Henry Fonda

Henry Jaynes Fonda was an American actor born on May 16, 1905, in Grand Island, Nebraska, to William Brace Fonda, a printer, and his wife Herberta. The family relocated to Omaha, Nebraska, in 1906. Fonda's career spanned five decades across Broadway and Hollywood, and his Broadway appearances extended from 1929 to 1978.

Fonda was raised as a Christian Scientist and attended the University of Minnesota, where he majored in journalism without completing his degree. At age 20, he began acting at the Omaha Community Playhouse after Dodie Brando, mother of Marlon Brando, recommended him for a juvenile part in You and I. He was cast as Ricky in that production and subsequently received the lead in Merton of the Movies, an experience that clarified his commitment to acting as a profession. He left Omaha in 1928 and traveled to Cape Cod, where he played a minor role at the Cape Playhouse in Dennis, Massachusetts, before joining the University Players, an intercollegiate summer stock company in Falmouth, Massachusetts. There he worked alongside Margaret Sullavan, whom he would later marry. His first professional role came in The Jest by Sem Benelli, in which Joshua Logan assigned him the part of Tornaquinci. Also appearing in that production were Bretaigne Windust, Kent Smith, and Eleanor Phelps.

Fonda subsequently moved to New York City, where he and James Stewart became roommates and developed their craft on Broadway. His stage work during this period led to his being cast in the Broadway production of The Farmer Takes a Wife, which brought him to the attention of Hollywood. In 1935, 20th Century Fox hired him to reprise that role opposite Janet Gaynor in the film adaptation, marking his Hollywood debut and earning him $3,000 per week. That same year he appeared in the RKO film I Dream Too Much alongside opera star Lily Pons, and The New York Times described him as the most likable of the new crop of romantic juveniles.

His film career expanded steadily through the late 1930s. He costarred with Sylvia Sidney and Fred MacMurray in The Trail of the Lonesome Pine in 1936, the first Technicolor film shot outdoors. Bette Davis selected him as her costar in Jezebel in 1938, and he appeared in Jesse James and Young Mr. Lincoln in 1939. His portrayal of Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath in 1940 earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. In 1941 he starred opposite Barbara Stanwyck in the screwball comedy The Lady Eve. Following his service in World War II, he appeared in two Westerns that received significant attention: The Ox-Bow Incident in 1943 and My Darling Clementine in 1946, the latter directed by John Ford. Ford also directed him in Fort Apache in 1948.

During a seven-year break from film work, Fonda concentrated on stage productions. Among his Broadway credits during this and other periods were Mister Roberts, Point of No Return, The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial, Critic's Choice, and A Gift of Time. His work in Mister Roberts earned him the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play in 1948. He returned to film in 1955 to star in the screen adaptation of Mister Roberts, a role he had championed on Broadway. In 1956, at 51 years of age, he played the title character of 38-year-old Manny Balestrero in Alfred Hitchcock's thriller The Wrong Man. The following year he starred as Juror 8 in 12 Angry Men, a film he also co-produced, which earned him a BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actor.

Fonda's later career included a range of character types. He played a villain in the epic Western Once Upon a Time in the West in 1968, appeared alongside Lucille Ball in the romantic comedy Yours, Mine and Ours, portrayed a colonel in Battle of the Bulge in 1965, and played Admiral Nimitz in Midway in 1976. On Broadway, his performance in 1974 earned him the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Performance. His final film role, as the lead in On Golden Pond in 1981 alongside Katharine Hepburn and his daughter Jane Fonda, brought him the Academy Award for Best Actor at the 54th Academy Awards. He was too ill to attend the ceremony. Fonda died of heart disease on August 12, 1982.

In 1999, the American Film Institute named Fonda the sixth-greatest male screen legend of the Classic Hollywood era. He was the patriarch of a family of actors that included his daughter Jane Fonda, his son Peter Fonda, his granddaughter Bridget Fonda, and his grandson Troy Garity. His ancestry traced back to a family from Genoa, Italy, that migrated to the Netherlands in the 15th century and later immigrated to the Dutch colony of New Netherland in 1642, eventually establishing the town of Fonda in what is now upstate New York.