Eduardo Frei Montalva

The winery San Pedro is still well known in Lontué and Molina 200 km south of Santiago and was founded in 1865 by the brothers Bonifacio and José Gregorio Correa Albano.

Eduardo Nicanor Frei Montalva (16 January 1911 – 22 January 1982) was a Chilean political leader.

Eduardo Frei Montalva was born in Santiago on 16 January 1911, the son of Eduard Frei Schlinz, a Swiss-born ethnic German from Feldkirch, Austria, and Victoria Montalva Martínez.

In 1914, his family moved to Lontué, where his father had been hired as an accountant at a winery.

In addition, his other two siblings, Arturo and Irene, were born.

He attended the Escuela Pública de Lontué (Public School of Lontué).

In 1919 the family returned to Santiago and Eduardo, as a young man, entered the boarding school Seminario Conciliar de Santiago where he remained until 1922.

In 1923, he entered Instituto de Humanidades Luis Campino, where he graduated in 1928, at the age of 17.

As an 18-year-old, he entered Universidad Católica School of Law in 1929.

For two years, he had been visiting María, the sister of his friend, Alfredo Ruiz-Tagle.

He attended high school and went on to study law, graduating as a lawyer in 1933.

He married María Ruiz-Tagle with whom he had 7 children.

He began his political career in the Conservative Party, but was among a group of young men who founded their own party in 1938: the Falange Nacional.

He was minister of Public Works in 1945, and in 1949, Frei was elected senator for Atacama and Coquimbo.

The same year he published “Historia de los Partidos Políticos Chilenos” (“History of Chilean Political Parties”) in collaboration with Albert Edwards Vives.

In 1950, he traveled to New York as a UN delegate.

In 1952, at 41 years of age, Frei Montalva announced his first candidacy in the presidential elections.

The 1952 election was won by Carlos Ibáñez del Campo.

Later, President Ibañez requested Frei to organize an executive committee.

However, this never came to be.

In 1954, the UN appointed him President of the Commission in charge of elaborating the report of the Conference of Chancellors held in Rio de Janeiro.

Some of its members were: Carlos Lleras Restrepo, former President of Colombia, and Raúl Prebisch director of ECLAC.

The report served as a basis for subsequent studies on economic development and the integration of Latin America.

In 1956 he was elected Senator in Santiago by first majority.

On 27 July 1957, the Falange Nacional became the Christian Democratic Party of Chile, and he became the undisputed leader.

Frei Montalva was offered once more the candidacy for president of the Republic in the 1958 elections.

Jorge Alessandri Rodríguez was elected president while Eduardo Frei Montalva took only third place.

During these years he published three more books: “Sentido y Forma de una Política” (“Meaning and Shape of Politics”), “La Verdad Tiene Su Hora” (“Truth Has Its Time”), and “Pensamiento y Acción” (“Thought and Action”).

In 1960, he lectured at conference “The Mission of Universities in Latin America” in Montevideo; a widely promoted conference at that time.

In 1961, he was elected President of the First World Christian Democratic Party Congress, held in Santiago, Chile.

The congress was attended by delegations from throughout Latin America, European, North American, and African countries.

That year he was invited as special guest to a seminar on the problems of Developing Nations, held at Oxford University.

In his long political career, he was Minister of Public Works, president of his Christian Democratic Party, senator, President of the Senate, and the 27th president of Chile from 1964 to 1970.

Frei's Christian Democratic Party supported the Armed Forces intervention to remove his successor Salvador Allende from office in 1973, after the Chamber of Deputies, on 22 August 1973, accused Allende of violating the Constitution.

He was later a vocal opponent of the Augusto Pinochet regime.

On 22 January 1982, Frei died in Santiago, Chile, following surgery.

Assassination was suspected by some but has never been proven.

On 18 August 2023, the Supreme Court ruled out the assassination charges and declared innocent all those accused.

His eldest son, Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, also became president of Chile (1994–2000).

His eldest son, Eduardo Frei Ruiz-Tagle, was President of Chile from 1994 to 2000.