Antal Pech

* Nagyváradolaszi, January 14, 1822 – † Selmecbánya, September 18, 1895 / metallurgist, mining engineer, geologist, corresponding member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1879) ; ; He completed his secondary education in Nagyvárad (in Latin) and Timisoara (in German). In 1838–1842 he studied at the Selmecbánya Academy, and in 1842 he entered the treasury service at the Selmec crushing works. In 1846 he was assigned to Jáchymov, Bohemia, where he built crushing works. In 1848 he was a draftsman in the Hungarian Ministry of Finance. During the War of Independence he had the minting machines of Körmöcbánya transported to Debrecen, and from there to Nagyvárad. From 1850 he was a mine director in Bohemia, then in the Prussian Rhineland. He returned to Hungary in 1863, entered the state service in 1867 and worked on the development of the treasury iron and mining works as a secretary of the Ministry of Finance, then a departmental advisor. He is credited with the construction of the Diósgyőr ironworks, the initiation of the treasury coal mining in Zsilvölgy and the first development of the plans for the Vajdahunyad ironworks. From 1873 until his retirement (1889), he was the director of the Selmec mining district: The most significant Hungarian mining engineer of the second half of the 19th century. Between 1889 and 1892, he was a member of parliament for the Selmecbánya constituency. In his scientific work, he was a pioneer in the study of earth crustal movements – essentially called geomechanics today. He has significant merits in creating the Hungarian mining terminology, in the field of mine mapping and in the cultivation of mining history. His valuable ; technical papers were published mainly in the Mining and Metallurgy Journal, of which he was the founder and editor from 1868 to 1870. At his suggestion, the greeting "Good luck!" was introduced in mining and metallurgy in 1894. In his honor, the National Hungarian Mining and Metallurgy Association established the Antal Péch Memorial Medal, which is awarded annually in 1963. ; ; His main works: ; Principles and practical rules for the preparation of ores, 1869, ; Compilation of mine maps, 1878, ; Hungarian and German mining dictionary I-II., 1879–1891, ; The influence of the progress of science on mining in the Selmec region, 1881, ; History of Mining in Lower Hungary I-II., 1884–1887 (volume III was published in Budapest in 1967), ; History of the Selmec Mining Companies, 1884.