John Wayne

John Wayne, one of the greatest stars of all time, was an icon of both Western films in particular and of American cinema in general. Born Marion Michael Morrison on May 26, 1907, in Winterset, Iowa, he played football for USC and held several behind-the-scenes jobs at Fox before moving in front of the cameras in the late 1920s in a series of bit roles. Director John Ford, who had befriended "Duke" Wayne, recommended him for the lead in Raoul Walsh's 1930 western epic, "The Big Trail." He also appeared in a number of lower-budget movies during this time, though his aura of easygoing authority and physical presence shone even in these lesser-known projects.

In 1939, Ford cast Wayne as the Ringo Kid in "Stagecoach." The role propelled Wayne into the top ranks of box-office stars and during the 1940s his legend began to take shape. But it was the movies he made at the end of the decade that established him as an actor of merit as well as a star of tremendous stature, as seen in such projects as Howard Hawks' "Red River" (1948). Two other John Ford films from the period gave Wayne the opportunity for great depth--"Fort Apache" (1948) and "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" (1949)--the latter a particularly moving portrait of a man and an era reaching a turning point.

Other major films included "Rio Bravo" (1959) for Hawks, and "The Searchers" (1956) and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" (1962) for Ford. Wayne won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in "True Grit" (1969), but one of his greatest roles was still to follow - a role that also ended up being his last. In "The Shootist" (1976) he played a dying gunman who is just beginning to understand his own life and legend. It was the perfect elegy for Wayne, who was himself dying of cancer, and a role which he invested with a touching simplicity and directness--the hallmarks of both his acting career and personal popularity.

John Wayne died on June 11, 1979, in Los Angeles.