Johann Kremenezky (also Kremenetski) (
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
: יונה קרמנצקי) February 15, 1850 – October 25, 1934, was a
Zionist
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Je ...
industrialist, electrical engineer, founder of the
Jewish National Fund
Jewish National Fund ( he, קֶרֶן קַיֶּימֶת לְיִשְׂרָאֵל, ''Keren Kayemet LeYisrael'', previously , ''Ha Fund HaLeumi'') was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Syria (later Mandatory Palestine, and subseq ...
, and personal secretary and adviser to
Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl; hu, Herzl Tivadar; Hebrew name given at his brit milah: Binyamin Ze'ev (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austro-Hungarian Jewish lawyer, journalist, playwright, political activist, and writer who was the father of modern p ...
.
Biography
Jonas Yosipovich Levinson (later Yona Kremenezky) was born in Odessa. He was the owner of Kremenezky, Mayer & Co, a noted electric lighting company in Vienna. In the summer of 1896, Kremenezky met with Theodor Herzl, leader of the Zionist movement, to discuss the implementation of modern technology in the future Jewish state.
Zionist activism
Kremenezky was the first chairman of the Jewish National Fund (JNF) from 1902 to 1907. JNF's blue
charity boxes were distributed by the JNF almost from its inception at the initiative of Kremenezky. Once found in many Jewish homes, the boxes became one of the most familiar symbols of Zionism. Additionally he sold stamps to raise funds.
Awards and recognition
In 1930, he was awarded the
Wilhelm Exner Medal The Wilhelm Exner Medal has been awarded by the Austrian Industry Association, (ÖGV), for excellence in research and science since 1921.
The medal is dedicated to Wilhelm Exner (1840–1931), former president of the Association, who initialized ...
On 20 June 1956 a street was named after him in
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
, called Kremenetzkygasse.
Streets in
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv-Yafo ( he, תֵּל־אָבִיב-יָפוֹ, translit=Tēl-ʾĀvīv-Yāfō ; ar, تَلّ أَبِيب – يَافَا, translit=Tall ʾAbīb-Yāfā, links=no), often referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the G ...
and
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
have been named for him.
References
Further reading
*
Salomon Wininger
Salomon Wininger (; 13 December 1877, Gura Humora, Bukovina – December 1968, in Ramat Gan, Israel) was an Austrian-Jewish biographer. He has been called one of the greatest Jewish biographers of all time.
Before World War I, Wininger lived in ...
: ''Große Jüdische National-Biographie'' ("Lexicon of Jewish National Biographies"). Vol. 4. Chernivtsi 1930.
* Mascha Hoff: ''Johann Kremenezky und die Gründung des KKL''. ("J. K. and the founding of the KKL"). Lang, Frankfurt/M. u. a. 1986, .
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kremenezky, Johann
1850 births
1934 deaths
Austrian Zionists
Odesa Jews
Businesspeople from Vienna