History for the day: John Wayne died: 11 June 1979

History.com has an article about the death of The Duke:

On 11 June 1979, John Wayne, an iconic American film actor famous for starring in countless westerns, died, aged 72, after battling cancer for more than a decade.
Born Marion Morrison on 26 May 1907 in Winterset, Iowa, he moved as a child to Glendale, California. A football star at Glendale High School, he attended the University of Southern California on a scholarship, but dropped out after two years. After finding work as a movie studio laborer, Wayne befriended director John Ford, then a rising talent. His first acting jobs were bit parts in which he was credited as Duke Morrison, a childhood nickname derived from the name of his beloved pet dog.
Wayne’s first starring role came in 1930 with The Big Trail, a film directed by his college buddy Raoul Walsh. It was during this time that Marion Morrison became John Wayne, when Walsh decided that Marion was not a good name for an actor playing a tough western hero. Despite the lead actor’s new name, however, the movie flopped. Throughout the 1930s, Wayne made dozens of mediocre Westerns, sometimes churning out two movies a week. In them, he played various rough-and-tumble characters and occasionally appeared as Singing Sandy, a musical cowpoke like Roy Rogers.
In 1939, Wayne finally had his breakthrough role, when his old friend John Ford cast him as the Ringo Kid in the Oscar-winning Stagecoach. Wayne went on to play larger-than-life heroes in dozens of movies, and came to symbolize a type of rugged, strong, straight-shooting American man. John Ford directed Wayne in some of his best-known films, including Fort Apache (released in 1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (released in 1949), Rio Grande (released in 1950), The Quiet Man (released in 1952) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence (released in 1962).
Off-screen, Wayne came to be known for his conservative political views. He produced, directed and starred in The Alamo (released in 1960) and The Green Berets (released in 1968), both of which reflected his patriotic, conservative leanings. In 1969, he won an Oscar for his role as a one-eyed Federal marshal named Rooster Cogburn (photo) in True Grit. Wayne’s last film was The Shootist (released in 1976), in which he played a legendary gunslinger dying of cancer. The role had particular meaning, as the actor was fighting the disease in real life.
During four decades of acting, Wayne, with his trademark drawl and good looks, appeared in over two hundred and fifty films. He was married three times and had seven children.

Rico says there's never been another one like him, and probably never will be... (And, no, Rico does not wear a patch in imitation of Wayne, he wears it because he has to.)