María Adela Gard de Antokoletz

María Adela Gard de Antokoletz (October 11, 1911 – July 23, 2002) was one of fourteen women who founded the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo movement. Her son Daniel was abducted in November 1976. Later, when she was working for the provincial courts in Buenos Aires, she joined other mothers of missing children to found the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo. This group was dedicated to finding out what had happened to their missing children. As part of this group, María Adela Gard de Antokoletz led protest marches every Thursday on Buenos Aires's Plaza de Mayo holding a picture of her son. Throughout her life, she received death threats because of her work, but she refused to forget what had happened to her son.

Antokoletz was from San Nicolás de los Arroyos. She had a son, Daniel, who was a lawyer and a professor. In his legal career, he defended political prisoners.

He was known internationally and was connected with the Organization of American States and the United Nations. However, due to the many disappearances of those who were considered a threat to the political regime in Argentina, his mother advised him to give up his work or leave the country to avoid confrontation with the government. In 1976, Daniel disappeared during Argentina’s Dirty War, which lasted from 1976 until 1983. Antokoletz had no idea what happened to her son, and unfortunately would never find out. During this time period in Argentina, thousands of political opponents either disappeared or were tortured and killed by the military dictatorship. Daniel’s disappearance, along with the disappearances of thousands of other sons and daughters, led Antokoletz and a group of mothers to seek information about the location of their missing children and question the role of the government in the disappearance of their loved ones.

In April 1977, María Adela Gard de Antokoletz and thirteen other women met in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires. They started by holding vigils in the Plaza dedicated to their missing children in order to show the government that they would not give up trying to gain information about their lost sons and daughters. Through their actions they were able to bring attention from all over the world to those who had disappeared under the military dictatorship. As time went on, the women began to participate in protest marches to demand information about the disappearances. Antokoletz led many of these marches on Thursday afternoons, and she always marched holding a picture of her son. This founding group of women, as well as the many women who would later join them in their fight for justice became known as the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo.

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