Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who ruled the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death in 1953, holding the titles of General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1952 and the nation's Premier from 1941 to 1953. Initially presiding over an oligarchic one-party system that governed by plurality, he ultimately became the de facto dictator of the Soviet Union by the 1930s. Ideologically committed to the Leninist interpretation of Marxism, Stalin helped to formalise these ideas as Marxism–Leninism, while his own policies became known as Stalinism. December 18, 1878 – March 5, 1953; died at 74. Alive at the same time as Albert Einstein, Leo Tolstoy, Vincent van Gogh, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Pope Francis. Wiki link