Johannes Käbin

Johannes Käbin was born in 1905 in Kalvi, Virumaa. In 1907, Käbin's family moved from Estonia to St. Petersburg, where his father died in the same year. In 1916, together with his mother and older sister, he moved to the village of Sussanino in Petrograd Province, where the family bought a small farm (0.27 hectares). In 1926 he entered the Leningrad School of Soviet and Party Construction. A year later, Käbin was appointed chairman of the Susanin Village Council of the Gatchina (Trotsky) district. He completed his studies from Institute of Red Professors in 1938.

He worked as a teacher in Moscow before returning to Estonia after the Second World War.[3] Käbin later became the Deputy Head of the Propaganda and Agitation Department of the Central Committee of the EKP. In 1948, Käbin returned to be elected secretary of the Central Committee for Propaganda and Propaganda. In 1950, at the 8th Plenum, he was elected as First Secretary of the EKP. Initially a hardline Stalinist, he gradually became more moderate in the post-Stalin era but nevertheless remained devoted to the consolidation of Soviet rule in Estonia. He was in this position for more than 25 years, in part due the Kremlin's approval of his policies.[4] He was the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet (head of state) from 1978 to 1983.

After the restoration of independence, he remained in Estonia. He died in Tallinn in 1999 at the age of 94. He is buried in Metsakalmistu.

His son is the physicist Eduard Käbin (born 17 April 1945), who is a graduate of Moscow State University and is a Honorary Worker of Higher Professional Education of Russia.[5]

He received many awards, such as the:

• Hero of Socialist Labour (1975)
• Six Orders of Lenin (1950, 1955, 1958, 1965, 1971, 1975)
• Order of the October Revolution (1973)
• Two Orders of the Red Banner of Labour (1946, 1981)
• Order of Friendship of Peoples (1985)
• Medal "For Labour Valour" (1959)