Noah London, a young American Jewish engineer, was today appointed the directing head of a gigantic industrial scheme by the Supreme Economic Council, the highest industrial and economic body in the Soviet Union. London, who is a graduate of the Cooper Union Institute of New York, worked as a tailor in the daytime and studied engineering at night. The industrial plan over which he will have charge involves an expenditure of two hundred million roubles, and, will, it is said, revolutionize the coal industry in the Don Basin.
London, who was active in the labor movement in New York, came to Russia in 1926. Shortly after he was offered employment as an engineer in the government works at the Don Basin. There he developed a plan whereby the electrical, chemical and metallurgical plants of the region would be furnished with electric power from the water turbines, and after an examination of his plan by a commission of experts the central government approved it.
Fifty thousand workers will be working under London’s supervision when the project gets under way. In an interview with the correspondent of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, London declared that his plan would be carried out in full by 1932, the finished plant supplying electricity for 1,500,000 people and irrigating 40,000 hectares of land. For this purpose 280,000,000 gallons of water will be used daily. As an indication of the magnitude of the task, London pointed out that New York City uses 800,000,000 gallons.
London is the second American Jewish labor leader who has come to Russia and been entrusted by the Soviet government with the direction and management of such a huge industrial operation. Bill Shatov, also a former New Yorker, who recently completed the construction of the great Turkish-Siberian railroad, was the first.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
