Gheorghe Balș (April 24, 1868 – September 22, 1934) was a

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

n engineer, architect and art historian. Born in

Adjud Adjud (; ) is a city in Vrancea County, Western Moldavia, Romania. It has a population of 15,178 inhabitants (as of 2021). It lies at a railway junction which has a classification yard and a passenger station. Adjud, situated north of the poin ...

Vrancea County Vrancea () is a county (județ) in Romania, with its seat at Focșani. It is mostly in the historical region of Moldavia but the southern part, below the Milcov (Siret), Milcov River, is in Muntenia. Demographics At the 2021 Romanian census, 2 ...

, his parents Alecu Balș (1838-1894) and Roxanda Sturdza (d. 1878) were descended from prominent

Moldavia Moldavia (, or ; in Romanian Cyrillic alphabet, Romanian Cyrillic: or ) is a historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester River. An initially in ...

n ''

boyar A boyar or bolyar was a member of the highest rank of the feudal nobility in many Eastern European states, including Bulgaria, Kievan Rus' (and later Russia), Moldavia and Wallachia (and later Romania), Lithuania and among Baltic Germans. C ...

'' families. He studied in Lausanne, where he completed high school, and at the

Zürich Polytechnic ETH Zurich (; ) is a public university in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 1854 with the stated mission to educate engineers and scientists, the university focuses primarily on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. ETH Zurich ran ...

, where he earned an engineer's diploma. In 1891, after returning home, he was hired at the bridge inspection service of ''

Căile Ferate Române Căile Ferate Române (; abbreviated as the CFR) was the state railway carrier of Romania. The company was dissolved on 1 October 1998 by splitting into several successor companies. CFR as an entity existed from 1880, even though the first ra ...

'' state railway carrier. He worked with

Anghel Saligny Anghel Saligny (; 19 April 1854, Liești, Șerbănești, Moldavia – 17 June 1925, Bucharest, Kingdom of Romania, Romania) was a Romanian engineer, most famous for designing the Anghel Saligny Bridge, Fetești-Cernavodă railway bridge (1895) ...

and possibly

Louis Blanc Louis Jean Joseph Charles Blanc ( ; ; 29 October 1811 – 6 December 1882) was a French Socialism, socialist politician, journalist and historian. He called for the creation of cooperatives in order to job guarantee, guarantee employment for t ...

on the

King Carol I Bridge The Anghel Saligny Bridge (), formerly King Carol I Bridge, is a complex of two railroad truss bridges in Romania, across the Danube River and the Borcea branch of the Danube, connecting the regions of Muntenia and Dobruja. The bridge is listed ...

Cernavodă Cernavodă () is a town in Constanța County, Northern Dobruja, Romania with a population of 15,088 as of 2021. The town's name is derived from the Bulgarian ''černa voda'' ( in Cyrillic), meaning 'black water'. This name is regarded by some s ...

and on the lighthouse in

Tuzla Tuzla (, , ) is the List of cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, third-largest city of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the administrative center of Tuzla Canton of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. As of 2013, it has a population of 110,979 inha ...

. He worked on the

Port of Constanța The Port of Constanța is located in Constanța, Romania, on the western coast of the Black Sea, from the Bosphorus Strait and from the Sulina Branch, through which the Danube river flows into the sea. It covers , of which is land and the re ...

together with George Duca.Gheorghe Balș
at Arhiva de arhitectură From 1908 to 1911, he worked in the technical service of the

Interior Ministry An interior ministry or ministry of the interior (also called ministry of home affairs or ministry of internal affairs) is a government department that is responsible for domestic policy, public security and law enforcement. In some states, the ...

's public health division. He collaborated closely with his brother-in-law

Ioan Cantacuzino Ioan I. Cantacuzino (; also Ion Cantacuzino; 25 November 1863 – 14 January 1934) was a renowned Romanian physician and bacteriologist, a professor at the School of Medicine and Pharmacy of the University of Bucharest, and a titular member o ...

in the fight against tuberculosis, and was president of the

Romanian Red Cross The Romanian Red Cross (''Crucea Roșie Română'', CRR), also known as the National Society of Red Cross from Romania (''Societatea Națională de Cruce Roșie din România''), is a volunteer-led, humanitarian organization that provides emergen ...

. Together with Nicolae Ghica-Budești, he built the Cantacuzino Institute in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ) is the capital and largest city of Romania. The metropolis stands on the River Dâmbovița (river), Dâmbovița in south-eastern Romania. Its population is officially estimated at 1.76 million residents within a greater Buc ...

in 1921. He was involved with the committee for historic monuments, joining in 1913 and later becoming vice president. In 1923, Balș was elected a titular member of the

Romanian Academy The Romanian Academy ( ) is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 active members who are elected for life. According to its bylaws, the academy's ma ...

. He died in Bucharest in 1934.Ștefan Ștefănescu, Adolf Armbruster, ''Enciclopedia istoriografiei române̦sti'', p. 44. Bucharest: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, 1978 Together with Ghica-Budești and

Nicolae Iorga Nicolae Iorga (17 January 1871 – 27 November 1940) was a historian, politician, literary critic, memoirist, Albanologist, poet and playwright. Co-founder (in 1910) of the Democratic Nationalist Party (PND), he served as a member of Parliament ...

, he sought to identify the influences that shaped

Romanian architecture Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditional ...

both in Moldavia and in

Wallachia Wallachia or Walachia (; ; : , : ) is a historical and geographical region of modern-day Romania. It is situated north of the Lower Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians. Wallachia was traditionally divided into two sections, Munteni ...

. His research took him to Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, Turkey and the Russian Empire. Balș pointed to Armenian and Georgian as well as Serbian contributions, and his work on 15th and 16th-century Moldavian architecture was favorably received. He sat on numerous company boards, including those of a mine and of a credit bank for encouraging industrial firms. The Balș family had extensive rural properties in Moldavia, but his parents gradually had to sell their lands in order to pay off debts and losses by their administrators. In 1880, his father sold the imposing residence in

Iași Iași ( , , ; also known by other #Etymology and names, alternative names), also referred to mostly historically as Jassy ( , ), is the Cities in Romania, third largest city in Romania and the seat of Iași County. Located in the historical ...

that today houses the

Music Conservatory A music school is an educational institution specialized in the study, training, and research of music. Such an institution can also be known as a school of music, music academy, music faculty, college of music, music department (of a larger i ...

. In 1897, Balș married Maria Știrbey, the daughter of prince Alexandru B. Știrbei and the sister of

Barbu Știrbey Prince Barbu Alexandru Știrbey (; 4 November 1872 – 24 March 1946) was 30th Prime Minister of Romania, Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Romania in 1927. Early life and ancestry Born into the prestigious Știrbei, House of Știrbey, he was ...

. The marriage contract specifies that the bride received a trousseau of 25,000 lei, and that she wished to invest 200,000 lei of her parents' inheritance for building and furnishing a house. The couple had four children: Zoe (1897-1991), Alexandru (1898-1950s), Ion (1901-1980) and Matei (1905–1976). A high school in Adjud was named after Balș in 2006.Colegiul Tehnic Gheorghe Balș
site

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bals, Gheorghe 1868 births 1934 deaths People from Adjud

Gheorghe Gheorghe is a Romanian and Aromanian given name and surname. It is a variant of George, also a name in Romanian but with soft Gs. It may refer to: Given name * Gheorghe Adamescu (1869–1942), Romanian literary historian and bibliographer * Gh ...

Sturdza family ETH Zurich alumni Romanian engineers Romanian art historians Romanian architects Romanian expatriates in Switzerland Căile Ferate Române people Titular members of the Romanian Academy