MENAKHEM-MENDL GELENBERG

MENAKHEM-MENDL GELENBERG

            He was born in the vicinity of Biała Podlaska.  He belonged to the circle of Hashomer Hatsair (Youth guard).  He was active in the cultural realm, and he administered a cultural circle and the Biała Podlaska public school Yavneh.  He was a Hebrew teacher and a gifted pedagogue, Esperantist, and translator.  He translated a series of items from Esperanto into Yiddish, founded and edited (together with A. Urmakher and Yankev Kohen) the Biała Podlaska weekly Podlasyer lebn (Life in Podlaska).  He published articles in Folkstsaytung (People’s newspaper), Literarishe tribune (Literary tribune), and Fraynt (Friend)—in Warsaw.  He published a string of works in Literarishe bleter (Literary leaves) in Warsaw, such as “Yidish af varshaver gasn” (Yiddish on the streets of Warsaw), an important work on folk Yiddish (1930); and in Foroys (Onward) in Warsaw (June 9, 1939): “Problemen un tematik” (Problems and subject matter).  He translated R. C. Sherriff’s Sof fun vanderung, pyese in dray aktn (Journey’s end, a play in three acts) (Warsaw, 1930), 130 pp.  He also wrote poetry and was a fine stylist.  He died during WWII.

Sources: Biblyografishe yorbikher fun yivo (Bibliographical yearbooks from YIVO), vol. 1 (Warsaw, 1928), p. 11; “Yizker” (Remembrance), Yidishe shriftn (Lodz, 1946).

Yitskhok Kharlash