Chaim Weizmann I. He founded the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel and was instrumental in the establishment of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Weizmann was born in the village of Motal, located in what is now Belarus and at that time part of the Russian Empire. He was the third of 15 children born to Oizer and Rachel Czemerinsky Weizmann. His father was a timber merchant. From ages four to eleven, he attended a traditional cheder, or Jewish religious elementary school, and he began studying Hebrew as a child. At the age of 11, he entered high school Pinsk, where
The Racah Institute of Physics before the opening of the Hebrew University, first steps towards physics research in Jerusalem were taken by Chaim Weizmann. Weizmann, the President of the Zionist Organisation, and the major figure in the planning and founding of the Hebrew University contacted Leonard Ornstein, the known physicist from Utrecht, the Netherlands, to prepare plans for physics research at the upcoming university. After the University was officially opened, he became the chairman of the physics group for several years, acting from his seat at Utrecht. In the year 1923, two years before its official opening, Albert Einstein gave a talk on Mount Scopus,