SHOLEM SANTOP

SHOLEM SANTOP (b. 1894)

            He was born in Myadl (Medilas), Lithuania.  He studied at the Volozhin Yeshiva and secular subjects privately.  In the United States, he began working with the Yiddish theater as an errand boy at a singing hall in Brownsville, and he was later a prompter in the troupe from Atlas.  He wrote one-act and three-act plays for the Yiddish stage in New York and throughout the provinces.  In early 1914 he came to Winnipeg with a Yiddish theatrical troupe and stayed.  He studied philosophy at the University of Manitoba.  He was also the editor there of the weekly Di kanader yidishe velt (The Canadian Jewish world).  Later, he was a contributor to the daily newspaper Der keneder yid (The Canadian Jew).  He then returned to New York, and there he published sketches in Di varhayt (The truth) and feature pieces in Der groyser kundes (The great prankster).  In 1917 he joined the Jewish Legion and returned in 1919.  In 1930 he settled in Stamford, Connecticut, and when Sholem Asch lived there (1938), Santop served as his literary secretary.  For several years he worked for the United Jewish Appeal.  In 1964 he wrote a series of articles for the theater page of the Forverts (Forward) in New York.

Source: Zalmen Zilbertsvayg, Leksikon fun yidishn teater (Handbook of the Yiddish theater), vol. 4 (New York, 1963).

Yankev Kahan