About Me
Albert II, Prince of Monaco (Albert Alexandre Louis Pierre Grimaldi; born 14 March 1958), styled His Serene Highness The Sovereign Prince of Monaco, is the head of the House of Grimaldi and the current ruler of the Principality of Monaco. He is the son of Rainier III of Monaco and Grace, Princess of Monaco, and the brother of Caroline, Princess of Hanover and Princess Stéphanie of Monaco.Albert attended the Albert I High School, graduating with distinction in 1976. Albert was a camper and later a counselor for six summers at Camp Tecumseh on Lake Winnipesaukee, Moultonborough, New Hampshire in the 1970s. He spent a year training in various princely duties, and enrolled at Amherst College in Massachusetts in 1977 as Albert Grimaldi, studying political science, economics, music, and English literature, and also joined Chi Psi fraternity. He spent the summer of 1979 touring Europe and the Middle East with the Amherst Glee Club and graduated in 1981 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science.During school, Albert was an enthusiastic athlete, participating in cross country, javelin throwing, handball, judo, swimming, tennis, rowing, sailing, skiing, squash and fencing. He is a patron of Monaco's football teams. He competed in the bobsled at the 1988, 1992, 1994, 1998, and 2002 Winter Olympics. He has been a member of the International Olympic Committee since 1985. (His maternal grandfather John B. Kelly, Sr., and maternal uncle John B. Kelly, Jr., were both Olympic medal winners in rowing and were actively involved in the Olympic movement.) The press reported the prince refused any special treatment during his Olympic stints, and lived in the same bare-bones quarters as all the other athletes.On 25 October 2002, Albert visited Miami, Florida for a World Olympians Association fund-raiser at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables. The group's mission was to have the 100,000 Olympians get involved with their communities and talk to young athletes about dedication and training.On 7 March 2005, Albert's father Rainier III, Prince of Monaco was admitted to a hospital in the principality; he was later moved to an intensive care ward. The Prince was being treated for breathing, kidney, and heart trouble. On 31 March 2005, the Palace of Monaco announced that Hereditary Prince Albert would take over the duties of his father as Regent since Rainier was no longer able to exercise his sovereign functions. This decision was reached by the Crown Council of Monaco, a body made up of notable local figures with residual powers to make judgments about certain constitutional matters. The 47-year-old prince spent his first day as regent of Monaco caring for his critically ill 81-year-old father, who was Europe’s longest-serving living monarch and the world's second-longest. However, Albert's regency lasted barely a week.On 6 April 2005, Prince Rainier III died and Hereditary Prince Albert became Albert II, Sovereign Prince of Monaco.The first part of Prince Albert II's enthronement as ruler of the Principality was on 12 July 2005, after the end of the three-month mourning period for his father. A morning mass at Saint Nicholas Cathedral led by the archbishop of Monaco, Monsignor Bernard Barsi, formally marked the beginning of his reign. Afterward Albert II returned to the princely palace to host a garden party for 7,000 Monegasques born in the principality. In the courtyard, the Prince was presented with two keys of the city as a symbol of his investiture. The evening ended with a spectacular fireworks display on the waterfront.The second part of his investiture was on 19 November 2005. Albert was enthroned at Saint Nicholas Cathedral. His family was there in attendance, including his elder sister (and now his heir) Princess Caroline with her husband Ernst, Prince of Hanover and three of her four children, Andrea, Pierre and Charlotte; as well as his younger sister Princess Stéphanie, his paternal aunt Princess Antoinette, Baroness of Massy, his godson, Baron Jean-Léonard Taubert-Natta de Massy, and his cousin Elisabeth-Anne de Massy. Royalty from 16 delegations were present for the festivities throughout the country. The evening ended with an opera performance in Monte-Carlo.Albert continues the policy, initiated by previous rulers of the statelet, of using his position to draw the world's attention to the need to protect the (marine) environment. Just like his great-great-grandfather Albert I he traveled to Spitsbergen in July 2005. During this trip he visited the glaciers "Lillihöök" and "Monaco". Prince Albert II also engaged in an Arctic expedition, reaching the North Pole on Easter, 16 April 2006. As a result, he is the first incumbent head of state to have reached the North Pole.The prince is also a Global Advisor to Orphans International.As Rainier III's health declined, his son's lack of legitimate children became a matter of public and political concern, due to the legal and international consequences in the event Albert were to die without lawful descendants while reigning. Prior to 2002, Monaco's constitution specified that only the last reigning prince's "direct and legitimate" descendants could inherit the crown. Therefore, Albert's sisters were due to lose their succession rights once their brother mounted the throne, leaving the Grimaldi dynasty to face extinction if Albert failed to produce a child within marriage or by adoption. Nor could a reigning or hereditary prince adopt an heir prior to age 50, according to a 1918 law. (This situation did not arise in Rainier's case, as he succeeded his maternal grandfather Louis II, rather than a collateral relative.)On 2 April 2002 Monaco passed Princely Law 1.249 which provides that if a reigning prince dies without surviving legitimate issue, the throne passes to his siblings and their descendants according to the principle of male-preference primogeniture. In October 2005, (after Albert's accession to the throne) this law took full effect when ratified by France, pursuant to the 1918 Franco-Monégasque Treaty, which had stipulated that Monaco would become a French protectorate if the throne fell vacant. His sisters and their legitimate children thereby re-acquired the right to succeed Albert upon the throne if the occasion arises, while the monarch lost the right to adopt an heir.
