Yeshayahu Daniel [S. D.] Weinberg
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Born on 15 June 1888 in
Bialo Mazovietsk, Poland, into a well-to-do family. He
learned in a cheder, Beit HaMedrash. Later he educated
himself in secular studies. After being in a Beit
HaMedrash sponsored by the "Bund", he experienced every
phase of every broyzindiker epoch: conspiratory
meetings, prison, "Birzhe", demonstrations,
Cossack whippings, etc. At the same time he really
blending together the Yiddish and world literature.
At the end of 1905 he
immigrated to London, where he became an active member
in a Yiddish dramatic circle, attending the finest
concerts and English theatre productions. W. became the
secretary of the West End branch of the "Amalgamated
Tailors Union". Then he founded the "Hazamir"
association and became one of the founders of the local
"Arbeter Ring". W. began to write under the pseudonym "Malmut"
in "Tsayt" about theatre and music, and became very
active in the "Russian Immigrant Committee", and was one
of the founders of "Temple Theatre". In London, he freed
himself, and he and his wife Rose, very intimate with
the later famous Yiddish actor Samuel Goldenburg, and
maintained this intimate friendship for their entire
lives.
In 1921 he immigrated to
America, and he lived for a certain time in New York,
where he worked in a shop. In the beginning of 1923 he
settled in Detroit, where he began his journalistic work
and soon became the local editor of the "Forward", where
he wrote about local matters, especially about the
Yiddish theatre, about |
which he wrote from
time to time under the pseudonym Vinogurski A.
And., also articles in the New York edition of
the "Forward". W. also wrote in many other
periodical editions and had in book form issued
in Yiddish "Idishe insṭiṭutsyes un anshṭalṭen in
Detroit" (Detroit, 1940, 211 pp.), which evoked
the greatest praise from the general Yiddish
critics, and in English, in the same, in 1943, a
brochure of 22 pages "Der 'Ṿor ṭshesṭ' fun
1943".
On 15 April 1943, W.
passed away in Detroit.
Zalmen Zylbercweig
characterized him as such:
"In a span of
several tens of years, first in London and later
in Detroit, where the deceased had made his
home, he had with a complete fire in his soul
thrown himself into Jewish cultural work, with
the help of all Jewish cultural institutions
with rat and tat, by himself he gave and
helped crate money for every cultural
requirement. Especially our friend Weinberg was
given over to the Yiddish theatre. Not only had
he with his pen served as Yiddish theatre
critic, but he had verbally propagandized for
the importance of the public Yiddish word. His
home in Detroit was the address of the Yiddish
theatre people, and the warmth with which those
in the theatre were received by him and his
beloved life-guide(?) Rosa, will forever remain
marked in the hearts of hundreds of Yiddish
actors and those in the theatre. Quite
particularly, had the deceased displayed an
intimate relationship to the "Theatre Lexicon".
From the first moment in which the editor of the
"Lexicon", Zalmen Zylbercweig, arrived in
Detroit, he found a brother and a friend in
Weinberg, who was dedicated to our work".
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[--] -- [Zalmen Zylbercweig]
-- Yeshayahu (S. D.) veynberg in "teatr
heftn", New York, N' 1, 1943.
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"Lexicon of the New Yiddish
Literature", New York, 1960, Vol. III, pp.
351-352.
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