Photographers
unknown
Sitter
Leon Liebgold, July 31, 1910 - September 2, 1993
Date
unknown
Type
Portrait
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Credit Line
The Museum of the City of New York
Accession Number
66.77.18
Testimony
He was born in 1911 in Przemysl, Galicia. His parents were
the Yiddish actors Bashe and Zalman Liebgold. His father was
the director of Yiddish theatre in Krakow and across the
Galician proivnce.
Possessing a beautiful voice,
Leon became a choir boy in a temple and acted in children's
roles in his father's troupe. In 1927 he became a
professional actor in Vienna's "Reklam" Theatre. In 1928 he
became a member of the "Vilna Troupe," where he acted until
1933, going on tour across Austria, Germany, Romania,
Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and other countries. In
1934 he became a member in the "cooperative" troupe in
Krakow and at the end of 1934 he was engaged in Warsaw's
theatre "Novoshtshi" to act in small-arts with the "Yidishe
bande."
In 1935 he married the
actress Lily Liliana, went on a tour across Europe with the
"Yidishe bande" (which was called the "Polish bande"), and
in 1939 they both came to America with the troupe. Liebgold
remained there due to the outbreak of the Second World War,
and he acted in 1940 with a cooperative union troupe in
Chicago, in 1941 with a cooperative union troupe in Detroit.
In 1943 he became a member in
the Yiddish Actors Union and became engaged in New York's
Second Avenue Theatre. From 1943 until 1946 he served in the
American army in the "Counter-Intelligence Core." After
returning from the army he acted in New York and across the
country until 1954, then traveled with his wife to
guest-star in Argentina, where he had, for the first time,
performed on 30 September 1954 in the Soleil Theatre."
Source of Testimony
Zalmen Zylbercweig -- "Lexicon of
the Yiddish Theatre," Volume 3, p. 2241, 1959.