“Political correctness is tyranny; just tyranny with manners.”
– Charlton Heston

Charlton Heston is a singular figure in American history and consciousness. During the early period of his acting career, he was known for historical and Biblical epics. After his career waned throughout the 1960s, he was reborn as a science fiction actor, thanks to his starring role in Planet of the Apes. While often viewed as a bit of camp today, this film and the series that spawned it was the biggest popular science fiction movie franchise in the pre-Star Wars era.

For our purposes, however, Charlton Heston is an unsung hero because he was a champion of limited government, especially as it pertains to Second Amendment rights. He served as president of the National Rifle Association for five terms, only retiring when he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2002. Starting his involvement in politics in the Civil Rights era, he later gravitated toward conservatism, organizing a political action committee to support Ronald Reagan.

From the Air Force to Film

Heston was the son of a sawmill operator, and grew up in backwoods areas of the Midwest. It was here that he acquired a lifelong love of nature, as well as hunting. His parents divorced when he was 10. His mother remarried, which is where the former John Charles Carter became Charlton Heston.

Acting came naturally to the young Heston, who was a bit of a loner. When tromping around the backcountry of Michigan, he would often act out the characters from books he was reading. When he got to high school, he enrolled in the drama program. He used his budding acting career to win a scholarship to Northwestern University, where he continued his study of dramatics.

In 1944, Heston volunteered for service in the United States Air Force, reaching the rank of staff sergeant as a radio operator and aerial gunner on a B-25. In March of that year, he married fellow Northwestern student Lydia Clarke, to whom he would remain married for the rest of his life. After the war, he received the highest civilian clearance – Q clearance – and acted as a narrator for highly classified Department of Defense instructional films about nuclear weapons.

After the war, the young couple moved to New York. Here, they worked as artists’ models to make ends meet while picking up whatever acting gigs they could. The Hestons had decided to pursue theater and television rather than film. This made things awkward when Charlton Heston was offered a contract with a major studio. He told his wife that he would try just one film to see what it was like. That film was 1950’s Dark City, but his breakthrough came with The Greatest Show on Earth, which won the Oscar for Best Motion Picture in 1952, and was also the highest grossing film of the year. This was also his first collaboration with Cecil B. DeMille.

His two biggest films were The Ten Commandments, where he played Moses, and Ben Hur, where he played the title role and won an Academy Award for Best Actor. The Ten Commandments remains one of the 10 highest-grossing films of all time when adjusted for inflation. He frequently returned to regional theater to get some time on the stage, feeling that it reinvigorated his creative energies, but he never performed on Broadway after starting his film career. A spotty up-and-down career followed his two major works, which left him somewhat marginalized and forgotten by the time Planet of the Apes came out in 1968. He acted as President of the Screen Actors Guild from 1965 to 1971, a position formerly held by future President Ronald Reagan.

Continue reading Charlton Heston: The Forgotten History of America's Favorite Actor and Gun Rights Advocate at Ammo.com.

I remember watching the Academy Awards ceremony just after he died. They did a film clip highlights section saluting performers who had died in the year prior. This was usually accompanied by applause at the end of each late actor's segment. I clearly remember during and just after Charlton Heston's segment, the auditorium was absolutely totally silent.
I lost all respect for current Hollywood and the Academy Awards after that.

quote:

Originally posted by Sacramento Johnson:
I remember watching the Academy Awards ceremony just after he died. They did a film clip highlights section saluting performers who had died in the year prior. This was usually accompanied by applause at the end of each late actor's segment. I clearly remember during and just after Charlton Heston's segment, the auditorium was absolutely totally silent.
I lost all respect for current Hollywood and the Academy Awards after that.

Isn't Hollywood magical?

FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS

https://youtu.be/5ju4Gla2odw