This Day in Russian History...

So, I browsing around the internet, and I found this nifty little website (yes, I did just use 'nifty' in a sentence, no, I am not an eighty-year old woman) called Russipedia, which I think is essentially some odd Wikipedia-type website for all things Russian. Basically, don't actually take what they say as cut-and-dry without actual research, but it's certainly fun to browse!

Mikhail I of Russia

Anyways... I found out that today, March 24, is the day that sixteen-year old Mikhail Feodorovich Romanov assumed the throne of the Russian Empire in 1613, thereby beginning the Romanov dynasty. As many of you knew, the Romanov dynasty ended with Czar Nicholas II in 1917 when the Bolsheviks assumed power; however, I bet you didn't know that the dynasty lasted nearly three hundred years. Mikhail was essentially chosen to be czar by a council of nobles because he was related to the last czar of the Rurik dynasty, and connected to Ivan the Terrible.

Mikhail was reluctant to take the job at first, but after his patriotism was appealed to the boy went to Moscow, and was crowned. His reign was, for the most part, dominated by his parents, but overall he began the longest-running dynasty in the history of Russia.