Olav V of Norway; World’s Oldest Ruler

King Olav V, Norway’s widely respected king and the world’s oldest reigning monarch, died Thursday after suffering a heart attack, the Norwegian news agency NTB reported. He was 87.

The king, who suffered a stroke in June that left him partially paralyzed, was a British-born Dane who became second monarch of modern Norway. His ancestry was firmly rooted among the bluebloods of Europe, but the Norwegians called him “Folkekongen”--the People’s King.

An only child, groomed for the throne from the time he was 2, he became a rallying point for his adopted countrymen during World War II and, as king, a beloved symbol of nationhood.

He became the world’s oldest reigning monarch after the death in January, 1989, of Japan’s Emperor Hirohito.

Norway is a constitutional and hereditary monarchy. Olav will be succeeded by his son, Crown Prince Harald V, who becomes the first Norwegian monarch born in Norway since 1370.

From his youth as an Olympic yachtsman and excellent ski jumper to his later years as Norway’s representative on dozens of state visits, Olav maintained an unflagging pace.

He visited the United States and Britain last year and spent his 86th birthday sailing in an Oslo regatta aboard his 18-foot boat. Last year, the 33rd of his reign, he stood for several hours on the palace balcony to receive Constitution Day tributes from a parade of citizens.

On May 28, the day before he was hospitalized with a heart complaint, Olav visited Narvik in northern Norway, joining in the 50th anniversary celebration of the first Allied victory in World War II.

His love of the outdoors and sports was one cause of public affection for the king.

During the 1973 oil crisis, Norwegians were enchanted by a photograph of the king carrying his skis on a crowded trolley, heeding government pleas to save gasoline and use public transport.

There are many stories of his subjects coming across Olav on cross-country skis, sliding alone through fields and forests. In 1923 as crown prince, he finished fourth in his age group in the Norwegian ski-jumping championships.

He got his first yacht, the “Teddy,” when he was 15. At 25, he crewed the 20-foot sailboat that won the gold medal in the 1928 Olympic Games at Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

He was born Prince Alexander Edward Christian Frederick on the British royal estate of Sandringham in Norfolk, England, the son of a Danish prince and an English princess.

Parliament chose his father, Prince Carl, to stand for election in 1905 to the new throne when Norway’s union with Sweden was dissolved. When he won, Carl took the name Haakon VII and named his son Olav. The names harked back to kings of Norway’s rich Viking past.

Olav married his first cousin, Princess Martha of Sweden, in 1929, but liked to joke thathe became so thoroughly Norwegian that his son and two daughters married Norwegian commoners.

A close adviser to his father, the crown prince gave the king his full support when, from their hideaway in northern Norway near the Swedish border during World War II, Haakon unequivocally rejected a demand of occupying Nazi Germans for a government headed by Vidkun Quisling, whose name became a synonym for traitor.

After the underground Council of State rejected Olav’s request to stay behind to oversee the anti-Nazi Resistance, he, his father and the government went to England on June 7, 1940.

On June 7, the fifth anniversary of their departure, Haakon came back to free Norway.

Haakon died Sept. 21, 1957, and Olav became king.