Don’t ever trust a man who doesn’t like john wayne.... how the duke saved the corps

HOW JOHN WAYNE SAVED THE MARINES


Ten days ago was John Wayne’s 104th birthday. He was born on May
26, 1907 in Winterset, Iowa, as Marion Morrison, weighing 13 pounds.
His birthplace is a museum. There is a guest book, opened to a page
with the entry, in the entrant’s handwriting, Name: Ronald Reagan.
Address: 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington DC.

To celebrate the birthday of a truly great American, let me
tell you how John Wayne saved the Marine Corps. In the aftermath of
World War II, the psychological letdown after years of war and
bloodshed, the huge demobilization of servicemen, the desire to slash
military spending, and the antipathy towards the military by
left-wingers in the Democrat Party all combined in a call by a number
of Senators and Congressmen to abolish the Marine Corps.

In this, they were supported by the Doolittle Board,
created by Harry Truman, which called for the Marine Corps to be
“disbanded” as a separate military force, and “unified” with the Army
(yes, the board was headed by an Air Force general, Jimmy Doolittle).

A group of enterprising Marines – you can always depend on
Marines to be enterprising – with Hollywood connections, thought a
movie made around the most famous photograph of World War II, Joe
Rosenthal’s of the Marines raising the flag on Mount Suribachi on Iwo
Jima, could help sway public opinion against their disbandment.

They approached legendary director Allan Dwan, who agreed
to commission a script. The movie was to be called “The Sands of Iwo
Jima,” and everybody agreed there was only one man who could play the
lead role of Sergeant Stryker: John Wayne.

To their great surprise, Wayne turned it down. He didn’t
like the script, and he wasn’t enamored of the character of Stryker.
The Marines came to the rescue again. The Marine Corps Commandant,
General Clifton B. Cates, got on an airplane and flew from Washington
to California to personally request Wayne make the picture. When
General Cates explained the stakes involved – the very existence of the
Marine Corps – Wayne immediately changed his mind, promising the
general he would do everything in his power to have the movie be a
success.

The Sands of Iwo Jima was released in 1949 and quickly
became a runaway blockbuster, with millions of moviegoers packing every
theatre showing it. Wayne was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar,
establishing him as Hollywood’s Number One box-office star. The
Doolittle Board folded its tent, and no politician on Capitol Hill ever
again said a word about disbanding the Marines.

So let’s all say “Semper Fi” to the memory of John Wayne.

To further celebrate his birthday, here’s a treat and some
advice. The treat is this link: A biography of John Wayne written by
Ronald Reagan, in the October 1979 Reader’s Digest.

The advice is this: Don’t ever trust a man who doesn’t like
John Wayne. A man’s opinion of John Wayne is a good rule-of-thumb test
of his character and moral values. To admire John Wayne is to admire
the heroic and the morally noble. To sneer at John Wayne is to admire
the opposite. It’s revealing that you find very few liberals among the
former, and very few conservatives among the latter.

:cowboy_12

the searchers was his best movie

The Quiet Man

Hands-down.

The Cowboys and The Horse Soldiers.

In Harms Way!

Also a big fan of Stagecoach, which would have won him his first Oscar (Best Picture) in 1939.

It wasn't meant to be, though, as some other movie trumped it that year...something about a chick who has an acid trip where she's dodging flying monkeys with a scarecrow, a bipedal cat, and some douchebag with a funnel on his head.*



*And some other flick about Atlanta getting burned down...

In Harms Way. +1
Favorite scene, when he meets his son for the first time.

Ensign Jere Torrey: Leaving, sir?
Captain Rockwell Torrey (John Wayne): Yes. Before I pick you up and throw you to the fish.

Green Berets. I still watch it on Netflix.

He had so many good movies, but Green Berets and Fighting SeaBees are my two favorites.

+1

Flaps,
Something tells me you actually believe that story about Wayne saving the Marines. Really?
And taking a dig at Gen Doolittle is uncalled for too. He certainly cared a great deal about Naval Aviation.

Maureen O'Hara. So hot. Want to touch the hiney.

Who's John Wayne?

re:

Flaps,
Something tells me you actually believe that story about Wayne saving the Marines. Really?
And taking a dig at Gen Doolittle is uncalled for too. He certainly cared a great deal about Naval Aviation.

In this, they were supported by the Doolittle Board,
created by Harry Truman, which called for the Marine Corps to be
“disbanded” as a separate military force, and “unified” with the Army
(yes, the board was headed by an Air Force general, Jimmy Doolittle).

not sure the general had anything against naval aviation.... shit... the navy should have designated him a naval aviator,.
it just appears he didn''t see a need for a marine corps.

i guess i need to attend a sensitivity/awareness program. sorry if i offended you, huggy.

^^^^Citation Needed.

Good actor, I like his movies (The Searchers, FTW), but I can't find anything to validate the truth of this story. The only Doolittle Board or Committee that comes up in my Google-Fu is 1867 one about Indian Affairs.

Also, I just can't bring myself to idolize a guy who intentionally obtained multiple preferential draft classifications/deferments during the war, so that he could make movies about fighting in wars.

But maybe my personal definitions of "heroic" and "morally noble" differ from yours, flaps.

concur, props
i checked with snoops. didn't find anything.

obviously never met the guy. just sayin' his movies were instrumental in fostering general purpose patriotism.
don't much care for tom cruise but i like what 'topgun' did for tomcats.

Well, there is some truth to all of this. Even though the existence of the Marine Corps was actually cemented with the passing of the National Security Act of 1947, the movie helped turn public opinion (and effectively that of Congress) in favor of the Marines for years to come. The documentary that's on the "Sands of Iwo Jima" DVD touches upon it. This book talks about it, also.

Ah, . :tophat_12

Surprised True Grit got no mentions. It was a great movie except for Glen Campbell's awful performance. IMHO, while serving the purposes of the war effort, most of John Wayne's WWII films were pretty thin stuff - especially seeing them as an adult after first having seen them as a kid in the late 40's & early 50's.

i thought they did an excellent job with the recent 'true grit' flick.

Yup. Mostly "swagger." But that's what he was good at. I do enjoy his movies, but I agree with you (thin). Though, I do especially like "In Harm's Way."

Steve

Flaps & Brownshoes: I agree w/ both of you. TG2 was better than the original, if only because Matt Damon played the Texas Ranger role so much more convincingly than Glenn Campbell. Does anyone remember They were Expendable? It was an early WWII flick about PT boats in the Philippines. I thought it was one of Wayne's best war flicks. FWIW.

Was never much of a fan of True Grit. It had a great soundtrack, and Robert Duvall was a badass, but the movie itself was rather flat. I can't help but think that the Academy gave him his Oscar as a make-up for ignoring him for nearly half a century.

As far as his "old-man cowboy" movies go, I have to go with The Shootist. Opie Cunningham aside, it's a badass flick with a great shootout...and quite fitting that he dies in his last film. The Cowboys is good, too, but a little dark. (Again, shit-hot soundtrack by a young John Williams, who was already a decade and a half into his musical scoring career.)

I'd forgotten the movie. Thanks!



Steve

If only because the cast actually did all their own stunts. Which means yes, John Wayne sat on the front of an old pickup truck going 40-50 mph in a metal seat welded too the fender with nothing more than a leather strap across his waist and a pole and rope to wrangle some uncooperative African wildlife. They also wrangled a Rhino for that movie... Balls... Big brass ones.

Oh yeah... and stone cold fox.