Moise A. Novomeysky died in Paris on 27th March, 1961, at the age of 86.
A Russian by birth who had adopted Palestinian citizenship, Mr. Novomeysky was educated at Irkutsk, Siberia, from 1885 to 1893 and then entered the Royal Mining Academy, Clausthal, Germany, working during the vacations in lead mines in the Harz mountains, gold mines in Hungary and salt mines at Stassfurt. He spent six months studying metallurgy at the Berlin Polytechnicum, Charlottenburg, and then returned to Clausthal and gained the degree of metallurgical engineer in June, 1897.
From 1898 to 1900 Mr. Novomeysky was engaged in exploration and prospecting work in gold and copper mining in Siberia (Trans-Baikalia), followed by prospecting and experimental laboratory work for the production of pure sodium sulphate from mirabilite (Glauber’s salt) in 1901, for the manufacture of which a factory was erected at Barguzin, Siberia, under his management. Mr. Novomeysky returned to Germany for the first six months of 1904 to take a course of studies in practical geology at Heidelberg University and then resumed his duties as managing director of the factory.
In 1907 Mr. Novomeysky undertook the erection of a Californian hydraulic plant in placer mining in Siberia on behalf of Tzipican Gold Mining Co., Ltd., and from 1908 to 1912 was engaged in prospecting for salt and the erection and management of his own factory in Western Siberia for the manufacture of common salt and sodium sulphate, which continued successfully until the outbreak of civil war in 1919. From 1913 to 1918 he again worked for Tzipican Gold Mining Co., Ltd., prospecting and subsequently supervising the erection and operation of a dredge in Siberia — the first in that country.
Mr. Novomeysky left Russia when civil war broke out and took up residence in Palestine, adopting Palestinian nationality, and from 1920 devoted himself to fostering the development of the country’s mineral resources. He began with research and prospecting work in the Dead Sea region, on the extraction, separation, dressing and refining of chemical salts from the sea, the extraction of oil from bituminous limestone, and the geological investigation of bitumen, shale and phosphates.
He obtained the Dead Sea Concession in 1929 and planned the production of salt by solar evaporation from brine, the production of sulphuric acid, and the construction of superphosphates and ammonia plants. The Potash Company founded by Mr. Novomeysky was taken over by the government in 1952 and, while remaining Honorary President of the Potash Company and chairman of Fertilizers and Chemicals until 1954, he gradually retired from public life and devoted himself to writing ‘My Siberian life’ and a description of the work connected with the Dead Sea ‘Given to salt’. He had previously published a pamphlet entitled ‘The Dead Sea: a storehouse of chemicals’. In May, 1957, the Technion conferred on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Technology.
Mr. Novomeysky was elected to Membership of the Institution in 1925. He was also a member of the Institution of Chemical Engineers.
Vol. 72, Trans IMM 1962-63, p.60
