ESTER LURYE

ESTER LURYE (1877-1920s)

            She was born in Warsaw.  She graduated from a Russian high school.  Over the years 1899-1903, she studied at the University of Berne (Switzerland) and received a doctoral degree in the humanities.  In Berne she joined the socialist movement.  In 1904 she returned to Warsaw, was active in the Bund, and was arrested on several occasions.  In 1906 she was deported to Siberia, from whence she fled in 1912 and arrived in the United States.  Initially (in New York) she was approached about giving public lectures on literary and scientific questions.  She debuted in print in Tsukunft (Future) in New York (1914-1915) with a series of articles entitled “Yidishe salon-froyen” (Jewish salonnières).  Later, until 1921, she published the following series in Tsukunft: “Barimte yidishe froyen in amerike un england” (Celebrated Jewish women in America and England) (1916-1917); “Di ershte froyen rekhtlerins” (The first women’s rights activists) (1918); “Barimte froyen-shriftshtelerins” (Celebrated women writers) (1919-1920); as well as such articles as: “Hayne un zayn mishpokhe” (Heine and his family) (March-April 1915); “Di froyen-tipn bay peretsn” (The types of women in Perets) (May 1915); “Shekspir un di daytshe literatur” (Shakespeare and German literature) and “Sholem-aleykhem un di yidishe froy” (Sholem-Aleykhem and the Jewish woman) (1916); “Marks’ froy un tekhter” (Marx’s wife and daughters) (May 1918); and “Dos lebn un virkn fun libkhnekht un luksemburg” (The life and impact of Liebknecht and Luxembourg) (1919).  She was an internal contributor to Di glaykhheyt (Equality), the weekly organ of the Ladies’ West End Dressmakers’ Union (New York, 1917-1918), in which among other items she published the series: “Di historye fun der kooperativer bavegung” (The history of the cooperative movement); “Di historye fun der ‘safradzh’-bavegung” (The history of the suffrage movement); and “Di rusishe froy un di revolutsye” (The Russian woman and the revolution).  And, she edited the column “Di froyen-velt” (The women’s world).  From time to time she contributed as well to Forverts (Forward), Fortshrit (Progress), and Millers vokhnshrift (Miller’s weekly writing)—in New York.  She lived in great poverty and died all alone in the Bronx, New York.

Sources: Tsukunft (New York) (August 1916); Glaykhheyt (New York) (April 6, 1917); A. Sh. Zaks, Di geshikhte fun arbeter-ring (The history of Workmen’s Circle), vol. 2 (New York, 1925), see index; information from Pauline Kobrin and N. B. Minkov in New York; Khayim Leyb Fuks, in Tsukunft (November-December 1962).

Khayim Leyb Fuks