Regina Gur Ari, Reb Yisroel Aryeh Leib’s Wife

Regina Milgram was born on September 29, 1910 in Lodz. At that time, Lodz was part of Russia. Later it became part of Poland. Her parents were Hirsch Meyer Milgram, a Jewish merchant, and Sarah Jaffe. Both her parents were killed in the Lodz Ghetto. In our phone conversation, the Rebbe’s sister-in-law told me that her brother-in-law, the Rebbe, was the one who filed the information about her parents with Yad Vashem.

As a young girl, Regina attended primary and secondary schools in Lodz from the age of seven to the age of fourteen and then moved with her parents to Danzig, where she continued her education in a private school until she was 19 years old. She then attended the Institute of Hygiene in Danzig for two years. In 1931, she went to Berlin and worked as a laboratory technician at the Hufeland Hospital. This hospital was just a few blocks away from where the Rebbe and his brother lived. It was in Berlin that they met, and she stayed in Berlin until 1933. When the Nazi crackdown began, she returned to her parents’ home in Danzig. Shortly afterwards, both Regina and the Rebbe’s brother emigrated to the land of Israel.

When she arrived in the Holy Land, Regina worked for two years in a pharmacy in Tel Aviv. In 1935, she became a laboratory technician with Dr. Walter Kahn of Tel Aviv and continued to work there for 15 years. The couple finally got married in Tel Aviv on August 15th, 1939 (Rosh Chodesh Elul 5699). Like his brother, the Rebbe, Leibel never received a degree from the University of Berlin. After emigrating to Israel, Leibel opened a clothing store, located on Nachlos Binyamin #3 in Tel Aviv. The store was later closed.

Yisroel Aryeh Leib was not happy with himself. He did not feel accomplished. Leibel’s dream was to finish his education. In his spare time, he would delve into mathematical problems. With the help of Zalman Shazar, he went to England to continue his studies. Leibel arrived in London on May 8, 1950. He traveled to Bristol University to discuss some of his independent research work in the field of physics with Professor Albrecht Frohlich and Professor Heilbron, both of the Department of Mathematics at Bristol University. With their help, Leibel became an external science student at the University of London. Based on his independent research work, he was awarded a B.Sc. in Special Mathematics in June of 1951.

Dr. Albrecht Frohlich, who had helped the Rebbe’s brother to be accepted at the University of London, helped him once again. His relative. Dr. Herbert Frohlich, held the Chair of Theoretical Physics at the University of Liverpool. With his help, Leibel filed an application with the Faculty of Science at Liverpool to write a Ph.D. thesis in Theoretical Physics. The subject of his dissertation was Theory of Electrons in Solids. The Faculty of Science minutes for October 8, 1951 show that the dissertation was approved. Besides working on his dissertation, Leibel also worked in the Theoretical Physics math lab to help struggling physics students. This allowed him to earn some money while working on his Ph.D.

The Rebbe’s brother lived in close proximity to the Liverpool campus. The Liverpool phone book for 1952 lists him as living at 56A Croxteth Road, Liverpool 8 in Sefton Park. The Immigration Department records also list this location as his address. Yisroel Aryeh Leib had been struggling for years with financial woes.

The Rebbe’s brother, who had a hard life, did not live to complete his Ph.D. He died on May 8, 1952 in Sefton Park, Liverpool. Dr. Herbert Frohlich, who helped the Rebbe’s brother so much since he had arrived in England, gathered together some of Leibel’s notes and published them in Philosophical Magazine, in March 1953.