YOYSEF SHLOSBERG

YOYSEF SHLOSBERG (May 1, 1875-January 15, 1971)

            He was born in Koydenev (now, Dzyarzhynsk), Minsk Province, Byelorussia, into the family of a tailor.  He studied in religious elementary school.  In 1888 he came to the United States.  He attended public school, worked for ten years in a sweatshop, and at the same time studied political economy and sociology for several years at Columbia University.  He played an active and leading role in the Jewish American labor movement and the Socialist Labor Party (SJP), and he was later one of the first in the socialist movement to become actively involved in Labor Zionism.  Over the years 1899-1902, he edited the socialist Dos abend-blatt (The evening newspaper) and, with Dovid Pinski, the weekly Der arbayter (The laborer) (1904-1911) and Di idishe vokhenshrift (The Jewish weekly writing) (1912).  For many years he edited Fortshrit (Progress) (from April 2, 1915, a weekly; from November 1924, a biweekly), organ of the men’s tailors’ union.  He also wrote article for: Tog (Day) for which he was a regular contributor, Tsukunft (Future), Yidish (Yiddish) (1932), and London’s Dos fraye vort (The free word), among others.  In pamphlet form: Shklafenvirtshaft un loynarbet (The slave economy and wage labor) (New York: Arbayter, 1909).  He also published several books in English.  He died in New York.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 4; Yoysef Khaykin, Yidishe bleter in amerike, a tsushteyer tsu der 75-yoriker geshikhte fun der yidisher prese in di fareynikte shtatn un kanade (Yiddish letters in America, a contribution to the seventy-five-year history of the Yiddish press in the United States and Canada) (New York, 1946), pp. 199, 208; Shmuel Niger, in Tog (New York) (May 7, 1955); Dovid Pinski, in Tog (June 18, 1955); Shmuel Izban, in Amerikaner (New York) (June 30, 1961); Betsalel Sherman, in Idisher kemfer (New York) (January 24, 1964); Zelik Sher, in Idisher kemfer (November 19, 1965); Pinkhes-Leyzer Goldman, In gang mit der tsayt (With the passage of time) (Tel Aviv: Peretz Publ., 1973).

Berl Cohen