LEVY, LOUIS EDWARD

LEVY, LOUIS EDWARD (1846–1919), U.S. chemist, inventor, communal leader, and newspaper editor. Levy, who was born in Pilsen, Bohemia, was brought to the U.S. at the age of eight. In 1875 he invented the photochemical engraving process known as "Levytype," permitting newspapers to print halftone pictures from the stereotype plate, and founded the Levytype Company in Baltimore. The company moved to Philadelphia in 1877. Levy, the first U.S. citizen to receive a patent in this field, also invented the Levy acid blast, an etch-powdering machine, and the Levy line screen. He published and edited the Philadelphia Evening Herald, an independent Democratic daily (1887–90), the Mercury, a Sunday paper (1887–91), and The Jewish Year (1895). Levy was a leader of the Philadelphia Jewish community and, reflecting his deep interest in the problems of Jewish immigration to the U.S., was a founder (1884) and president of the Association for Relief and Protection of Jewish Immigrants. He wrote The Russian Jewish Refugees in America (1895), a pamphlet; Business, Money and Credit (1896); and (with Hugo Bilgram) The Cause of Business Depressions as Disclosed by an Analysis of the Basic Principles of Economics (1914).