Ali Hewson

Alison Hewson (née Stewart; born 23 March 1961) is an Irish activist and businesswoman.

She is married to singer and musician Paul Hewson, known as Bono, from the rock group U2.

Alison Stewart was born on 23 March 1961, the daughter of Terry and Joy Stewart.

She has an older brother, Ian, and nephew, Ross Stewart, who both live in Australia.

The Stewart family, who resided in the suburb of Raheny on Dublin's Northside, raised their children as Protestants.

Her father was a self-educated electrical worker who, according to Hewson, was "constantly questioning" things.

Her mother, who was a housewife, had a secretarial career in mind for her daughter.

Stewart studied at Mount Temple Comprehensive School.

At the age of twelve, she met Paul Hewson, who was in the year above at the school.

He pursued her immediately, but she initially kept her distance, labeling him "an eejit" even though she secretly admired him.

In September 1974, Paul's mother Iris died suddenly, leaving him emotionally adrift and in conflict with his father and brother.

Soon after, Alison began taking care of Hewson: cleaning his clothes, walking to school with him, and cooking for him.

In September 1976, Hewson met the other members of what would become U2; the band members adopted nicknames, and Hewson soon became known as Bono.

At around the same time, he and Ali, as she was known, began dating, and soon became a steady couple.

It took Stewart a while to enjoy the band's music, as her own tastes ran toward her father's Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole records.

At one point, the pair split up, but soon reunited.

The relationship became more serious as she accompanied him in his efforts to break through in the music industry, and by 1979 they were discussing marriage, conditional upon his career becoming established.

In the meantime she worked in a motor insurance company and in her father's electrical business.

Raised in Raheny, she met her future husband at age 12 at Mount Temple Comprehensive School, and married him in 1982.

Hewson married Bono on 31 August 1982 in a Church of Ireland ceremony at All Saints Church, Raheny.

The ceremony combined rituals of both conventional Protestantism and the Shalom Friendship Christian group that Bono and other U2 members had belonged to.

In debt to U2's record label, Island Records, the couple could not afford a honeymoon, but Island founder Chris Blackwell gave them use of the Goldeneye estate he owned in Jamaica.

Having returned to Ireland, the couple moved to a small mews house in Howth, which they shared with the rest of U2.

As the band broke through in popularity with the War Tour in 1983, Ali Hewson did not readily adapt to the new circumstances.

After seeing her with the group at a trendy Hollywood nightspot, journalist Ethlie Ann Vare commented that Ali looked "as out of place as a dairymaid in a brothel."

Although she had wanted to become a nurse, Hewson gave up on the notion, as the intense schooling required would have been incompatible with the direction that her husband's life had taken.

Instead she focused on studying in the social sciences, to give her an ability to understand social policy and make a difference to people, similar to what nursing would have enabled.

By Bono's own description, the marriage hit a period of strain in 1986 due to time commitments during the group's recording of The Joshua Tree.

She was awarded a degree in politics and sociology from University College Dublin (UCD) in 1989.

The couple have four children together and live at residences in Ireland, France, and the United States.

She has inspired several U2 songs, most famously "Sweetest Thing".

Hewson became involved in anti-nuclear activism in the 1990s.

She narrated Black Wind, White Land, a 1993 Irish documentary about the lasting effects of the Chernobyl disaster, and has worked closely with activist Adi Roche.

She has been a patron of Chernobyl Children's Project International since 1994 and has participated in a number of aid missions to the high-radiation exclusion zones of Belarus.

She has also campaigned against Sellafield, the northern English nuclear facility.

In 2002 she helped lead an effort which sent more than a million postcards, urging the site be closed, to Prime Minister Tony Blair and others.

Hewson has repeatedly been discussed by tabloid newspapers as a possible candidate for political offices, including President of Ireland; none of these suggestions have come to fruition.

Hewson is the co-founder of two ethical businesses, the EDUN fashion line in 2005, and Nude Skincare products in 2007.

The former, intended to promote fair trade with Africa, has struggled to become a viable business.

French conglomerate LVMH has made substantial investments into both companies.