Thursday 3 September 2015

BINYUMIN (BENJAMIN) GEBINER

BINYUMIN (BENJAMIN) GEBINER (June 25, 1898-February 7, 1997)
            He was born in Rovno, Volhynia.  He studied in religious primary school and in a Russian Hebrew high school, and he graduated from a Russian state high school.  He studied law at the Universities of Odessa and Kiev.  From 1922 he was living in the United States, where he studied journalism and graduated as a lawyer.  He was a leader in the Jewish labor and socialist movements.  Over the years 1930-1936, he was the general secretary of the Jewish Socialist Union.  He was the executive secretary, 1924-1936, of the Jewish Workers Committee.  From 1937 he was assistant secretary of the Workmen’s Circle.  He was active in the Jewish Workers Committee, ORT (Association for the Promotion of Skilled Trades), YIVO, Jewish Culture Congress, Jewish Socialist Union, the Forward Association, and others.  For twelve years he was a teacher at an elementary school and at the middle school of Workmen’s Circle in New York.  From 1949 he had a daily radio commentary on WEVD in New York.
            He began writing for Der emigrant (The emigrant) in Warsaw (1919).  He contributed to Bagrayfung (Comprehension), organ of the left Youth Zionists in Warsaw (1919-1922).  He also contributed to: Forverts (Forward), Tsukunft (Future), Der veker (The alarm), and Der fraynd (The friend) in New York; and Di shtime (The voice) in Mexico; among others.  He published as well in The Call, English-language organ of the Workmen’s Circle, and in publications of the trade union movement in America.  He edited Veker (Alarm), organ of the Jewish Socialist Union (1930-1934).  From 1937 he was managing editor of Fraynd, organ of the Workmen’s Circle in New York.


Sources: Y. Sh. Herts, 50 yor arbeter-ring in yidishn lebn (Fifty years of the Workmen’s Circle in Jewish life) (New York, 1950), pp. 284-87; Herts, Di yidishe sotsyalistishe bavegung in amerike (The Jewish socialist movement in America) (New York, 1954), see index; Who’s Who in World Jewry (New York, 1955), p. 239.

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