Susanna Agnelli, Contessa Rattazzi, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI (24 April 1922 – 15 May 2009) was an Italian

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

, businesswoman and writer. She was the first woman to be appointed

Minister of Foreign Affairs A foreign affairs minister or minister of foreign affairs (less commonly minister for foreign affairs) is generally a cabinet minister in charge of a state's foreign policy and relations. The formal title of the top official varies between cou ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

Early life

Born in

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

, she was the daughter of

Edoardo Agnelli Edoardo Agnelli (9 June 1954 – 15 November 2000) was the eldest child and only son of Gianni Agnelli, the industrialist patriarch of Fiat and of Marella Agnelli (born Donna Marella Caracciolo di Castagneto). He converted to Islam when he was l ...

and Donna

Virginia Bourbon del Monte ''Donna'' Virginia Bourbon del Monte dei principi di San Faustino (Rome, 24 May 1899 – Pisa, 30 November 1945) was the wife of Edoardo Agnelli (industrialist), Edoardo Agnelli and the mother of Gianni Agnelli. Biography She was the daughter of ...

, a daughter of the Prince di San Faustino and his Kentucky-born wife Jane Campbell. Her brother,

Gianni Agnelli Giovanni "Gianni" Agnelli (; 12 March 192124 January 2003), nicknamed ("The Lawyer"), was an Italian industrialist and principal shareholder of Fiat. As the head of Fiat, he controlled 4.4% of Italy's GDP, 3.1% of its industrial workforce a ...

, was the head of

Fiat Fiat Automobiles S.p.A. (, , ; originally FIAT, it, Fabbrica Italiana Automobili di Torino, lit=Italian Automobiles Factory of Turin) is an Italian automobile manufacturer, formerly part of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, and since 2021 a subsidiary ...

until 1996; members of the Agnelli family are still the controlling shareholders of the company. During the Second World War she worked at times as a nurse for the Red Cross, and when transport became unobtainable in the post-war chaos she used her connections with Fiat and the Allied military to establish for the Red Cross a fleet of five ambulances with ten drivers to transport injured and sick civilians.

Politics

In 1974, Agnelli gained her first public appointment, when she became mayor of

Monte Argentario Monte Argentario is a ''comune'' (municipality) and a peninsula belonging to the Province of Grosseto in the Italian region Tuscany, located about south of Florence and about south of Grosseto. The peninsula is connected with the mainland by thre ...

. Her

grandfather Grandparents, individually known as grandmother and grandfather, are the parents of a person's father or mother – paternal or maternal. Every sexually-reproducing living organism who is not a genetic chimera has a maximum of four genetic ...

and great-grandfather had been mayors in their time. Agnelli served as mayor for a decade, from 1974 to 1984. The experience inspired her to enter national politics. Agnelli was elected to the

Italian Parliament The Italian Parliament ( it, Parlamento italiano) is the national parliament of the Italian Republic. It is the representative body of Italian citizens and is the successor to the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1943), the transitiona ...

in 1976 for the

Italian Republican Party The Italian Republican Party ( it, Partito Repubblicano Italiano, PRI) is a liberal and social-liberal political party in Italy. Founded in 1895, the PRI is the oldest political party still active in Italy. The PRI has old roots and a long histo ...

(PRI). In 1979, still for the PRI, she became an MEP in the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

, from 1979 to 1981. In 1983, she returned to the Italian Parliament, becoming a

senator A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

. The culmination of her political career was her appointment as Italy's first female

, in 1995. She served for more than a year which, in the fragile politics of postwar Italy, makes her one of the most long-lasting holders of the office. It was not until 2013 that

Emma Bonino Emma Bonino (born 9 March 1948) is an Italian politician. A senator for Rome, she served as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2013 to 2014. Previously, she was a Member of the European Parliament and a member of the Chamber of Deputies. She serve ...

became the next female incumbent of the post.

Family

In 1945 she married Count Urbano Rattazzi (1918–2012), and they had six children youngest of whom is photographer

Priscilla Rattazzi Priscilla Rattazzi (born 1956) is an Italian-born photographer whose work has been featured for over four decades in international magazines, galleries and museum exhibitions. Personal life Priscilla Rattazzi was born in Rome, Italy and came to ...

. The marriage was dissolved in 1975. She divided her time between

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and Italy and she was long a loyal fan of

Robert Denning Robert Denning (March 13, 1927 – August 26, 2005) was an American interior designer whose lush interpretations of French Victorian decor became an emblem of corporate raider tastes in the 1980s. Early life Denning was born Robert Dennis B ...

, of Denning & Fourcade, who designed over 15 homes for her in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

and Italy.

Autobiography

Her autobiography ''Vestivamo alla marinara'' ("We always wore sailor suits", 1983) was a bestseller in Italy.

Works

*''Vestivamo alla marinara'' (1975) *''Gente alla deriva ''(1980) *''Ricordati Gualeguaychu ''(1982) *''Addio, addio mio ultimo amore ''(1985)

Honour

* : Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (21 may 1996)

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Agnelli, Susanna 1922 births 2009 deaths Nobility from Turin Susanna Italian countesses Italian Republican Party politicians Foreign ministers of Italy Mayors of places in Tuscany Deputies of Legislature VII of Italy Deputies of Legislature VIII of Italy Senators of Legislature IX of Italy Senators of Legislature X of Italy Women government ministers of Italy Female foreign ministers 20th-century Italian women politicians 20th-century Italian women writers 20th-century Italian writers Italian people of American descent Italian women diplomats Bancarella Prize winners Politicians from Turin Knights Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic Women members of the Chamber of Deputies (Italy) Women members of the Senate of the Republic (Italy)