Anghel Saligny was a Romanian engineer, most famous for designing the Feteşti-Cernavodă railway bridge over the Danube, the longest bridge in Europe at that time.
Background
Saligny was born in Șerbănești, Tecuci County (nowadays, Galați County). His father Alfred Saligny, an educator of French descent, was an immigrant to Moldavia, coming from Prussia. He started his studies at the boarding school founded by his father in Focşani, then went on to high school, initially also in Focşani and then in Potsdam, Germany.
Career
He also designed the storage facilities in Constanţa seaport, one of the earliest examples of reinforced concrete architecture in Europe. He pursued engineering studies at the Polytechnical Institute in Charlottenburg, and then contributed to the construction of railways in Saxony (Cottbus-Frankfurt an der Oder).
Membership
He was a founding member of the Bucharest Polytechnic Society (the precursor to today"s Politehnica University of Bucharest) and was even appointed a Minister of Public In 1892, he was elected a member of the Romanian Academy, and he served as its president between 1907 and 1910. Anghel Saligny"s brother Alfons Oscar Saligny was a chemist and educator who was also elected a member of the Romanian Academy.