Olav V of Norway
Olav V was King of Norway for thirty-three years, from 1957 to 1991, the son of the Danish prince the Norwegians had elected in 1905, born in England as Prince Alexander of Denmark and brought to Christiania at two, who won an Olympic gold medal in sailing in 1928, commanded the Norwegian forces in exile in the war and came home in the crown prince's landing at Oslo in May 1945 to be cheered as the country's own, and who as king took the tram to go skiing during the oil crisis of 1973 and paid his fare, which is the photograph the Norwegians remember him by. They called him the people's king, and the candles outside the palace on the night he died covered the square. He was educated at the Norwegian military academy and at Balliol College, Oxford, married the Swedish princess Martha in 1929, and was a ski-jumper at Holmenkollen and a helmsman good enough to win at the Amsterdam games. When the Germans invaded in April 1940 he was with his father and the government through the two months of retreat up the country, argued for staying and fighting when the cabinet chose exile, and went to London with the king in June. His wife and children spent the war in the United States as guests of Roosevelt, who was fond of Martha. He was made chief of defence of the Norwegian forces abroad in 1944 and led the liberation, landing at Oslo on 13 May 1945, a week before his father. Martha died in 1954, three years before he succeeded, and he reigned alone. Haakon VII had refused anointing as a foreign novelty and Olav asked for a consecration in the Nidaros cathedral in 1958, which the church gave and every successor has had. He was a constitutional king in the strictest sense, whose opinions on the European Community referendum of 1972, which the Norwegians rejected, and on the oil wealth that arrived the same decade were not known, and whose public life was ski races, ship launchings and the Storting's opening. He had a stroke in 1990 and died at Kongsseteren, the royal lodge above Oslo, in January 1991. His son Harald succeeded, and the crowd outside the palace that night lit the square with candles in the snow.
- Lived: 1903 CE – 1991 CE
- Nationality: Norwegian
- Roles: king, monarch
