George Bariț

In 1838 he founded in Brașov the first Romanian newspaper in his native region, and named it Gazeta de Transilvania and its supplement "Foaie pentru inimă și minte" (Paper for the Mind, Heart, and Literature) at the request of publisher Johann Göt.

[1] Politically active, he was an important personality in the revolution of 1848 in Transylvania, establishing connections with Romanian nationalists and radicals in Wallachia and Moldavia, and using Gazeta as one of the main political voices demanding equal rights for Romanians and Hungarians after the Hungarian revolutionary government began pressing for Transylvania to be removed from direct Austrian supervision to be reunited with Hungary.

In 1861, alongside Andrei Șaguna, Timotei Cipariu, he founded Asociația Transilvană pentru Literatura Română și Cultura Poporului Român (ASTRA).

His main personal work, published between 1889 and 1891, was Părți alese din Istoria Transilvaniei pre două sute de ani în urmă ("Selected Episodes of the Past Two Hundred Years in Transylvania's History").

He died in Sibiu a couple of months after his election and is buried in the graveyard of the "Biserica dintre Brazi" church in the city, along with other major Romanian Transylvanian leaders.