Leorah Kroyanker photograph collection

Leorah Farkas (now Kroyanker) was the daughter of Ladislaus and Hannah Farkas. Ladislaus Farkas, son of Istvan (Stefan) and Anna Farkas, was born in Ounaszerdahely, Hungary (now Ounajska Streda, Slovakia), in 1904. His brother,
Adalbert (Belus), was born in 1906. In 1908 the family moved to Nagvarad
(Oradea Mare), Romania, where a third brother, Paul, was born in 1909. Istvan owned a drugstore and served as the chairman of the merchants' association.

Paul also became a pharmacist and worked with his father. Ladislaus attended Gymnasium in Oradea then went to Vienna, Austria, to study chemistry in the Technische Hochschule where he was joined by his brother, Adalbert. After graduating
Ladislaus moved to Berlin, Germany to continue his education, and he received his diploma in chemical engineering in December 1926. Nobel laureate, Fritz Haber, Director of the Institute for Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physical Chemistry, hired Ladislaus to become his personal assistant in 1926.

On April 29, 1933, because of Nazi racial laws, Haber was forced to fire Farkas and his other Jewish employees. Though still personally unaffected by the legislation, Haber, a Jewish convert to Christianity, also submitted his own resignation and set about seeking positions abroad for Farkas and his other protegees. Haber helped Farkas find work in Cambridge, England, and wrote to Weizmann on his behalf to get him a position in Palestine. Haber also hoped to move to Palestine and continue to work with Farkas, but he passed away in Switzerland on January 27, 1934. Ladislaus' brother, Adalberl, also went to Cambridge. The two brothers worked in the same laboratory and shared a living stipend from the Central British Fund for German Jewry. Ladislaus immigrated to
Palestine in 1935, and Adalbert followed in 1936. Ladislaus became a professor of chemistry at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. On July 16, 1940, he married Hannah Aharoni, a microbiologist. Adalbert became a lecturer in physical chemistry, but left Palestine for the United States in 1941.

In addition to pursuing theoretical science, Ladislaus Farkas concentrated on developing applications of physical chemistry to facilitate economic, military, and industrial growth for the nascent Jewish State. His research aided Israel's citrus fruit, potash, and military industries. He also developed new materials for filling dental root canals. After the end of World War II, Ladislaus traveled to England during the summer of 1945 to meet with international colleagues and also to try to determine the fate of his relatives in Hungary. He learned that both of his parents perished in Auschwitz in 1944. His youngest brother, Paul, who had also become a pharmacist and worked with his father, and his wife, Eva, survived, though their baby daughter, Kati, perished. Paul and Eva immigrated to Palestine in October 1946 and established a pharmacy in Jerusalem. After returning to Palestine, Ladislaus continued his work at Hebrew University. However, in the months preceding Israel's declaration of Independence, fighting intensified in Jerusalem, and Ladislaus had to abandon his laboratory on Mount
Scopus. His wife, Hannah, and infant daughter, Leorah, fled to Tel Aviv where a second daughter, Ruti, was born in April 1948. In the late fall of 1948, Ladislaus accepted a commission to come to the United States to purchase equipment for Hebrew University, Hadassah Medical Center, and the Israeli Air Force. Since commercial flights were not flying to Israel, he boarded a chartered flight manned by Mahai volunteers. The plane left Haifa, Israel, on December 30, 1948, and encountered difficulties shortly thereafter. It crashed in a small town north of Rome, Italy, killing Ladislaus and the other passengers on board. [Source: Kroyanker, Leorah and Geva, Ruth; "Prof. L. Farkas, The Story of a Scientific Pioneer": Jerusalem, The Jewish National and University Library, 1998.)