Catherine the Great - Ruler. Catherine II continued the work of Peter the Great and made Russia into a European power. Influenced by the French Enlightment, she wanted to rationalise and reform the Russian Empire. She founded some of the first Russian schools for girls and a medical school to provide health care for her subjects. She was thought of a ‘queen for the people.’ Under her reign, the territory of the Russian Empire was greatly expanded. Catherine undoubtedly played a key role in the development of Russia as a modern state.

Sofia Kovalevskaya – Mathematician. Born in 1850, Kovalevskaya was a great mathematician, a writer and advocate of women’s rights in the 19th century. Her struggle to obtain the best education possible began opening university doors to women. Her masterful work in mathematics made her male counterparts reconsider their archaic notions of women’s inferiority to men in scientific arenas. In 1883 she lectured at the University of Stockholm and was made Chairwoman of Mechanics. In 1888 she entered a pioneering paper in an international competition by the French Academy of Sciences and won. Her life’s work produced revolutionary scientific theories and gave impetus for future discoveries.

Anna Pavlova - Ballerina. Born in a suburb of St. Petersburg, Pavlova is one of the greatest ballerinas of the 20th century and also one of ballet’s most influential ambassadors. Her unique, expressive style thrilled audiences all over the world. No dancer, before or since, has travelled as extensively: 350,000 miles in 15 years - long before air travel was accessible! She invented the first modern Pointe shoe and no ballerina today would even attempt toe work without it. In 1931 she contracted pleurisy. Doctors could have saved her life with an operation that would have left her unable to perform. She chose to die rather than give up dancing.

Marina Ivanova Tsvetaeva - Poet. Famous across Russia, Tsvetaeva left behind an incredible body of work that broke ground for women poets. One of her innumerable themes was the tension between women’s private lives and their public roles and she wrote vividly about the external and internal battles she lived through. Anna Akhmatova was her strongest literary influence. Tsvetaeva lived in exile and poverty in the 1920s and 30s because of her political views and during this time she supported her family through her writings alone. She committed suicide in 1941.As Boris Pasternak said: ‘The greatest recognition and reevaluation of all awaits Tsvetaeva, the outstanding poet of the twentieth century.’ See Poem of the Month.

Marina Raskova – Pilot. In September 1938, Raskova became the first person ever to fly from Moscow to the Russian Far East. She did it in a non-stop flight with a completely female crew. She was made Hero of the Soviet Union. During WWII she formed three air regiments consisting of women. They are thought to be the first women in history to take part in military actions and they fought fanatically. Known for hitting their marks, of the 240 ‘Witches of the Night’ (as the Germans called them), 32 were burned. Raskova died in 1943 during one of her flights. She was interred in the Wall of the Kremlin.

Raisa Gorbatjov – First Lady. Raisa Gorbatjov was a philosophy teacher before becoming the First Lady of the USSR in 1985. She was her husband’s principal advisor behind closed doors. Unlike previous leaders’ wives, she attended public functions in designer clothes and jewellery. Her ‘bold’ behaviour and active role promoting equality shocked the Soviet people, but in the West it helped to give the Soviet Union a more human face. Diagnosed with leukaemia in 1999, she began to get appraisals from the Russian people and fundraised for children’s leukaemia hospitals. She died in 1999 and was given a public funeral.

Valentina Tereshkova – Cosmonaut and first woman in space. Born in 1937 in a farming village, Tereshkova received a technical education after the war and she learned how to parachute jump and how to fly, which ignited her passion for astronautics. On June 16, 1963, Tereshkova was launched into space aboard the Vostok 6 and became the first woman to travel in space, making 48 orbits of Earth. After this feat, she became Chairwoman of the Committee of Soviet Women in 1968, was made Vice-President of the International Democratic Women Confederation (for world peace) in 1969 and in 1971 she became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. A moon crater is named after Tereshkova.

Galina Starovoitova – Politician. Starovoitova was popular amongst the Russian people as she was one of the few politicians who worked for the benefit of others. She was popular in the West because she consistently expressed her political ideals of democracy, freedom of press and respect for human rights.1989-91 she was a member of Congress of People's Deputies, the prominent democratic opposition to the Communist Party. In 1990 she co-founded the ‘Democratic Russia’ party and 1991-1992 was an adviser to president Yeltsin. In 1995 she became a member of the Duma, the Russian parliament. Here she opposed the anti-Semitic statements of Albert Makasjov. One year later the Election Committee refused her nomination as candidate for president because she was a woman. Starovoitova planned to run for the presidency elections in 2000, but in 1998 she was shot in her house in St. Petersburg. Her murder remains unsolved.