קהילת יהודי גיור

Gyula Konig (1849-1913), mathematician, born in Gyor, Hungary (then part of the Austrian Empire). He studied medicine in Vienna, Austria, and physics and mathematics at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, where he was awarded a Ph.D. in 1870. At that time he published his essay "Ueber die elliptischen Modulen and Beitrage zur Theorie der elektrischen Nervenreizung". He then studied at the University of Berlin, and became assistant professor in 1872, and full professor in 1874, at the age of twenty-five, at the Technical School of Budapest. When he was aged forty (in 1889), the Hungarian Academy of Arts and Sciences elected him a member and in the same year he converted to Christianity.


Konig's most important works were published in German; amongst them were: "Zur Theorie der Modulargleichungen" (1871); "Ueber eine reelle Abbildung der nicht-cuklidischen Geometric" (1872); "Ueber die Darstellung von Funktionen durch unendliche Reihen" (Mathematische Annalen, vol. 5); "Zur Theorie der Funktionen einer reellen Variabelen" (Monatshefte fuer Mathematik, vol. 1); "Ueber rationale Funktionen von Elementen" (Mathematische Annalen, vol. 14); "Die Faktorenzerlegung und Eliminationsprobleme" (Mathematische Annalen vol. 15); "Zur Theorie der Resolventen" (Mathematische Annalen, vol. 18); "Ueber endliche Formensysteme"; "Beitrage zur Theorie der algebraishen Gleichungen"; "Nouvelle demonstration du Theoreme de Taylor" (1874); "Grundzuege der allgemeinen Theorie der Mengenlehre" (1903). His "Neue Grundlagen der Logik, Arithmetik und Mengenlehre" was published one year after his death (1914) by his son. He also contributed essays to the "Comptes Rendus" of the French Academy, and published the correspondence of the mathematicians Bolyay and Gauss (1899). He was founder and editor of "Muegyetemi Lapok", a publication of the Technical School of Budapest, and founder, together with the physicist Lorant Eotvos, of the Hungarian Society for Mathematics and Physics.

Viktor Ranschburg (1862-1930), publisher, born in Gyor, Hungary (then Part of the Austrian Empire). After graduating from high-school he studied in Germany and prepared himself for the profession of publisher in Germany. He became director of the Hungarian publishing houses Revai Brothers and Atheneaum, and eventually became head of the Pantheon.

Ranschburg was vice-president of the Hungarian Association of Publishers and Booksellers (1906-19). His articles on copyright and publishers' right appeared in the periodical "Corvina". From 1901 on he was an officer of the Acadamie Francaise.

Among his published works are "A szerzoi jog vedelmere alakitott berni egyezmeny, vonatkozassal Magyarorszagra" ("The Bern Agreement for the Protection of Copyright, in its Relations to Hungary"; 1901); "A konyvarus muveltsege" ("The Education of the Bookseller").

Pal Ranschburg (1870- 1945), neurologist and psychologist born in Gyor, Hungary (then part of Austria-Hungary). The son of the chief rabbi of Gyor, Salamon Ranschburg, he received a MD degree (1894) from the University of Budapest and then worked under Wilhelm Wundt in Leipzig, Germany.

In 1899 he established the first psycho-physiological laboratory in the University of Budapest. He then opened a medico-psychological laboratory. From 1909 on he was lecturer andfrom 1918 an assistant professor of neurology at the University of Budapest; In 1916 Ranschburg was apppointed physician-in-chief of the neurology division of the Apponyi Polyclinic of Budapest.

In 1900 Ranschburg invented the mnemometer for measuring the capacity of memory and performing other intelligence tests. The inhibitions which he found to be responsible for the many mistakes were called after him "Ranschburg'sche Hemmungen." He was medical director of the secondary school for problem children; member of numerous medical and scientific societies and an officer of the French Academy.
In edition to hundreds of articles on neuropsychology and psychopathology, on psychology and war injuries of the nervous system, he published (in Hungarian): "A fejfajasrol" (1897); "Lelki gyogymodok" (1900); "A kretinizmus kor- es gyogytana" (1905); "A szellemi mukodesek fizikaja" (1908); "A lelki elet abnormalitasai" (1908); "A gyermeki elme" (1908); "Pszichologiai tanulmanyok" (I-II., 1914); "Az emberi elme" (1923) and "Ideggyogyaszat" (1926). In German he wrote: "Psychotherapie" (1900); "Der Geist des Kindes" (2nd ed., 1908); "Das Kranke Gedaachtnis" (1910); "Die Heilerfolge der Nervennaht" (1918); "Lese und Schreibstoerungen des Kindesalters" (1928). He was co-editor of "Psychological Abstracts and Psychological Register".

Imre (Emerich) Kelen (1895-1978), political cartoonist, born in Gyor, Hungary (then part of Austria-Hungary) and studied at Budapest, Munich and Paris. During World War I he was a lieutenant in the Austro-Hungarian army, and was decorated with the Hungarian Military Cross. After the war he moved Paris, France, where he became famous as a result of the cartoons which he drew of the statesmen at the peace conference in 1919. Later he went to live in Switzerland, where in 1922 he began his collaboration with another Hungarian Jew Alajos Dezso (1888-1964). Together the two men attended the League of Nations and major international conferences and over the next 15 years their Kelen-Derso cartoons appeared in many European newspapers.

In 1938 they emigrated to the United States, where they continued to work together until 1950. Collections of their work include "Guignol and Lausanne" (1922), "Indian Round Table Conference" (1930), "Le Testament de Geneve" (1931), "Pages Glorieuses" (1932), "The League at Lunch" (1936), and "Peace in Their Time" (1963). Kelen also wrote children's books. From 1948 to 1957 he was adviser to and then director of the United Nations Television Service in New York, and in 1966 published a biography of Dag Hammarskjold, the former secretary-general of the UN.

Joseph Ben-David (1920-1986), sociologist, born in Gyor, Hungary. He immigrated to the Land of Israel in 1941. He received his doctorate from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem where he was appointed professor of sociology in 1951. In 1979 he became professor of sociology in the University of Chicago. His main work was in the interaction between macrolevel historical events and microlevel sociological processes in science, higher education, and the professions and social stratification.

Otto Zuckerkandl (1861-1921), physician, urologist, born in Gyor (Raab, in Germany), Hungary (then part of the Austrian Empire), the younger brother of the renowned anatomist Emil Zuckerkandl (1849-1910).

From 1912 he was assistant professor of the surgical department at the Jewish Community Hospital in Vienna. He was the most important assistant of professor Leopold Dittel, a surgical urologist. Zuckerkandl worked primarily on and wrote about hypertrophy of the prostate, about the muscular system of the bladder, the histology of zystitis, and about tumor in the bladder. Zuckerkandl was named Professor of the University of Vienna in 1896.

He is the author, with Julius Tandler, of Handbuch der Urologie (1903-1905). He was coauthor on a number of textbooks on urology and surgery, among them Handbuch der Therapie der Tukerkulose.

Emil Zuckerkandl (1849-1910), anatomist, born in Gyor (Raab, in German), Hungary (then part of the Austrian Empire). He taught at the Viennese anatomical institute from 1874 and then in Utrecht, Netherlands, before being appointed Professor of Anatomy at the University of Graz, Austria, in 1882. He wrote an epoch-making book which made him the father of modern rhinology. Several anatomical entities that he discovered are named after him. From 1888 he was professor of descriptive and anatomic topography in the University of Vienna where he was also dean of the medical faculty. Emil Zuckerkandl was the brother of the urologist Otto Zuckerkandl (1861-1921). 

Kosman Yehoshua Wodianer (1759-1831), talmudic scholar, born in Veprovac, Hungary (then part of the Austrian Empire, now Kruščić in Serbia), the son of Philip Wodianer.

He maintained at his own cost a yeshiva and dormitories at Gyor, Hungary. His Hebrew writings were published by his son Arnold (Aaron) under the title “Sofer Nahlath Yehoshua”. The introduction to his “Liber Hereditatis Josuae, Commentationes in plerosque Talmudi Babylonici Tractatus additis commentationibus in Pentateuchum” (published in 2 vol., Vindobonae, 1890), was written in Hebrew by Prof. Vilmos (Wilhelm) Bacher. A copy of this book was sent to the Vatican, where it was received with much appreciation as a valuable theological tractate.