Holger Crafoord

{{Infobox person

| name = Holger Crafoord

| image = Crafoord Holger 19080725 (cropped).jpg

| birth_name = Alf Erik Holger Lundquist

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1908|07|25|df=y}}

| birth_place = Stockholm, Sweden

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1982|05|21|1908|07|25|df=y}}

| death_place = Lund, Sweden

| resting_place = Ödestugu cemetery

| alma_mater = Stockholm School of Economics

| occupation = Industrialist, patron

| known_for = Founding Gambro, developer of kidney dialysis products

| spouse = {{marriage|Anna-Greta Löfdahl|1935}}

| children = 3

| awards = {{awards|Illis quorum|1982}}

}}

File:20160929 Holger Crafoords Ekonomicentrum Lund 0028 (30040404245).jpg

Alf Erik Holger Crafoord (né Lundquist; 25 July 1908 – 21 May 1982){{Cite book |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1152148910 |title=Vem är det: svensk biografisk handbok |date=1976 |publisher=Norstedts förlag |isbn=91-1-766022-X |volume=33. 1977 |pages=190–191 |language=sv |chapter=Crafoord Holger |oclc=1152148910 |chapter-url=https://runeberg.org/vemardet/1977/0210.html}} was a Swedish industrialist and patron. He founded Gambro, which developed and commercialised the artificial kidney. He also established the {{Ill|Crafoord Foundation|sv|Crafoordska stiftelsen}}, the proceeds of which fund the Crafoord Prize for scientific research.

Biography

Holger Crafoord was born in Stockholm, the son of Alfred Lundquist (1882–1927), an army officer, and Hanna Lundquist née Johansson (1883–1965). The marriage is said to have been short-lived, and Hanna Lundquist supported herself and her son in meager circumstances as the proprietor of a grocery store. She later remarried ship engineer Harry Crafoord (1881–1935), who adopted her stepson.{{Cite web |title=Crafoord, Holger (1908-1982), industrialist, patron – Kulturportal Lund |url=https://kulturportallund.se/en/crafoord-holger-1908-1982-industrialist-patron/ |access-date=2022-05-19 |language=en-GB}} Crafoord attended Palmgrenska samskolan and Östra Real in Stockholm growing up.{{Cite web |last=Kurkus |first=Jan |title=Holger Crafoord på firma Åkerlund & Rausing |url=http://www.medicinhistoriskasyd.se/Bildspel/Dialys2011/Dialys_04.01.02.html |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=Sydsvenska Medicinhistoriska Sällskapet |language=sv}}

After graduating from the Stockholm School of Economics in 1930, Crafoord started working at Ruben Rausing's {{Ill|Åkerlund & Rausing|sv}} the same year.{{Cite book |title=Vem är Vem? |volume=Skåne, Halland, Blekinge 1966 |pages=161 |language=sv |chapter=CRAFOORD, HOLGER A E |chapter-url=https://runeberg.org/vemarvem/skane66/0185.html}} In 1935, Crafoord married Anna-Greta Crafoord née Löfdal (1914–1994) and they had three daughters: Birgitta, Katarina, and Margareta.{{Cite web |last=Kurkus |first=Jan |title=Holger Crafoord, familj, arbete och sjukdom |url=http://www.medicinhistoriskasyd.se/bildspel/Kurkus%20Dialys%20kort%20151103/Dialys_04.01.04.html |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=Sydsvenska Medicinhistoriska Sällskapet |language=sv}}

Crafoord was the director of {{Lang|sv|Östanå pappersbruk|italic=no}} paper mill for a number of years. He was involved in a number of organizations, including as a board member of the Association of Swedish Lithographic Printers, head of a paper packaging employers' association, head of the Cultural History Society, and head of the board of a bank.

At Åkerlund & Rausing, he was Managing Director from 1946 to 1968 and Chairman of the Board from 1968 to 1972. During his time at the company, the food packaging company Tetra Pak was established in 1950. By later selling his stake in the company, he freed up a considerable amount of capital which he could use to build up the international company Gambro.

Crafoord suffered from asthma and severe rheumatoid arthritis for a number of years.

In 1982, he died in Lund of sepsis. He is buried at Ödestugu cemetery in Jönköping Municipality.{{Cite web |title=Holger Crafoord |url=https://gravar.se/forsamling/barnarp-odestugu-forsamling/odestugu-kyrkogard/04/holger-crafoord-efe20 |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=gravar.se |language=sv}}

Gambro

Professor Nils Alwall had been working since the 1940s on an artificial kidney and dialysis treatments to filter the blood of kidney patients.{{Cite web |last=Westling |first=Håkan |title=Nils Alwall |url=https://www.medicine.lu.se/faculty-medicine-lund-university/history-faculty/nils-alwall |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=Lund University Faculty of Medicine |language=en}} The filters of the time required a long cleaning process to render them suitable for reuse. In 1961, after being unable to help two patients due to these limitations, Alwall happened to meet Crafoord at a dinner. What Alwall needed was someone to produce disposable filters; Crafoord had experience in the manufacturing and plastics industry and was very interested in financing the product, which could save lives.{{Cite web |last= |first= |title=Nils Alwall and his artificial kidneys: Seventieth anniversary of the start of serial production {{!}} Artificial Organs |url=https://icaot.org/nils-alwall-and-his-artificial-kidneys-seventieth-anniversary-of-the-start-of-serial-production/ |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=International Center for Artificial Organs and Transplantation |language=en-US}} In 1964, Crafoord founded the company Gambro – originally {{Lang|sv|Gamla Brogatans Sjukvårdsaffär|italic=no}} AB – which developed and three years later commercialized the invention.{{Cite book |last1=Kjellstrand |first1=C. M. |title=Dialysis: History, Development and Promise |last2=Lindergård |first2=B. |last3=Odar-Cederlöf |first3=I. |isbn=9789814439947 |pages=86 |chapter=Alwall, Crafoord, and Gambro|date=29 August 2012 |publisher=World Scientific }}

In 1981, Gambro "diversified into the heart-lung product area and built up a special network of suppliers",{{Cite book |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/17697774 |title=Growth policies in a Nordic perspective |publisher= |others=Instituttet for fremtidsforskning, Elinkeinoelämän Tutkimuslaitos, Industriens utredningsinstitut, Næringsøkonomisk institutt |year=1987 |isbn=951-9206-19-1 |location=Helsinki, Finland |pages=230 |oclc=17697774}} developing other technologies for treating blood outside the body (extracorporeally), for example in connection with heart surgery, and blood component technology, which separates blood into different components and then uses some of them in the care of cancer patients.{{Cite web |date=2016-09-21 |title=Holger Crafoord |url=https://www.foretagskallan.se/foretagskallan-nyheter/lektionsmaterial/holger-crafoord/ |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=Företagskällan |language=sv-SE}}

Crafoord Foundation and Prize

Crafoord laid the foundations for the {{Ill|Crafoord Foundation|sv|Crafoordska stiftelsen}} in 1980{{Cite web |last=Eriksen |first=Jon |date=2020-04-29 |title=The Crafoord Foundation |url=https://law.lu.se/webukv2.nsf/menuItem.xsp?SessionID=312A14442D7D01C84065D7822B7129348A94125F#!the_Craaford_foundation |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=Lund University Faculty of Law}} and the Crafoord Prize which has been awarded since 1982 and was intended to supplement fields awarded the Nobel Prize, with awards for arthritis research as well.{{Cite web |date=2021-02-01 |title=Crafoord Prize |url=https://irp.nih.gov/about-us/honors/crafoord-prize |access-date=2022-05-19 |website=National Institutes of Health Intramural Research Program |language=en}}{{Cite journal |last=Kolata |first=Gina |date=1982 |title=New Award to Supplement Nobels |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1689669 |journal=Science |volume=216 |issue=4553 |pages=1391 |doi=10.1126/science.216.4553.1391.c |jstor=1689669 |pmid=17798350 |s2cid=239807483 |issn=0036-8075|url-access=subscription }} He was the founder of the Holger Crafoord Economics Center in Lund, which later became the Lund University School of Economics and Management.

Awards

50px {{flagicon|Sweden}} Illis quorum, 8th size (1982){{cite book |url=https://www.regeringen.se/contentassets/61bab671f59a46af81cb11ee99e0d0eb/regeringens-beloningsmedaljer-och-regeringens-utmarkelse-professors-namn |title=Regeringens belöningsmedaljer och regeringens utmärkelse Professors namn |series=SB PM, 99-0433409-9; 2006:1 |year=2006 |publisher=Statsrådsberedningen, Regeringskansliet |location=Stockholm |language=sv |id={{LIBRIS|10400721}} |page=20}}
50px {{flagicon|Sweden}} Commander Grand Cross of the Order of the Polar Star (3 December 1974){{cite web |url=https://sok.riksarkivet.se/bildvisning/E0000849_00054 |publisher=Royal Court of Sweden |work=Kungl. Maj:ts Ordens arkiv |title=Matriklar (D 1) |trans-title=Directory (D 1) |volume=14 |page=178 |date=1970–1979 |access-date=18 December 2024 |language=sv |via=National Archives of Sweden |url-access=registration}}

Honours

Member of the Society of Sciences in Lund (1951){{cite book |url=https://runeberg.org/vemardet/1981/0217.html |title=Vem är det: svensk biografisk handbok. 1981 |trans-title=Who is it: Swedish biographical handbook. 1981 |year=1980 |publisher=Norstedt |location=Stockholm |language=sv |isbn=91-1-805012-3 |id={{SELIBR|3681525}} |page=197}}
Member of the Royal Physiographic Society in Lund (1960)
Royal Society of the Humanities at Lund (1964)
Honorary Doctor of Economics, Lund University (1972)
Honorary Doctor of Medicine, Lund University(1976)