Tine Orel - Citizen of the Municipality of Trzin, teacher, mountaineer, editor, cultural worker

Tine Orel was born on February 9, 1913 in Trzin no. 137 to father Janez and mother Rozalija, born Žankar. Despite the lack of money, he went to school at the classical high school in Šentvid near Ljubljana and in 1936 he graduated from the Faculty in Ljubljana with a degree in the history of Yugoslav literature, Slovene language with Old Slovene and national history, as well as Russian and French.                                                                                        

The beginning of his teaching career was interrupted by the Second World War. After the end of the war, he was again employed as a professor at the Celje Real Gymnasium. In 1949, he became the principal of the 1st Celje Gymnasium, which he led until 1963. His further professional work in Ljubljana was also dedicated to noble work – educating and teaching youth, at the Tourist Association of Slovenia, as a pedagogical consultant at the Institute for Educational Pedagogy a job where he headed the department for textbooks and manuals and from 1972 as a professor at the department of Slovenian at the Faculty of Education of the University of Ljubljana and at the department of this faculty in Nova Gorica.

Tine Orel was a mountaineer with all his heart. From the age of 12, he went to the nearby Kamnik’s Alps. At the age of 19, he became a member of the Slovenian Mountaineering Association, and at the age of 20 he became an active alpinist. After 1946, he headed the Mountain Society of Celje for 17 years. During his presidency, quite a few mountain lodges and cabins were newly built or renovated.

Tine Orel was also known as the long-time editor of Planinski vestnik, the oldest magazine for mountain lovers, published since 1895. He edited it for almost 30 years, from 1950 to 1979. He introduced many innovations into the magazine’s editing: new sections, author contributions by well-known writers and poets, as well as young writers. He was also a writer of articles, translator, correspondent, proof-reader.

In addition to his regular work duties, he performed many other tasks. As a publicist and editor, he wrote a series of independent publications, translations, accompanying texts, popular and professional articles in the field of Slovenian literary history and mountaineering. He was a member of the newspaper and publishing councils, the Celje Chamber of Commerce, a member of the council of the Celje Theater, and a writer of theater reviews. As a social worker, he was a member of numerous municipal and state commissions in education, culture, mountaineering and tourism.

For his extremely fruitful work, Prof. Tine Orel received high honors from the state and the organizations in which he worked: like in 1971 theStanko Bloudek Prize, the highest state award of the Republic of Slovenia in the field of sports, he was awarded the Golden Badge of the PZS and PSJ, he was also awarded the golden sign of the Tourist Association of Slovenia, became the first honorary member of Onger Trzin PD in 1984. In 2004, the new local library Trzin, part of the Domžale Library, was named after him.