Family
In 2009, reporter Joshua Prager wrote an article in the Wall Street Journal profiling the long-term toll that Raoul Wallenberg's disappearance had on his family. His mother Maj and his stepfather Fredrik von Dardel spent the rest of their lives searching for their son. They both committed suicide by overdosing on pills two days apart in 1979. Their daughter Nina Lagergren, Raoul's half-sister, attributed their suicide to their despair about never finding their son. Both Nina and Raoul's half-brother Guy von Dardel established organizations and worked to find their brother or confirmation of his death. At the request of their parents, they were to assume he was alive until the year 2000.
Nina's daughter, Nane Maria Lagergren, married Kofi Annan, former secretary general of the United Nations, and is active in many humanitarian efforts. Another of Wallenberg's nieces, Louise von Dardel, is the main activist in the family and dedicates much of her time to speaking about Wallenberg and lobbying various countries to help uncover information about her uncle. The extended Wallenberg family remains an influential part of Swedish society as major shareholders in banks and corporations including Saab and Scandinavian Airlines.
Read more about this topic: Raoul Wallenberg
Famous quotes containing the word family:
“The Family is the Country of the heart. There is an angel in the Family who, by the mysterious influence of grace, of sweetness, and of love, renders the fulfilment of duties less wearisome, sorrows less bitter. The only pure joys unmixed with sadness which it is given to man to taste upon earth are, thanks to this angel, the joys of the Family.”
—Giuseppe Mazzini (1805–1872)
“It is in the love of one’s family only that heartfelt happiness is known.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“If it had not been for storytelling, the black family would not have survived. It was the responsibility of the Uncle Remus types to transfer philosophies, attitudes, values, and advice, by way of storytelling using creatures in the woods as symbols.”
—Jackie Torrence (b. 1944)