ELYAHU GALATSKI

ELYAHU GALATSKI (1875-June 23, 1958)

            Born in Kremenchuk, Ukraine, he was from his student days on an important leader in the Russian socialist movement, and for a time he was sent to Siberia.  After escaping from there, in 1912 he arrived in Germany and became a professor of social science at Munich University.  During WWI, he was deported from Germany and settled in Oslo, Norway.  When the Bolsheviks seized power, they wanted to make him Soviet ambassador to Norway, which he turned down due to his opposition to Communism.  In 1919 he arrived in New York, and for a time he was the director of cultural work among Russian émigrés with support from the Rockefeller Foundation.  He was an excellent speaker and lecturer, enabling him later, in the Workmen’s Circle and the socialist union, to develop a great deal of activity during his travels over the American continent.  He worked for a time as the travel agent for ORT (Association for the Promotion of Skilled Trades) in the United States.  From 1935 until he became ill in 1955, he served as a member of the editorial board of the weekly newspaper Kanader nayes (Canadian news) in Montreal, where in addition to informative and journalistic writings, he also published currents events articles on Jewish and general issues.  He died in Montreal.

Sources: Idishe zhurnal (Toronto) (June 24, 1958); Forverts (New York) (June 30, 1958).