Madeleine Albright died of cancer in March at the age of 84, according to her family.
Her father was a diplomat in Prague when she was born on May 15, 1937, and her family fled Czechoslovakia when she was two years old to avoid the Nazis.
They first settled in England before relocating to Denver in 1948. Albright became a citizen of the United States in 1957 and attended Wellesley College.
She went on to earn a doctorate in public law and government from Columbia University.
President Clinton appointed Albright as the United States’ ambassador to the United Nations shortly after his election in 1993, and nominated her to be Secretary of State three years later.
She was the highest-ranking woman in US government history at the time.
Albright discovered her Jewish ancestry after becoming Secretary of State, thanks to a Washington Post reporter.
Albright’s burial is scheduled to take place immediately following the service, and will be attended only by family members and well-known diplomats.
