many money problems, including inflation and corruption. Yeltsin decided to sell off many things the government had owned, such as oil and natural gas, and many government businesses, but these ended up falling into the hands of a small powerful group of billionaries, who became known as the oligarchs. In 1998, Russia suffered a large financial crisis. Yeltsin also started a war to stop the Chechnya part of Russia from breaking away.
Despite these problems, Yeltsin was re-elected in 1996. His biggest opponent was a Communist, Gennady Zyuganov. Many Russians felt that if Zyuganov was elected, it would cause a civil war. But by the time he resigned on New Year's Eve in 1999, Yeltsin was so unpopular, that his approval rating was believed to be just 2%.
Yeltsin's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin took over as President. This was only temporary, but Putin was then properly elected a few months later when an election was held to decide who should replace Yeltsin.
Yeltsin struggled with alcoholism while President. This often resulted in some strange behaviour when he visited other countries. During a visit to Berlin, he grabbed a stick and tried to conduct a military band. During a visit to Washington, he was found drunk outside the White House by members of the Secret Service. He also suffered from heart attacks.
Yeltsin died of congestive heart failure on April 23, 2007 in Moscow, Russia, aged 76. His funeral was held on April 25, 2007.
Treasurer
A treasurer is someone who looks after the money in a club, company, organization, association, or government.
The treasurer of a government manages the Annual Budget of a state or country. The budget is used to give money to government departments and to pay for the debts or promises the government makes. This post is called Chancellor of the Exchequer in the United Kingdom. There is a treasurer of the United States, but the United States Secretary of the Treasury actually controls the department.
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county in Northern England. It covers a large area of the Pennines and its east coast borders the North Sea. The River Humber separates Yorkshire from Lincolnshire and the River Ouse flows into it.
The main towns and cities in Yorkshire are Leeds, York, Sheffield, Bradford, Middlesbrough, and Hull. It is the largest county in the United Kingdom. It covers just under with a population of around 5 million.
Yorkshire was historically split up into three parts known as the East, North, and West Ridings while the county town York was in the middle. In the local government reorganization of England in 1974 the counties of West Yorkshire, North Yorkshire, South Yorkshire were established instead. Humberside included the former East Riding and Cleveland included part of the former North Riding.
The people of Yorkshire are traditional rivals of the people of Lancashire; they sometimes call Yorkshire the "County of Broad Acres" (because its land area is so large) or "God's Own County".
It has a wide range of landscapes: the green hills and valleys of the Yorkshire dales, the rugged heather of the Yorkshire moors, the coast which includes the resorts of Whitby or Bridlington. It also has several large cities including York (county town), Leeds, Sheffield (the greenest city in Europe and built on seven hills), Hull, Bradford, Doncaster, Harrogate and Wakefield.
Pixel
A pixel (short for picture element) is a single point in a picture. On the monitor of a computer, a pixel is usually a square. Every pixel has a color and all the pixels together are the picture. The color of a pixel can be stored by using a combination of red, green and blue (RGB) but other combinations are also possible, such as cyan, magenta, yellow and black (CMYK).
The word "pixel" was first used in a paper by Frederic C. Billingsley in 1965. He did not create the word himself. He got it from Keith E. McFarland but Keith does not know where he got it from. Keith said that the word was in use in those days.
The word "pixel" uses "pix" as a shorter word (an abbreviation) for "picture". The word pix was first used in 1932 in Variety, a magazine. It was an abbreviation for "pictures" or movies. By 1938 the word "pix" was also used for pictures that did not move (still pictures).
The word "picture element" is even older. For example, the German word "Bildpunkt" (which means "picture point") was used in a 1888 patent of Paul Gottlieb Nipkow.
Olomouc
Olomouc is the sixth largest city in the Czech Republic. It is in the center of the historical region Moravia. In the past, Olomouc was a capital city of Moravia. The city has about 102,000 residents. Its larger urban zone has a population of about 480,000 people.
There are many churches and historical buildings. There is beautiful "Holy Trinity Column" in the centre. UNESCO has this column on the list of World Heritage Sites. There is a nice astronomical clock.
Its university is the oldest in Moravia and second oldest in the Czech Republic. The university was founded in 1573 as part of effort to reestablish Roman Catholicism in the country. Roughly nine out of ten people of the Czech Crown lands were Protestants at the time.
Astronomical clock
An astronomical clock is a clock with special mechanisms and dials to display astronomical information. It shows the relative positions of the sun, moon, zodiacal constellations, and sometimes major planets. Some examples are large public clocks, but others are instruments for use inside buildings. Astronomical watches are made by several manufacturers. They are also extremely accurate.
The clocks made in the Middle Ages used the geocentric method, showing the Earth at the centre. The Sun rotates round the Earth: this accords with daily experience and with the world view of pre-Copernican Europe.