Simcha Blass

Simcha Blass (or Symcha Blass, or Simkha Blass); November 27, 1897 – July 18, 1982; Hebrew: שמחה בלאס‎‎) was an Israeli engineer and inventor. He was a main figure of water development in Israel, initiator, introducer and developer of new drip irrigation systems, inventor of new dripper (with his son Yeshayahu).

Simcha Blass was born in Warsaw, Poland, which was then part of the Russian Empire, to an Orthodox Jewish family. He was active in the Jewish self-defense units organized in Warsaw to defend Jews during the end of World War I. His engineering studies in Warsaw were interrupted by the Polish-Soviet War and completed after that war. During the war, he was recruited to the Polish Army, there he invented for the Polish Air Force, a meteorological appliance, measuring the intensity and direction of winds.

Later, he invented, patented and developed an operative wheat planting machine, which was tested in Europe (and even sold there) and in Palestine (1927), but proved uneconomical. The main motivation for this invention was Zionism (i.e. enabling more Jews settle in Palestine). Zionism was the main drive for most of his other activities in adult life.

During the years 1930–1948 he was the most known water engineer in the Jewish Yishuv of Palestine. He planned the first modern aqueduct in the Jordan valley. He was the chief engineer and one of the founders (with Levi Eshkol and Pinchas Sapir) of Mekorot water company (established 1937, now Israel's national water company).

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