That was a great video i have to share that with a friend of mine who is very patriotic and a huge john Wayne fan

Thanks Kevin

I’m a jerk and I know it so don’t flame me for this. But, when history is written, it needs to be written correctly. Otherwise Bin Laden may wind up a hero.

I know John Wayne is a hero to a whole generation. I grew up watching (and loving it) with my Grandfather. I cried with him the day we found out he was dead.

But was John Wayne a Patriot? Or was his whole career a terrible irony?

The following is an excerpt from the book “John Wayne’s America: The Politics of Celebrity” (1997) by:Garry Wills

At the time of Pearl Harbor, Wayne was 34 years old. His marriage was on the rocks but he still had four kids to support. His career was taking off, in large part on the strength of his work in the classic western Stagecoach (1939). But he wasn’t rich. Should he chuck it all and enlist? Many of Hollywood’s big names, such as Henry Fonda, Jimmy Stewart, and Clark Gable, did just that. (Fonda, Wills points out, was 37 at the time and had a wife and three kids.) But these were established stars. Wayne knew that if he took a few years off for military service, there was a good chance that by the time he got back he’d be over the hill.

Besides, he specialized in the kind of movies a nation at war wanted to see, in which a rugged American hero overcame great odds. Recognizing that Hollywood was an important part of the war effort, Washington had told California draft boards to go easy on actors. Perhaps rationalizing that he could do more good at home, Wayne obtained 3-A status, “deferred for [family] dependency reasons.” He told friends he’d enlist after he made just one or two more movies. The real question is why he never did so. Had Wayne divorced, his status would have been revoked. He waited until after the war to finalize his divorce. He remarried that very same day.

Wayne cranked out thirteen movies during the war, many with war-related themes. Most of the films were enormously successful and within a short time the Duke was one of America’s most popular stars. His bankability now firmly established, he could have joined the military, secure in the knowledge that Hollywood would welcome him back later. He even made a half-hearted effort to sign up, sending in the paperwork to enlist in the naval photography unit commanded by a good friend, director John Ford.

But he didn’t follow through. Nobody really knows why; Wayne didn’t like to talk about it. A guy who prided himself on doing his own stunts, he doesn’t seem to have lacked physical courage. One suspects he just found it was a lot more fun being a Hollywood hero than the real kind. Many movie star-soldiers had enlisted in the first flush of patriotism after Pearl Harbor. As the war ground on, slogging it out in the trenches seemed a lot less exciting. The movies, on the other hand, had put Wayne well on the way to becoming a legend. “Wayne increasingly came to embody the American fighting man,” Wills writes. In late 1943 and early 1944 he entertained the troops in the Pacific theater as part of a USO tour. An intelligence big shot asked him to give his impression of Douglas MacArthur. He was fawned over by the press when he got back. Meanwhile, he was having a torrid affair with a beautiful Mexican woman. How could military service compare with that?

In 1944, Wayne received a 2-A classification, “deferred in support of [the] national . . . interest.” A month later the Selective Service decided to revoke many previous deferments and reclassified him 1-A. But Wayne’s studio appealed and got his 2-A status reinstated until after the war ended.

People who knew Wayne say he felt bad about not having served. (During the war he’d gotten into a few fights with servicemen who wondered why he wasn’t in uniform.) Some think his guilty conscience was one reason he became such a superpatriot later. The fact remains that the man who came to symbolize American patriotism and pride had a chance to do more than just act the part, and he let it pass.

All of these statements can be confirmed in Waynes own archives. His letters to the millitary pleading his case, as well as the corespondence from the movie studios.

Every time I see John Wayne Movies pop up on TV, I still think of my Grandfather who I miss great deal. The question is, had Boyd known this about Wayne, would he ever have watched his movies. I think not, in fact I’m certain of that.