Octavian Utalea

Octavian Utalea (11 February 1868 – 9 May 1932) became mayor of the municipality of Cluj, Romania on 1 May 1923. He served as mayor until 14 March 1926. Among the accomplishments of his term in office were the opening of an Army Club (Cerc Militar) in the Reduta Palace and the founding of a School of Fine Arts (today's School of Plastic Arts) in the Central Park.

He was born in Maieru, at the time in Beszterce-Naszód County, Kingdom of Hungary, now in Bistrița-Năsăud County, Romania. He attended primary school in Sângeorz-Băi and secondary school at the Romanian Higher Secondary School in Năsăud, and from 1889 to 1893 he took classes at the Faculty of Law of Cluj's Franz Joseph University. He obtained his Juris Doctor degree in Cluj in 1905, then the certificate of free practice of law in Târgu Mureș in 1906, after which he settled in Rodna. At the start of World War I, he was mobilized into the Austro-Hungarian Army and sent to the front with the rank of officer. In the fall of 1918, he was a military engineering captain in the Cluj garrison.