Fernando Vial

Fernando Vial Letelier (9 July 1907 – 18 April 1981) was a Chilean lawyer, farmer and politician affiliated with the Liberal Party.

He served as a Deputy for the 6th Departmental Group ―Valparaíso and Quillota― for three consecutive legislative periods between 1945 and 1957.

Biography He was born in Santiago on 9 July 1907, the son of Alberto Vial Infante and Teresa Letelier Valdés. He married Marta de las Mercedes Risopatrón Guzmán in Santiago on 19 December 1941; they had five children, including María Cristina, Marta, and Fernando.

Vial studied at the Sacred Hearts School of Santiago and completed his secondary education at a private school in Paris. He later entered the Faculty of Law at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, graduating as a lawyer in 1931 with a thesis titled «El plazo en Derecho Procesal» («The Term in Procedural Law»).

He devoted much of his life to agriculture, owning the estate «Las Masas» in Llay Llay and a small property in Chagres. Politically, he was a member of the Liberal Party, where he served as a director. He was also councilman and later mayor of the Municipality of Llay Llay from 1938 to 1941.

Vial was elected Deputy for the 6th Departmental Group (Valparaíso and Quillota) for the periods 1945–1949, 1949–1953, and 1953–1957. He served on the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Colonization during his three terms, and alternately participated in the Committees on Interior Government, Constitution, Legislation and Justice, Labor and Social Legislation, and Public Works.

Outside politics, he was a member of several Chilean institutions such as the Club Hípico, the National Agriculture Society, and the Club de la Unión.

He died in Santiago on 18 April 1981.