Timeline of Saint Petersburg

17th-18th centuries

1611 – Nyenschantz built by Swedes.

1703

City founded by Tsar Peter the Great

Cabin of Peter the Great built.

Artillery museum formed.

1709 – Petrischule founded.

1710 – Saint Sampson's Church built.

1711 – Menshikov Palace opens.

1712

City becomes capital of Russian Empire.

Winter Palace built.

1714

Library of the Russian Academy of Sciences founded.

Summer Palace of Peter the Great built.

1716 – Catholic Church of St. Catherine founded.

1718 – Saint Petersburg Police established.

1719 – Summer Garden laid out.

1720

Hermitage Bridge opens.

New Holland Island created.

1721 – Ligovsky Canal constructed.

1724

Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences founded.

Saint Petersburg Mint founded.

1725

Peterhof Palace built (approximate date).

Death of Peter the Great.

1727 – Kunstkamera built.

1728 – State capital moves to St. Petersburg from Moscow.

1731 – Cadet Corps founded.

1733 – Peter and Paul Cathedral built.

1736 – Fire.

1738 – Imperial Ballet School established.

1740

Peter and Paul Fortress built.

Mariinsky Ballet founded (approximate date).

1744

Lomonosov Porcelain Factory founded.

Twelve Collegia built.

1748 – Smolensky Lutheran Cemetery opens.

1754

Stroganov Palace built.

Anichkov Palace built.

Transfiguration Cathedral built.

1756 – Alexandrinsky Theatre founded.

1757

Academy of the Three Noblest Arts founded.

Vorontsov Palace built.

1759 – Page Corps founded.

1762 – Winter Palace built.

1764

Hermitage Museum established.

Institute for Noble Maidens founded.

1770

Foundling Hospital established.

Moika Palace built.

1771 – Chicherin House built.

1773

Mining School established.

Volkovo Cemetery established.

1774 – Roller coaster pavilion built at Oranienbaum.

1779 – Free Russian Theatre opens.

1780

Saint Andrew's Cathedral consecrated.

Chesme Church built.

1782 – Bronze Horseman monument unveiled.

1783

Russian Imperial Opera Orchestra formed.

Kamenny Theatre opens.

1785

City Duma established.

Hermitage Theatre opens.

Great Gostiny Dvor built.

Marble Palace built.

19th century

1801

Friendly Society of Aficionados of Elegance formed.

Saint Michael's Castle built.

Tsarina's Meadow renamed Field of Mars.

1802 – Saint Petersburg Philharmonia formed.

1804 – Petersburg Pedagogical Institute established.

1805 – Russian Naval Museum established.

1806 – Police Bridge rebuilt.

1807 – Constantine Palace built.

1808 – Smolny Institute building constructed.

1810

Military Engineering school established.

Stock Exchange built.

1811 – Kazan Cathedral built.

1812 – Syn otechestva begins publication.

1813 – Red Bridge built.

1814

Imperial Public Library opens.

Narva Triumphal Arch erected.

1818

Otechestvennye Zapiski begins publication.

Blue Bridge built.

Asiatic Museum founded.

1819 – Saint Petersburg University formed.

1822 – Yelagin Palace built.

1823 – Admiralty building rebuilt.

1825

December – Interregnum.

Decembrist revolt.

Northern Bee begins publication.

Mikhaylovsky Palace built.

1826 – Kamenny Island Theatre building constructed.

1829 – General Staff Building constructed.

1832 – Zoological Museum established.

1833

Obvodny Canal opens.

Mikhaylovsky Theatre founded.

1834 – Alexander Column unveiled.

1835

Imperial School of Jurisprudence founded.

Trinity Cathedral built.

1836

Sovremennik begins publication.

Premiere of Glinka's opera A Life for the Tsar.

1838 – Moscow Triumphal Gate erected.

1839

Observatory opens.

Bolshoi Zal built.

1842 – Alexander Park established.

1844 – Mariinsky Palace built.

1848 – Beloselsky-Belozersky Palace expanded.

1850 – Blagoveshchensky Bridge built.

1851

Moscow – Saint Petersburg Railway begins operating.

Nicholaevsky rail terminal opens.

1858 – Saint Isaac's Cathedral built.

1860 – Mariinsky Theatre opens.

1861 – Nicholas Palace and New Michael Palace built.

1862

Saint Petersburg Conservatory founded.

New Michael Palace built.

November: Premiere of Verdi's opera La forza del destino.

1863 – Pavel Military School established.

1866

Vestnik Evropy begins publication.

Dostoyevsky's fictional Crime and Punishment published.

1867 – Khlebnikov founded.

1869 - Population: 667,926.

1870 – Riihimäki – Saint Petersburg Railway constructed.

1874 - Premiere of Musorgsky's opera Boris Godunov.

1876 – School of Technical Drawing founded.

1877 – Ciniselli Circus opens.

1878 – Bestuzhev Courses and Stieglitz Museum established.

1879

Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography established.

Nobel Brothers Petroleum Company headquartered in city.

1882 – Imperial Music Choir formed.

1890 – Saint Petersburg Prison for Solitary Confinment built.

1893 - Premiere of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6.

1894 – Ves Peterburg directory begins publication.

1895 – Russian Museum established.

1897 - Population: 1,267,023.

1900s–1940s

1900

Russian cruiser Aurora launched.

Suvorov Museum founded.

1905

January – Bloody Sunday.

October – Saint Petersburg Soviet formed.

1907 – Electric trams begin operating.

1909 – Na Liteinom Theatre founded.

1910 - March: Soyuz Molodyozhi art exhibit held.

1913 - Population: 2,318,645.

1914 – City renamed "Petrograd."

1916

Grigori Rasputin assassinated.

Palace Bridge built.

1917

February Revolution begins.

March – Petrograd Soviet formed.

July Days.

August – Golos Truda begins publication.

October Revolution.

1918

State capital moves to Moscow from Petrograd.

Osobaya Drammaticheskaya Truppa organized.

Ioffe Institute established.

1920 – Theatrical re-enactment of Storming of the Winter Palace.

1921 – Art Culture Museum opens.

1922 – Leningrad Young People's Theatre opens.

1923 – Russian Museum of Ethnography opens.

1924 – City renamed Leningrad.

1928 – Circus museum opens.

1929 – Young Theatre founded.

1931 – Komarov Botanical Institute and Leningrad Radio Orchestra established.

1932

Shosseynaya Airport begins operating.

Leningrad Union of Soviet Artists and St Petersburg Union of Composers founded.

Bolshoy Dom built.

Avrora Cinema active.

1934

Sergey Kirov assassinated.

Leningrad Secondary Art School established.

Premiere of Shostakovich's opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District.

1936

Arctic and Antarctic Museum opens.

Memorial Lenin Komsomol Theatre established.

1938 – Museum of History and Development of Leningrad established.

1941

Siege of Leningrad begins.

Road of Life begins operating.

1942 – Russian Museum of Military Medicine founded.

1944

Siege of Leningrad ends.

State Puppet Theatre of Fairy Tales established.

1946 – Moskovsky Victory Park opens.

1949 – Leningrad Affair.

1950s–1990s

1953

Pavlovsky District becomes part of city.

Pushkin Museum established.

1954 – Levashovo, Pargolovo, and Pesochny become part of city.

1955 – Saint Petersburg Metro begins operating.

1962 – Saint Petersburg TV Tower constructed.

1963 – Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-124 Neva river ditching.

1967 – Museum of Electrical Transport established.

1971

Dostoevsky Museum opens.

Rimsky-Korsakov Museum established.

1974 – Na Fontanke Youth Theatre founded.

1981 – Leningrad Rock Club opens.

1984

Teatralnaya laboratoriya founded.

Sister city relationship established with Los Angeles, United States.

1987

Na Neve Theatre opens.

Zazerkalie (theatre) opens.

1988 – Xenia of Saint Petersburg canonized.

1989

Komedianty Theatre founded.

Akhmatova Museum opens.

1990 – Ostrov Theatre opens.

1991

City renamed Saint Petersburg.

Flag design adopted.

Anatoly Aleksandrovich Sobchak becomes mayor.

1993 – Tunnel nightclub opens.

1994

Legislative Assembly of Saint Petersburg formed.

St Petersburg Ballet Theatre founded.

1996 – Vladimir Anatolyevich Yakovlev becomes city governor.

1997 – Toy Museum established.

1998

Politician Galina Starovoytova assassinated.

Nabokov Museum opens.

21st century

2000 – City designated administrative center of Northwestern Federal District.

2003

Aleksandr Dmitriyevich Beglov becomes city governor, succeeded by Valentina Ivanovna Matvienko.

Peter & Paul Jazz Festival begins.

Museum of Optical Technologies opens.

2004

Big Obukhovsky Bridge opens.

Sergey Kuryokhin Center for Modern Art established.

2005 – Gas incident.

2006 – 32nd G8 summit held.

2007 – Dissenters' March.

2008 – Side by Side (film festival) begins.

2009 – Gallery of Contemporary Sculpture and Plastic Arts opens.

2010

Yota Space art festival begins.

Erarta art museum established.

2011

Georgy Sergeyevich Poltavchenko becomes city governor.

Saint Petersburg Dam inaugurated.

Saint Petersburg Ring Road opens.

St. Petersburg International Legal Forum begins.

2013 – September: 2013 G-20 Saint Petersburg summit.