Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
John Wayne: The Forgotten History of “The Duke”
John Wayne is an American Hollywood icon every bit the equal of James Dean or Marilyn Monroe. He is also a man from another era, a man whose conservatism came as naturally as walking down the street. Affectionately known as “The Duke,” he spent three decades as a top box office draw with 179 film and television credits to his name
Before The Duke: Marion Robert Morrison
His story is as American as his values. Born Marion Robert Morrison in Iowa at a whopping 13 pounds, his family relocated to Southern California. His family first arrived in America from Ireland in 1799 and his grandfather was a Civil War veteran. His nickname was bestowed upon him in childhood (“Little Duke” at the time) by a milkman amused by the omnipresence of Wayne’s Airedale Terrier, Duke.
Wayne attended the University of Southern California where he studied pre-law and played football for the Trojans before a broken collarbone from a bodysurfing accident ended his college athletic career. Losing his athletic scholarship forced Wayne to drop out of school.
He was first hired by the legendary Western director, John Ford, and silent Western star, Tom Mix. It was Mix who then introduced him to Wyatt Earp, who Wayne credited with his on-screen mannerisms.
Becoming the Duke: John Wayne’s Early Film Career
Wayne was hired as a favor to the equally legendary USC coach, Howard Jones, who later portrayed himself in Knute Rockne, All American, the famous Ronald Reagan film. Wayne soon graduated from an extra and prop boy to bigger parts – this began his life-long working relationship with director Ford. Director Raoul Walsh renamed Marion Robert Morrison “John Wayne,” though Wayne would keep his birth name for the rest of his life. Wayne was not present at the meeting where his stage name was crafted.
Wayne got his big break in The Big Trail, which cost a staggering $2 million (about $31.9 million in 2021 dollars). The film was shot in both 35mm and 70mm and was extremely well received by the 70mm audiences. Unfortunately, most cinemas were not equipped to show the “bigger” version of the film and it was regarded at the time as one of the all-time flops. After this, he was relegated to smaller parts in A pictures. In one of these roles, 1931’s The Deceiver, he played a corpse.
During these years, his bread and butter were the so-called “horse operas” – Poverty Row Westerns made on the cheap. Wayne appeared in over 80 of these while he was hustling to get back on his feet. In the 1933 film Riders of Destiny, he became one of the first singing cowboys, a popular style of film over the next two decades.
John Wayne Breaks Into the Big Time
In 1939, Wayne rose back to the top of the marquee on an A picture, John Ford’s Stagecoach. Ford had trouble finding financial backing and a studio, but he eventually acquired it, and Wayne was catapulted into the stardom that would follow him for the rest of his life.
World War II came but John Wayne did not serve due to his age and his family status. He was classified as 3-A, however, Wayne was not content to simply sit by the sidelines as his country went to war. He tried to enlist and even asked John Ford if he could join his unit, but the studio worked against him not wanting to lose their A-list actor who was under contract. This isn’t the braggadocio of the chickenhawk – there is ample evidence in official government records of Wayne attempting to change his status, as well as lobbying by his studio to keep him stateside.
Wayne’s failure to serve is, by all accounts both personal and biographical, the most painful experience of his life. He was accepted into service in the Field Photographic Unit, however, his enlistment letter was delivered to his estranged wife’s house, who concealed it from him. He performed with the USO for the troops and even carried out a mission for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS, the precursor to the CIA).
To list every major production of high artistic merit that the Duke would be an article all to itself. He mostly made war movies and Westerns. Three stand out head and shoulders above the pack:
- The Searchers, an epic John Ford Western about a Civil War veteran returning from war who must once again make war against a tribe of Indians who kidnapped one of his nieces and murdered another. It set the tone for a grittier, more realistic, and more ethically complex Western film. It is said that French director Jean-Luc Godard cries every time he views it.
- Rio Bravo is a Western musical co-starring Dean Martin and Rick Nelson. Made as a direct response to High Noon, which Wayne considered deeply unpatriotic, it is a story of flawed men of unimpeachable morality who risk their lives to prevent a rancher’s gang from freeing one of their own from the town jailhouse. The film, along with Night of the Living Dead, was the inspiration for John Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13.
- The original True Grit, where Wayne starred alongside country singer Glenn Campbell, tells the tale of a Civil War veteran who had served in Quantrill’s Raiders hired by an adolescent girl to bring her father’s murderer to justice. Less faithful than the Coen Brothers’ adaptation of the source material, it is a visually stunning film in its own right, with Wayne tailor-made for the role of the “one-eyed fat man” who is past his prime but still has a trick or two up his sleeve.
The Big C and the End of John Wayne
His final film, The Shootist, had more than a passing similarity to The Gunfighter, one that Wayne wanted but was turned down for. He plays a character with cancer, the disease that later took his life. It was nominated for an Oscar and was named as the 10th best film of 1976 by Roger Ebert.
Despite being enrolled in an experimental cancer vaccine study, Wayne succumbed to stomach cancer on June 11, 1979. You can go visit him at the Pacific View Memorial Park Cemetery in Corona del Mar, Newport Beach. He converted to Catholicism shortly before his death.
Wayne, a chain smoker since childhood, previously had lung cancer in 1964 and had to have his entire left lung removed. Despite pressure from inside the industry to keep it quiet, Wayne went public and encouraged people to get preventative screenings to improve their chances of survival from “The Big C” – a phrase that Wayne is credited with coining.
The Conservative Politics of John Wayne
Wayne was known throughout his life as perhaps the most staunchly conservative Republican in all of Hollywood, which was no small feat at the time. In particular, Wayne was ardently anti-Communist and more than willing to play ball with the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) outing Communists in the film industry. He formed the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals and was elected as president twice for the organization. Wayne even went so far as to make the film, Big Jim McLain, where he starred as a HUAC investigator.
Joseph Stalin, who was a fan of Wayne’s film, once said that Wayne should be assassinated – this speaks to Wayne’s influence on anti-Communism. It probably goes without saying that Wayne was a big backer of Senator Joseph McCarthy, but he also voted for FDR in 1936 and was a vocal admirer of Harry S Truman.
Likewise, it’s probably not very surprising that Wayne was a big supporter of former-Vice President Richard M. Nixon’s 1960 campaign. However, in a statement that sets the bar for patriotism, Wayne said after the election of John F. Kennedy, “I didn’t vote for him but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.” He supported the Vietnam War and was even a member of the John Birch Society, but resigned after the organization denounced fluoridation of water as a Communist plot.
After the success of fellow conservative actor George Murphy in the 1964 California Senate race, the Texas Republican Party urged the star to run for national office from the Lone Star State. He joked that he didn’t think anyone would take an actor seriously – the joke being that he was already helping his friend, a certain former Screen Actors Guild President by the name Ronald Reagan run for Governor of California. George Wallace offered him the number two spot on his Presidential campaign, but the Duke immediately declined, and instead supported Richard Nixon’s second bid for the White House.
The Legacy of John Wayne
Wayne left a massive footprint on Southern California the nation as a whole – on his 72nd birthday, he received the Congressional Gold Medal; after his passing, he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom; and the Orange County airport is named after him, featuring a large statue of the Duke, despite efforts by the left to cancel Wayne and rename the airport.
More than just a politically conscious actor, Wayne was a symbol of America and American masculinity. He was well aware of this role in American society and implored his friend and fellow actor Kirk Douglas to avoid “feminine” roles, such as Vincent Van Gogh, because “There’s so goddamn few of us left. We got to play strong, tough characters.”
Despite his reputation as a stern and stoic man, the Duke was not above laughing at himself. In 1973, Wayne was invited by satirical Harvard University newspaper, The Harvard Lampoon, to receive the “Brass Balls Award.” What started as a joke at his expense became an Army convoy complete with an armored personnel carrier for Wayne who received a standing ovation when he came onstage.
When Emperor Hirohito visited the United States in 1975, he specifically requested to meet Wayne as a representative of the American people. Similarly, when Nikita Khrushchev visited the States in 1959, he came with two requests: Disneyland and John Wayne. Additionally, he appeared on every annual Harris Poll of America’s favorite actors and is still the only person to appear on the list after his death.
Such was the status of the Duke.
Robert Aldrich, president of the Directors Guild of America, summed up the Duke in a statement at his funeral:
“It is important for you to know that I am a registered Democrat and, to my knowledge, share none of the political views espoused by Duke. However, whether he is ill-disposed or healthy, John Wayne is far beyond the normal political sharpshooting in this community. Because of his courage, his dignity, his integrity, and because of his talents as an actor, his strength as a leader, his warmth as a human being throughout his illustrious career, he is entitled to a unique spot in our hearts and minds. In this industry, we often judge people, sometimes unfairly, by asking whether they have paid their dues. John Wayne has paid his dues over and over, and I’m proud to consider him a friend and am very much in favor of my government recognizing in some important fashion the contribution that Mr. Wayne has made.”
The Duke is an inspiration both in his public persona of a man’s man’s man, as well as his willingness to stand up, uncompromisingly against leftist forces who want to turn America into something other than America. He was also one heck of an actor who made some of the most entertaining films ever, with none of the leftist cultural jihads that plagues Hollywood today.
John Wayne: The Forgotten History of “The Duke” originally appeared in The Resistance Library at Ammo.com.
Published in Entertainment
This was a fascinating tribute to Wayne, but I found the link to Wyatt Earp to be quite a revelation. The arms- bearing citizens kept the west not nearly as wild as its reputation and not nearly as violent as modern American cities. Ironically, the famous shoot-out at the OK Corral can be blamed on an attempt at gun control.
An interesting post, thanks. A sidelight or two:
For decades, there was a fake story, which people took as real, that at the height of the Tet Offensive, with The Green Berets opening, Wayne personally landed a helicopter at Paramount Studios, got out of the helo and started shouting about “Commies”. That’s the caricature. The story is so stupid it’s amazing it took so long to shoot it down. The timeline doesn’t match up. Wayne wasn’t a pilot. In 1968, and probably even now, there was no space to land a helicopter on the Paramount lot, one of the smallest in Hollywood and hemmed in on all sides by housing. Oh, and Berets was released by Warner Brothers. Above all, Wayne’s conservatism was smart, not moronic. There’s never been so much as a peep of an apology from the dimwits who credulously believed and spread the story.
Big Jim McLain was made when movie stars were first going into independent production, making their own films with their own money and releasing them through studios. It’s got some interesting background about Communist infiltration of maritime unions and shipping in Hawaii, but to be honest it’s not a very good movie. It’s a cheapie and looks it. But it belies the later image of Wayne as being some kind of right wing nut. In fact, as right wingers go, Wayne comes across as eminently fair. He states that he doesn’t hold prewar, Depression era Communist affiliations against people; and doesn’t consider being happy about WWII Soviet victories against the Nazis unpatriotic while we were actually allied with the USSR. He draws the line at postwar sympathy for Communism; by that time, he reasons, nobody could be in any doubt about the kind of regime it was.
My favorites are The Cowboys and Mclintock.
And what happened to The High and The Mighty? I watched that so many times when I was a kid, but now it’s never mentioned as if it never happened.
Wait a minute, thirteen pounds?!?!? That poor woman…
The original True Grit is probably my favorite of all western movies. And this is my favorite line “fill your hand you son of a bitch”. The movie also started a my lifelong infatuation with Kim Derby.
Anybody who remained on Team Commie after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was a knucklehead.
John Wayne is the quintessential American hero in fiction, bar none.
His role as J W McLintock particularly exhibits all the traits of American manhood, including a willingness to laugh at himself and to rub shoulders with the riff-raff.
The title of the video says it all.
If there is a better character introduction, I’ve either forgotten it or never seen it.
“Awww … what’d he have to go and do that for?”
A great man.
Here’s another of his accomplishments. One day back in the 1950’s, when very little was known about the prevalence of child sexual abuse and the personal devastation it causes, one of Wayne’s fellow actors told him about how he had been sexually abused when very young, and how the trauma had affected him.
So Wayne personally paid for the first public education film telling parents how to keep children safe. It started a whole movement that is now successfully reducing the extent of this terrible problem.
Man, that one handed re-cocking of that rifle. Years before they had the Terminator do it:
“I thought you were dead Mr McAndles… Not Hardly.”
Great film.
He was Army. It would have been a chopper. Helo is Navy.
My dad had him beat by a pound …
John Wayne is not the equal of James Dean. Dean’s memory is fading as Wayne’s cultural impact continues and grows. ( Monroe on the other hand…)
Arnold once said that he specifically studied True Grit to learn that trick.
Good thing it wasn’t a bolt action.
I heard his former personal assistant speak once. I forget the reason he was speaking, as it had absolutely nothing to do with Wayne but I remember the Q & A afterwards was hilarious. Every question was about Wayne and not what the presentation was about. While I can’t remember the presentation, I still recall the uproarious laughter of that what seemed to be hours-long Q & A. The man is a very open homosexual, vegetarian and was a pacifist in those days. His stories about long forceful debates with his boss and how they razzed one another were something else.
His boundless admiration and respect for his former boss was obvious.