Georges Montefiore-Levi (18 February 1832 – 24 April 1906) was a

Belgian Belgian may refer to: * Something of, or related to, Belgium * Belgians, people from Belgium or of Belgian descent * Languages of Belgium, languages spoken in Belgium, such as Dutch, French, and German *Ancient Belgian language, an extinct languag ...

politician, industrialist and inventor of

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

extraction who created the first phosphorus bronze.

Early life

He was born in Streatham, South London. His father, Isaac Levi, was a merchant, and his mother was a first cousin of financier

Moses Montefiore Sir Moses Haim Montefiore, 1st Baronet, (24 October 1784 – 28 July 1885) was a British financier and banker, activist, philanthropist and Sheriff of London. Born to an Italian Sephardic Jewish family based in London, aft ...

Career

A businessman and an active philanthropist, Montefiore-Levi represented Liège in the Senate from 1882 to 1901, and he was the president of the 1892 international monetary conference that met in Brussels. Montefiore-Levi founded one of Belgium's oldest engineering schools, the

Institut Montefiore An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes can ...

in Liège, and it later became part of the

University of Liège The University of Liège (french: Université de Liège), or ULiège, is a major public university of the French Community of Belgium based in Liège, Wallonia, Belgium. Its official language is French. As of 2020, ULiège is ranked in the 301 ...

. He also established an asylum for convalescent children in Esneux that he named after his wife. He had an interest in photography and was once president of the Belgian Association of Photography. He improved existing technology so that it was possible to take up to fifteen wax-paper negatives without opening a camera, and he introduced a canopy that allowed for the immediate processing of collodion negatives. In 1866, he married , daughter of

Jonathan-Raphaël Bischoffsheim Jonathan-Raphaël Bischoffsheim (26 April 1808 – 5 February 1883) was a Belgian banker, businessman and philanthropist. Family He descended from the Bischoffsheim family, which was endowed with an exceptional European network. On 11 June 1832, ...

. He died at his home in Brussels in 1906.

References

External links

Full-length biography from the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium (in French)

Tribute from L'Association Belge de Photographie (in French)

Institut Montefiore
1832 births 1906 deaths 19th-century Belgian inventors 19th-century Belgian Jews 20th-century Belgian Jews Belgian Sephardi Jews Levites Georges Members of the Senate (Belgium) Belgian industrialists {{Belgium-bio-stub