AVROM-YITSKHOK PROVOLSKI

AVROM-YITSKHOK PROVOLSKI (b. 1895)

            He was born in Warsaw.  He studied economics at the Universities of Warsaw and Paris.  He was a cofounder of “Tseire-tsiyon” (Young Zionists) in Poland, of the first “Academic Home,” and for many years a contributor to the Joint Distribution Committee.  He was general secretary of the Zionist Organization and of the Jewish National Fund in Poland.  He established the Central Zionist Handicraftsmen’s Union, the association of Jewish cooperatives, and other groups.  From 1914 he was writing for Haynt (Today) in Warsaw—its jubilee volume of 1928 included a work by him on the Jewish economic situation in Poland.  He later wrote for: Moment (Moment) in Warsaw; Der morgn (The morning) in Lemberg; and elsewhere.  He was co-editor of: Bafrayung (Liberation) (1918-1919); Di idishe virklekhkeyt (Jewish reality) (1925-1926); Handverker tsaytung (Craftsmen’s newspaper) (1928-1932); Farn folk (For the people) (1923-1939); Di kooperativer almanakh (The cooperative almanac) (1934); and Di tashn-lukhes (The pocket calendars) for 1930-1932—all in Warsaw.  Among his pseudonyms: A. Froymzon, A. Ben Froym, and A. Y. P.  From the time of the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939, there has been no news of him.

Sources: Biblyografishe yorbikher fun yivo (Bibliographic yearbooks from YIVO) (Warsaw, 1928), see index; Pinkes-yekopo (Records of Yekopo [Yevreyskiy komitet pomoshchi zhertvam voyny (Jewish Relief Committee for War Victims)]) (Vilna, 1930), pp. 827-28; Yidishe gezelshaftlekhe leksikon (Handbook of Jewish society) (Warsaw, 1939), pp. 804, 832; Khayim Finkelshteyn, Di yidishe prese in varshe (The Yiddish press in Warsaw) (New York, 1956), p. 207.

Khayim Leyb Fuks