While the Chemla family was originally from Djerba, Jacob Chemla served as a legal representative for litigants of the Beth din of Tunis. Chemla was an active philanthropist in the Jewish community of Tunis, serving as a founding member of the :fr:Hôpital israélite de Tunis|Jewish Hospital of Tunis among other ventures.
Journalist, author, translator
In 1878, Chemla began a career in journalism with his brother-in-law, :he:מסעוד מעארך|Messaoud Maarek. For over thirty years, until 1925, he helped bring in a period of growth in Judeo-Tunisian Arabic literature. He published two novels, Amour et malice in 1912 and Les Cœurs purs in 1923. Chemla translated multiple titles into Hebrew and Judeo-Tunisian Arabic, including The Jews of Spain at the Time of the Inquisition and The Count of Monte Cristo, which he originally released as a serial and later in full during the 1880s.
Ceramics
Chemla is perhaps most well known around Tunisia for his activities in ceramics. His father Haïm Chemla was named by the Bey during the 1860s as the tax collector for the Artisans of Tunis. Haim Chemla would often pay the Bey the equivalent tax in cash while re-selling the pottery he had collected. Jacob Chemla followed in his father's footsteps around 1880, when he opened a shop in the Place des Potiers à Tunis,. In 1887, the Tunisian government contracted him to help revive traditional ceramics. In the Interwar period, production was moved to French Algeria and the United States, and the company presented at expositions in 1925, 1931 and 1937. Chemla's ceramic tiles decorated the homes of the rich in Tunis, Sidi Bou Said and La Marsa. He brought in his sons Victor, Albert and Moïse to the family business. After the death of Victor and Albert's departure for Algeria in the 1930s, Moise succeeded his father and renamed the businessLes fils de J. Chemla, which operated as a family business until 1966. In the 1960s, President of TunisiaHabib Bourguiba contracted the company to install ceramic panels at Carthage Palace.
