Rabinovich, Leon

Russian physicist and journalist; born at Brestovitz, government of Grodno, Jan. 2, 1862. He is descended on his father's side from Yom-Ṭob Lipmann Heller, and on his mother's side from Meïr Eisenstadt, being a grandson of Abraham Hirsch Eisenstadt. He received his early education in the ḥeder and from his mother, who taught him German. At the age of fourteenyears he went to the yeshibah of Mir and thence to that of Volozhin. In 1881 he went to Königsberg, where he pursued the study of medicine for two years. In I884 his predilection for physics took him to Paris, where he entered the Sorbonne. He won a gold medal at the Paris Exhibition of 1890 for various inventions in machinery. His inventions, which are numerous, include an oil-raiser, a rotating thermometer, a portable fountain, an automatic siphon, and a distributor for liquids.

Rabinovich contributed a series of scientific articles to "Ha-Meliẓ" in 1887, and later wrote for other Hebrew periodicals, as well as for "La Nature." In 1890 he undertook the editorship of "Ha-Meliẓ" and of "Die Blätter" (Yiddish); in 1904 he began to publish "Der Tag," a Yiddish daily. Rabinovich's articles in "Ha-Meliẓ" were collected under the title "Ha-Yerushah weha-Ḥinnuk."

Bibliography:

  * Oẓar ha-Sifrut, iii. 63-67.



H. R. A. S. W.