Horodischtsch, Leon

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HORODISCHTSCH, LEON

HORODISCHTSCH, LEON (1872–1940), merchant and banker, one of the first adherents of political Zionism in Russia. Horodischtsch was born in Bialystok into a Zionist family. His father was an associate of Samuel *Mohilever. At first he worked in his father's bank and then established a bank of his own in Brest-Litovsk. In 1906 he became the head of a savings and loan society in Brest-Litovsk. He attended the First Zionist Congress and all the subsequent Congresses until World War i. In 1920 he settled in Palestine, where he continued his banking activities as manager of Halva'ah ve-Hissakhon in Tel Aviv, and other positions. He published his reminiscences of the First Zionist Congress in Sefer ha-Congress ("Book of the Congress," 19502, 132–3).

[Getzel Kressel]