Margareta Hegardt, 73; Sweden’s Consul General to L.A. in ‘80s

Margareta Hegardt, 73, Sweden’s consul general to Los Angeles from 1982 to 1989, died July 22 of heart failure in a Stockholm hospital.

During her tenure in Los Angeles, Hegardt hosted an unofficial visit of King Carl XIV Gustaf and Queen Silvia for the 1984 Olympic Games and their official state visit for the New Sweden 1988, a celebration of the 350th anniversary of the New Sweden Colony in America. She also escorted then-Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and his wife on a trade mission to Sweden.

Hegardt later served as Swedish ambassador to Ireland and as Swedish consul general to Hamburg, Germany. She returned to Southern California in 1998 to teach international relations as the first diplomat-in-residence at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks.

Born in Goteborg, Sweden, Hegardt earned a law degree at the University of Lund. She practiced law, rose through the ranks to become vice president of the Swedish Employers’ Federation and was labor counselor with the Swedish delegation to the European Common Market in Brussels. She was named Sweden’s first woman undersecretary in trade before joining the country’s diplomatic service.