YOYSEF MELER

YOYSEF MELER (1884-December 3, 1940)

            He was born in Cracow, western Galicia.  He attended a Polish high school and studied law at Lemberg and Vienna Universities; he received his doctor of law degree in 1907 from the latter.  In 1908 he settled in Lemberg, where he practiced as an attorney.  During WWI he lived in Serbia and later, until 1939, he was back again in Lemberg.  He was cofounder of the Zionist socialist youth movement in Austria, initially with Tseire-Tsiyon (Young Zionists) and later with the Labor Zionist party.  He was secretary of the association of business employees in Galicia.  He began writing initially for Labor Zionist publications in Polish in Nasze Hasło (Our password) in Lemberg (1903), for which he also served as editor; later he wrote for Morija (Moriah) (1905-1906).  From 1903 he placed work in (and for a time served as editor of) Der yudisher arbayter (The Jewish worker) (Cracow-Lemberg-Vienna) from 1904 to 1918.  He also wrote for: Życie Żydowskie (Jewish life) in Lemberg (1919-1939); Der idisher kempfer (The Jewish fighter) in New York (1906-1918); Der yudisher handels-ongeshtelter (The Jewish business employee) in Lemberg (1912); Arbayter-tsaytung (Workers’ newspaper) in Warsaw; and other serials as well.  In 1939 when the Bolsheviks entered Lemberg, he was arrested and thrown in jail in Lemberg, and there he died.

Sources: N. Buksboym, in Yudisher arbeter-pinkes (Jewish labor records) (Warsaw, 1928), see index; N. M. Gelber, Toldot hatenua hatsiyonit begalitsiya (History of the Zionist movement in Galicia) (Jerusalem, 1958), see index.

Khayim Leyb Fuks