KHAYIM-BOREKH VORZOGER (CHAIM WARZAGER)

KHAYIM-BOREKH VORZOGER (CHAIM WARZAGER) (b. April 20, 1911)

            He was born in born in Dubienko, Lublin district, Poland, into a well-to-do family.  In 1918 he moved with his parents to Chelm.  He studied in religious primary school, junior yeshiva, “cheder metukan” (improved religious elementary school), and in a small Orthodox house of study.  He was later for several years a student at the Vilna Teachers’ Seminary.  He was an active leader among the left Labor Zionists.  In 1931 he moved to Argentina.  He was a cofounder and member of the central committee of the Central Secular Jewish School Organization (Tsvisho [Tsentraler veltlekh-yidisher shul-organizatsye]) and for a time the secretary of the “Society for Laborers in the Land of Israel.”  From 1934, he was living in Montevideo, Uruguay.  He was a cofounder and builder of the local Sholem-Aleichem School and one of the most active builders of Uruguayan Jewish cultural life generally.  He belonged to the Zionist central council, was a councilor in the Jewish community, and served as director of Vaad haḥinukh (Educational council).  He debuted in print with correspondence pieces and articles in: Fraye yugnt (Free youth) in Warsaw (1928); and Khelemer folksblat (Chelm people’s newspaper).  He later contributed to: Arbeter-tsaytung (Workers’ newspaper) in Warsaw; Dos arbeter-palestine (Workers’ Palestine), Unzer vort (Our word), and Shul-bleter (School pages) in Buenos Aires; Folksblat (People’s newspaper), Unzer baytrog (Our contribution), Unzer veg (Our path), Unzer shul (Our school), and Tsvisho yedies (News from Tsvisho) in Montevideo, as well as in the Spanish-language Gaceta israelita there.  In book form: 60 teg in medines yisroel (Sixty days in the State of Israel) (Tel Aviv: Peretz Publ., 1965), 183 pp.  In Yizker-bukh—khelm (Remembrance volume for Chelm) (Johannesburg, 1954), he published a piece entitled “Khelm tsvishn di yorn 1924-1931” (Chelm between the years 1924 and 1931).

Sources: Unzer vort (Montevideo) (Augiust-September 1947); L. Halpern, in Folksblat (Montevideo) (December 16, 1955); Y. Vaynshenker, Boyers un mitboyers fun yidishn yishev in urugvay (Founders and builders of the Jewish community in Uruguay) (Montevideo, 1957), pp. 87-88.

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 233.]