Argentine actress in radio and movies before her marriage to Juan Peron on 21 October 1945. As the First Lady from 1946 she helped him to rise to power and became one of the most influential women of her time. Beloved by her people, she was mourned by the nation at her death in 1952. Legendary, she was either a saint who loved the common people or a calculating whore who slept her way to power and exploitation, according to different accounts.
She created much of her own myth, saying that she’d been born in 1922 where it was actually 1919, one of five kids of a married rancher and his mistress, a cook. When her dad died in 1926 she moved to Junin where her mother ran a boardinghouse. As young teenagers she and her girl friend were sexually assaulted by two young aristocrats and left naked by the side of the road. She left home at 15.
Not a great beauty, she nonetheless had transparent skin and vivid eyes. Over the next ten years she made her career as an actress on stage, radio and movies, using sex to get what she wanted. When she met Peron in 1943, he was a well-known career army officer and a widower, 48 to her 23-24. After a military coup, he was named Minister of Labor. Eva became his mistress and they married in 1945. The following year he was elected President of Argentina.
Photogenic and charismatic, Eva now learned to dress her role and use her power. Where Peron was almost devoid of personality, she blazed like a meteor for five years with her political machinations. When she aided the poor, and helped women get the vote for the first time in 1950, she became a national icon. The country was in an economic slump while the corrupt wealthy had power and control. Eva spoke for the common people.
Always frail, Eva had an emergency appendectomy in 1950 and was found to have uterine cancer. She refused to have a hysterectomy. She made a final public appearance on 5 June 1952 at Peron’s second inauguration and died seven weeks later on 26 July 1952 in Buenos Aries.
When Peron was overthrown in 1955, Eva’s preserved body was taken to a secret grave in Italy where it stayed until 23 September 1971. It was then taken back to Argentina, still perfectly preserved, with her blonde hair flowing like a halo around her face. Eva’s body was buried in the Duarte family tomb in La Recoleta Cemetery, Buenos Aires.
Link to Wikipedia biography