Charles Bronson

Charles Bronson (born Charles Dennis Buchinsky; November 3, 1921 – August 30, 2003) was an American actor.

He was known for his roles in action films and his "granite features and brawny physique".

Bronson was born into extreme poverty in Ehrenfeld, Pennsylvania, a coal mining town in Pennsylvania's Allegheny Mountains.

Bronson's father, a miner, died when Bronson was young.

Bronson was born November 3, 1921, in Ehrenfeld, Pennsylvania, a coal mining region in Pennsylvania's Allegheny Mountains, north of Johnstown.

In 1933, Bronson's father died and he went to work in the coal mines, first in the mining office and then in the mine.

He later said he earned one dollar for each ton of coal that he mined.

In another interview, he said that he had to work double shifts to earn $1 a week.

Bronson later recounted that he and his brother engaged in dangerous work removing "stumps" between the mines, and that cave-ins were common.

The family suffered extreme poverty during the Great Depression, and Bronson recalled going hungry many times.

His mother could not afford milk for his younger sister, so she was fed warm tea instead.

His family was so poor that he once had to wear his sister's dress to school for lack of clothing.

Bronson was the first member of his family to graduate from high school.

Bronson himself worked in the mines as well until joining the United States Army Air Forces in 1943 to fight in World War II.

After his service, he joined a theatrical troupe and studied acting.

Bronson worked in the mines, until enlisting in the United States Army Air Forces in 1943 during World War II.

He served in the 760th Flexible Gunnery Training Squadron, and in 1945 as a Boeing B-29 Superfortress aerial gunner with the Guam-based 61st Bombardment Squadron within the 39th Bombardment Group, which conducted combat missions against the Japanese home islands.

He flew 25 missions and received a Purple Heart for wounds received in battle.

During the 1950s, he played various supporting roles in motion pictures and television, including anthology drama TV series in which he would appear as the main character.

Near the end of the decade, he had his first cinematic leading role in Machine-Gun Kelly (1958).

Bronson had sizeable co-starring roles in The Magnificent Seven (1960), The Great Escape (1963), This Property Is Condemned (1966), and The Dirty Dozen (1967).

On television, Bronson was nominated for an Emmy Award for his supporting role in an episode of General Electric Theater, and performed in many major television shows.

Eventually, actor Alain Delon (who was a fan of Bronson) hired him to co-star with him in the French film Adieu l'ami (1968).

That year, he played one of the leads in the Italian spaghetti western, Once Upon a Time in the West (1968).

Bronson continued playing leads in various action, western, and war films made in Europe, including Rider on the Rain (1970), which won Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Eventually, he returned to the United States to make more films, working with director Michael Winner.

Their first collaborations included Chato's Land (1972), The Mechanic (1972) and The Stone Killer (1973).

At this point, he became the world's number one box office star, commanding $1 million per film.

In a 1973 interview, Bronson remarked that he did not know his father very well, and was not sure if he loved or hated him, adding that all he could remember about him was that whenever his mother announced that his father was coming home, the children would hide.

In 1974, Bronson starred in the controversial film Death Wish (also directed by Winner), about an architect-turned-vigilante, a role that typified the rest of his career.

Most critics initially panned the film as exploitative, but the movie was a major box-office success and spawned four sequels.

In cinema, he played in the Western comedy From Noon till Three (1976), and a supporting role in The Indian Runner (1991), a dramatic film for which his performance received good reviews.

Until his retirement in the late 1990s and death in 2003, Bronson played almost exclusively lead roles in action-oriented films, often working with director J. Lee Thompson in films such as Mr. Majestyk (1974), Hard Times (1975), St. Ives,(1976), The White Buffalo (1977), Telefon (1977), and Assassination (1989).

He made a number of non-action television films in which he would often act against type.

He was the 11th of 15 children born into a Roman Catholic family of Lithuanian heritage.

His father, Walter Buchinsky (born: Valteris P. Bučinskis), was a Lipka Tatar from Druskininkai in southern Lithuania.

Bronson's mother, Mary (née Valinsky), whose parents were from Lithuania, was born in Tamaqua, Pennsylvania in Pennsylvania's Coal Region.

Bronson did not speak any English at home during his childhood in Pennsylvania, like many children he grew up with.

He once recounted that even as a soldier, his accent was strong enough to make his comrades think he was a foreigner.

Besides English, he could speak Lithuanian, Russian and Greek.