Russian Geographical Society
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The Russian Geographical Society is a learned society, founded on 6 August 1845 in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
[edit] Imperial Geographical Society
Prior to the Russian Revolution of 1917, it was known as the Imperial Russian Geographical Society.
Founding members of the Society included Fyodor Litke, Fyodor Wrangel, Vladimir Dahl, Vladimir Odoyevsky, Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve, and Karl Ernst von Baer, among others.
The Society's official presidents were Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich of Russia in 1845-92 and Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich of Russia in 1892-1917, but actually it was run by the Vice-Presidents: Fyodor Litke (1845-50, 1855-57), Count Mikhail Muravyov (1850-57), Pyotr Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky (1873-1914), and Yuly Shokalsky (1914-31).
The Imperial Society comprised four departments, specializing in physical geography, mathematical geography, ethnography, and statistics. The filial societies were established at the Caucasus (1850), Irkutsk (1851), Vilnius (1867), Orenburg (1868), Kiev (1873), Omsk (1877), and other cities.
The Society organized and funded the expeditions of Pyotr Kropotkin, Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky, Nikolai Przhevalsky, Nikolai Miklukho-Maklai, Pyotr Kozlov, Vladimir Obruchev, and Lev Berg. It helped set up the first polar stations in Russia and was one of the first to publish detailed studies of the Russian folklore and Ukrainian fairs.
The Society pioneered the systematic exploration of the Northern Urals in 1847-50, of the farthest reaches of the Amur River in 1854-63, of the vast areas of Kashgaria, Dzungaria, and Mongolia from the 1870s onward.
[edit] All-Union Geographical Society
The Society changed its name to the State Geographical Society in 1926 and to the Geographical Society of the USSR in 1938. After Shokalsky its presidents were geneticist Nikolai Vavilov (1931-40), zoologist Lev Berg (1940-1950), parasitologist Evgeny Pavlovsky (1952-64), glaciologist Stanislav Kalesnik (1964-77), polar explorer Aleksei Treshnikov (1977-91). The Society has convened numerous congresses and has awarded four types of medals, named after Litke, Semyonov, Przhevalsky, and Semen Dezhnev. By 1970, it had published more than 2,000 volumes of geographical literature, including the annual Zapiski (since 1846) and Izvestiya (since 1865). It reverted to its original name upon the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The main offices of the Society are in St. Petersburg.
[edit] Further reading
- Pyotr Semyonov-Tyan-Shansky. История полувековой деятельности Императорского Русского географического общества. Volumes 1-3. SPb, 1896.
- Lev Berg. Всесоюзное Географическое общество за 100 лет. 1845-1945. Moscow-Leningrad, 1946.
- Географическое общество за 125 лет. Leningrad, 1970.
