Professor Zygmunt Sariusz Bielski (1869–1944)

Rector for the 1931–1933 term of office
Mechanics

He was born in Widawa (central Poland). He graduated from the Lviv Polytechnic National University, where in 1892, in the Faculty of Machine Construction, he obtained a degree of engineer-mechanic.

After graduation, he worked in the industry. He constructed the first earth tanks for oil and conducted test drills in search of potassium salts in Morshyn and Bolekhiv (Ukraine), as well as natural gas in Kalush (Ukraine). In 1913, he headed the drillings in Maniava and Kryczka (Ukraine) for the Oil Company “Opiag”; in the years 1914–1915, he worked in the Central Board of the company in Vienna. He was the chief director of the oil company ‘Małopolska’ in Lviv.

In 1923, he chaired the Department of Drilling and Oil Exploitation of the Mining Academy in Krakow, simultaneously holding the position of the director of the oil repository of the “Premier” company. Since 1930, he had given himself over to academic and didactic work. In 1939, together with other Krakow professors, he was seized and imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany.

His academic achievement covers nearly 85 publications. His main focus was the question of technological development in Polish oil mining. He was one of the founders of an association of Polish oil engineers (Borysław), an initiator of annual oil meetings. Professor Bielski died in Krakow.