RUPERT VON TRAPPRupert von Trapp, who diedon 22 February,1992 at the age of 80, was the oldest of the famous singing family and he was represented by the character'Frederick' in the film loosely based on their lives, The Sound of Music.
Rupert was born in Pola, Austria - later to become Pula, Croatia - the first child of World War One hero Baron Georg von Trapp and his wife Agathe. The couple had six more children - Agathe, Maria, Werner, Hedwig, Johanna and Martinabefore Agathe's death in 1922 from scarlet fever.
In search of a fresh start the family later moved to Salzburg.
In 1926, when Rupert's sister Maria was bedridden withrheumatic fever, the abbess of a nearby Roman Catholic convent sent a young novice nun - Maria Augusta Kutschera - to stay with the family and becomelittle Maria'stutor.
Maria never returned to the convent life and she and Georg were married the following year andwent on to havethree more children.
Rupert studied medicine and became an Austrian citizen. The whole family was very musical - which their stepmother encouraged. Rupert played both the accordion and the piano.
After losing a lot of money in the worldwide depression of the early 1930s, the von Trapps decided to try to turn their singing hobby into a professional career. Rupertsang bass, and the family began to enjoy great success singing in Europe.
But the Nazi annexation of Austria in 1938 meant big changes. The von Trapps hated the Nazi regime and when Rupert had thepossibility of a job in Viennahe refused because it was being taken away from a Jewish doctor by the Nazis.
Keen to escape their troubled country, the family left Austria and went to America via Italy.
Rupert, now in his mid-20s, joined the von Trapp Family Singers on their world tour.
In 1942 he joined the American army alongside his brotherWerner.
In 1947 he married Henriette Lajoie and they had six children. Rupertleft the family singers at this point andbecame a naturalised United States citizen the following year.
After a divorce he remarried Janice Tyre and continued to work as a doctor until the 1980s.
Mr von Trapp died at the Trapp Family Lodge in Vermont which had become the family's home in the 1940s. He was buriedin its private cemetery next to his father andstepmother and his sisters Hedwig and Martina.
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