# John Wayne's Military Absence

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/john-waynes-military-absence/557283>\
**Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\
**Created:** [October 15, 2010, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/john-waynes-military-absence/557283 "2010-10-15T19:45:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gamay9\_aol.com](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/aca169/32.png) [@gamay9\_aol.com](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamay9_aol.com)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2010, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/john-waynes-military-absence/557283/1 "2010-10-15T19:45:39Z")

</div>

The story I hear is that it was either Louis B. Mayer’s or John Ford’s threat that if Wayne enlisted for WWII he would never work for either studio again. They also convinced him that making war hero movies would be of greater service to the allied military effort than being one of hundreds of thousands of soldiers.

Perhaps that’s why he didn’t talk about it much; many patriots would have dismissed that as a lame excuse. I don’t, since we won the war.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2010, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/john-waynes-military-absence/557283/2 "2010-10-15T20:28:30Z")

</div>

Welcome, **gamay**.

A [link](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1055/was-john-wayne-a-draft-dodger)to the column update in question.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\
**Post date:** [October 15, 2010, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/john-waynes-military-absence/557283/3 "2010-10-15T20:45:59Z")

</div>

> [@gamay9\_aol.com](#):
>
> The story I hear is that it was either Louis B. Mayer’s or John Ford’s threat that if Wayne enlisted for WWII he would never work for either studio again. They also convinced him that making war hero movies would be of greater service to the allied military effort than being one of hundreds of thousands of soldiers.

The story you hear from where? There are dozens of biographies on John Wayne (and Ford and Mayer and everybody else from that period). Why not give a cite?

Of course, if you don’t have a cite, we need to know that as well.