Trotsky’s father, David Bronshtein, was a farmer of Russified Jewish background who had settled as a colonist in the steppe region, and his mother, Anna, was of the educated middle class.
He moved to Nikolayev in 1896 to complete his schooling. It was in Nikolayev, at age 17 that Trotsky became acquainted with Marxism. He began to skip school in order to talk with political exiles and read illegal pamphlets and books.
After briefly attending the University of Odessa, he returned to Nikolayev to help organize the underground South Russian Workers’ Union.
In 1897, Trotsky helped found the South Russian Workers' Union. For his activities with this union, Trotsky was arrested in January 1898 and sent to Siberia for a four-year sentence. He celebrated his 20th birthday in prison.
After escaping from Siberia in 1902, Bronstein adopted the pseudonym Trotsky. He managed to make his way to London, England, where he joined the Socialist Democratic Party and met Vladimir Lenin.
By late 1905, Trotsky had become a leader of the revolution. Although the 1905 revolution failed, Trotsky himself later called it a "dress rehearsal" for the 1917 Russian Revolution.
Trotsky quickly became a leader in the 1917 Russian Revolution. He officially joined the Bolshevik Party in August and allied himself with Lenin.
Following a power struggle with Joseph Stalin in the 1920s, Trotsky was expelled from the Communist Party and deported from the Soviet Union.
Leon Trotsky - Prolific writer, a leader in the 1917 Russian Revolution
