YITSKHOK VALK

YITSKHOK VALK (b. 1895)

            He was born in Dvinsk (Daugavpils), Byelorussia.  He studied in religious elementary school, in the state Russian-Jewish school, and privately.  Early on (1911) he joined the Zionist movement, initially Tseire-Tsiyon (Young Zionists) and later the Labor Zionists.  He was secretary of Ḥoveve sefat ever (Lovers of the Hebrew language) in Dvinsk.  He was a member of the administrative organs of Tseire-Tsiyon in the province of Vilna and in Poland.  From 1915 he took an active part in the community relief work for exiled Jews from Kovno and nearby environs.  For many years thereafter he worked for Yekopo (Yevreyskiy komitet pomoshchi zhertvam voyny—“Jewish Relief Committee for War Victims”) in Vilna.  From the 1920s he contributed written work to: Idishe tsaytung (Jewish newspaper), Unzer fraynd (Our friend), and Tsayt (Time) in Vilna; and Haynt (Today) in Warsaw.  He published features and articles on issues of the day, as well as images of immigrant life.  In Unzer hilf (Our aid), organ of Yekopo in Vilna, he published impressions of his community relief work in the Vilna region.  In Tsukunft (Future)—the Vilna party organ of the Zionist socialists—he published articles on party matters.  He was a close contributor to Af di khurves fun milkhomes un mehumes, pinkes yekopo (On the ruins of wars and turmoil, records of Yekopo), in which he published an entire series of reports and scenes his activities.  In 1941 he was still in Vilna, then under the authority of the Soviets.  What happened to him thereafter remains unknown.

Source: Af di khurves fun milkhomes un mehumes, pinkes yekopo, ed. M. Shalit (Vilna, 1931), see index.