AVC Multimedia e-Book Series e-Book#3: AGBU 100 Years of History (Vol. II) | Page 83

The Presidents of the AGBU, 1906-2006

Louise Manoogian Simone (1989-2002)

Berge Setrakian (2002- )

Born in Beirut in 1949, Berge Setrakian became the AGBU’s seventh president on 22 February 2002. As a very young man, he was an active member of the organization in, first, Lebanon, and then, after he moved to the United States, in New York City, where he settled in 1976.

A lawyer with diplomas from French universities, Setrakian was elected to the Central Board in 1977 and to the post of vice-president in 1992. He worked closely with his two predecessors and, over the years, familiarized himself with the or-ganization’s inner workings, thanks especially to regular visits to AGBU chapters on five continents.

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Born in Detroit in 1933, Louise Manoogian Simone succeeded her father as the AGBU’s sixth president in September 1989, after playing an active role in Detroit’s civic affairs for many years. She is the mother of three children. In 1982, she was elect-ed to the Union’s Central Board.

With Manoogian Simone begins the period of the AGBU’s dias-poran presidents, that is, presidents born and educated in the diaspora. This fact deserves to be singled out for attention, because the opening of this new chapter in the AGBU’s history saw the introduction of new working methods involving greater distance from the realities of Armenian political life and greater pragmatism in the search for concrete results. Having become a member of the Central Board relatively late, doubtless out of fidelity to her father’s ... Read all