YANKEV-SHMUEL YOFE (JACOB SAMUEL JOFFE)

YANKEV-SHMUEL YOFE (JACOB SAMUEL JOFFE) (September 2, 1886-1963)

            He was born in Kupishok (Kupiskis), Kovno district, Lithuania.  Until age eleven he studied in religious elementary schools.  In 1904 he graduated from a Russian Jewish state school in Ponevezh (Panevezys), where he belonged to the youth organization Pirḥe Tsiyon (Flowers of Zion) and later joined the Zionist Socialist Party.  In 1907 he made his way to the United States, where he worked initially as an employee in a clothing business in Newark, New Jersey, and later in a shirt factory in New York.  He studied (1909-1910) in the Baron Hirsch Agricultural School in Woodbine, New Jersey, and later worked on various farms in New Jersey.  Over the years 1914-1918, he studied at the Agricultural Institute of Rutgers University (New Brunswick, New Jersey), and in 1922 received his doctoral degree in soil chemistry and bacteriology.  In 1923 he published in Tsukunft (Future) in New York a treatise on Louis Pasteur, and he wrote as well on the developmental tendencies in American agriculture.  From that point, over the course of ten years, he published a series, entitled “Populer-visnshaftlekhe shmuesn” (Chats on popular science), in Der amerikaner (The American) in New York.  He also often published writings in: Fraynd (Friend), Morgn-zhurnal (Morning journal), Fraye arbeter-shtime (Free voice of labor), and other periodicals in New York.  In the 1920s he made a research trip through the agricultural colonies of the Agro-Joint in the Crimea and in the Kherson and Odessa regions, and after returning he published reports in: Literarishe bleter (Literary leaves) in Warsaw; Der yidisher landvirt (The Jewish farmer) in Lemberg; Tsukunft and Idish (Jewish) in New York.  His writings were later translated into Hebrew and published in the trade publications in the state of Israel.  He also wrote in Yiddish a special series of treatments of soil science for Hasade (The field), the Israeli organ of Merkaz Haḥaklai (Agricultural Center) (1926-1928).  In 1935 he made a research trip through Israel and published articles concerning it in: Tog (Day) and Idisher kemfer (Jewish fighter) in New York.  In the 1930s he was active in the Provisional Commission for Jewish Agricultural Settlements in America, and in September 1933 he published its bulletin, Afn agrar-front (On the agrarian front).  In issue 25.2 of Yivo-bleter (Pages from YIVO) (March-April 1945), he published an analysis of Walter Clay Lowdermilk’s Palestine, the Land of Promise (which also appeared in a separate imprint under the title Erets yisroel, dos land fun hofenung [Israel, land of hope], with a foreword and Yofe’s biographical notice [New York, 1945], 24 pp.).  From 1922 he was working in the agricultural experimental station in New Jersey; for a short time he also worked at the experimental station at Cornell University.  From 1924 he also gave courses at Rutgers University, and from 1937 he was professor of pedology (soil science) there.  In the same field, he made important findings.  He published his scientific works in English, Russian, and other languages.  His Pedology (New York, 1935), 550 pp., was a textbook and reference work for research students scholars of soil science; it was in its third edition and was being used in numerous agricultural institutes throughout the world.  He was also the author of a second volume for college students: The ABC of Soils (New Brunswick, 1949), 385 pp.  He was active in general and Jewish academic and cultural organizations; for a time he was a lecturer at the New York teachers’ seminary; he was a member of the administrative committee and the director’s council of the “League for Working Israel”; he was also a member of the director’s council of YIVO and other institutions.  He visited Israel again in 1947 and 1952.  He provided a great deal of assistance to Israeli agriculture with his knowledge of the field.  He visited once again in 1949.  He died in Haifa.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 1; “Undzere mitarbeter” (Our contributors), Tsukunft (New York) (December 1943); biographical notice in his Erets yisroel, dos land fun hofenung (Israel, land of hope), p. 22 (see also the accompanying notice in Yivo-bleter 25.2 [1945]); YIVO bibliography, part 2 (New York, 1955), p. 75; A. Nesher, in Haarets (Tel Aviv) (February 12, 1959); Austin Wehrwein, in New York Times (August 18, 1960).

Zaynvl Diamant