SHAYE-DANYEL VAYNBERG (S. D. WEINBERG)

SHAYE-DANYEL VAYNBERG (S. D. WEINBERG) (June 9, 1888-April 15, 1943)

            He was born in Biała Podlaska, Shedlets (Siedlce) district, Poland, into a well-off family.  He studied in religious primary school, synagogue study chamber, and later secular subjects through self-education.  In his years at the synagogue study hall, he joined the Bund, and until he left Poland he was active as a party leader in the Shedlets-Warsaw area.  He was arrested on several occasions and for that reason left Poland.  At the end of 1905, he moved to London, became a worker in a tailor shop, served as secretary of the Jewish Tailors’ Union, and was active in the socialist movement.  He was founder of the Workmen’s Circle and Hazemir (The nightingale) and cofounder of the Yiddish Temple Theatre in London.  In 1921 he moved to the United States, lived for a time in New York, working in a sweatshop, and then (early 1923) settled in Detroit, Michigan.  He was a member of the Socialist Party, and later, after the rift in the party, of the Jewish socialist union, Jewish workers’ committee, and the Workmen’s Circle.  He began his journalistic work with correspondence pieces in the illegal Bundist publications: Arbater-shtime (Voice of labor), Der bund (The Bund), and Fraynd (Friend) in St. Petersburg.  In his years in London, he was a regular contributor to the social democratic Naye tsayt (Our time) and the anarchist Arbayter-fraynd (Friend of labor); a contributor as well to Di tsayt (The times) in 1913, where (using the pseudonym Meloman) he wrote about theater and music; he also wrote for the daily newspaper Idishe zhurnal (Jewish journal) in 1914, where (using the pseudonym Iks) he took charge of a weekly column.  After WWI he co-edited the monthly Der nayer dor (The new generation), organ of the Workmen’s Circle in London.  From America he wrote a weekly letter to the London-based Der fraynd (The friend), which ceased publication in late 1924.  From 1923 until his death, he served as city editor of the Detroit edition of the New York-based Forverts (Forward).  He also placed pieces in: Tsukunft (Future), Der veker (The alarm), and Forverts—all in New York.  He published a series of articles on Jewish life in bygone times in Podlaska in Podlyaser shtime (Voice of Podlaska) in Shedlets (1933).  Among his books: Idishe institutsyes un anshtaltn in detroyt (Jewish institutions in Detroit) (Detroit, 1940), 211 pp.; “Vor tshest” fun 1943 (“War chest” for 1943) (Detroit, 1943), 22 pp.  He also wrote under the following pen names, among others: Malamut, S. Vinogurski, N. Brenvays, Metsenat, and Riveson.  He died in Detroit.

Sources: Dr. A. Mukdoni, in Morgn-zhurnal (New York) (June 23, 1941); Y. Leshtshinski, in Forverts (New York) (June 29, 1941); Shmuel Niger, in Der tog (New York) (July 5, 1941); A. Galatski, in Kanader nayes (Toronto) (September 21, 1941); S. Dinin, in Jewish Education (New York) (November 1941); Forverts (Detroit edition) (April 18, 1943); F. Shlamovitsh, in The Jewish News (Detroit) (April 23, 1943); Y. D. Berg, in Fraye arbeter shtime (New York) (July 18, 1943); E. Sherman, in Shriftn (New York) (Summer 1943); Z. Zilbertsvayg, in Teater heftn (New York) (1943); Y. Blum, in Folksshrift (New York) (December 1944).