Gerda Ring

She became one of the longest living actresses in the world, she died at the formidable age of 107 1/2 years in January 1999. Stage debut back in 1911, in a play written by her mother, the famous writer Barbra Ring. (1870-1955) She was also the very first woman in Norway who got a driving license, and while filming in Denmark she was badly injured in a car fire. After that accident she did not want to go in front of a camera any more. She therefore concentrated her work to the stage, both as an actress, and from 1930 on, as a very gifted director. During the war she and six other actors refused to work in a radio-play, because the Norwegian broadcasting were under the total control by the Nazi authority. All of them immediately lost their right to work, and the day after all actors organized in the actors union went on striking in solidarity. The strike lasted for five weeks, and was the first organized action against the Nazi-regime in Norway! Still under pressure, she and her husband Halfdan Christensen, who also was a famous actor, had to escape to Sweden, where they established a free Norwegian theater group called Fri norsk scene. After the war she continued her work as stage director until old age.