Lenin Medal
| Order of Lenin | |
|---|---|
Order of Lenin, Type 4 awarded from 1943 to 1991
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Awarded by the  Soviet Union |
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| Type | Single-grade order |
| Eligibility | Citizens of the Soviet Union; foreigners; institutions, enterprises and collectives |
| Awarded for |
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| Status | No longer awarded (the very last award dates by 1998) |
| Statistics | |
| Established | April 6, 1930 |
| First awarded | May 23, 1930 |
| Last awarded | December 21, 1991 |
| Total awarded | 431,418 |
| Precedence | |
| Next (higher) | Hero of the Soviet Union |
| Next (lower) | Order of the October Revolution |
 Ribbon of the Order of Lenin |
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The Order of Lenin (Russian: Орден Ленина, Orden Lenina), named after the leader of the Russian October Revolution, was the highest civilian decoration bestowed by the Soviet Union. The order was awarded to:
From 1944 to 1957, before the institution of specific length of service medals, the Order of Lenin was also used to reward 25 years of conspicuous military service.
Those who were awarded the titles "Hero of the Soviet Union" and "Hero of Socialist Labour" were also given the order as part of the award. It was also bestowed on cities, companies, factories, regions, military units and ships. Corporate entities, various educational institutions and military units who received the said Order applied the full name of the order into their official titles.
The order was established by the Central Executive Committee on April 6, 1930.
The first design of the Order of Lenin was sculpted by Pyotr Tayozhny and Ivan Shadr based on sketches by Ivan Dubasov. It was made by Goznak of silver with some lightly gold-plated features. It was a round badge with a central disc featuring Vladimir Lenin's profile surrounded by smokestacks, a tractor and a building, possibly a power plant. A thin red-enamelled border and a circle of wheat panicles surrounded the disc. At the top was a gold-plated "hammer and sickle" emblem, and at the bottom were the Russian initials for "USSR" (Russian: СССР) in red enamel. Only about 800 of this design were minted. It was awarded between 1930-1932.
The second design was awarded from 1934 until 1936. This was a solid gold badge, featuring an silver plated disc bearing Lenin's portrait . The disc is surrounded by two golden panicles of wheat, and a red flag with "LENIN" in Cyrillic script (Russian: ЛЕНИН). A red star is placed on the left and the "hammer and sickle" emblem at the bottom, both in red enamel.
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