"How Chuck Norris Turned Personal Loss into Fame as America's Karate-Kicking Hero – Despite Never Having Been in a Fight"

WITH his old-school patriotism and all-American action movies in which he punched, kicked and blasted his way across cinema screens, Chuck Norris invented the monosyllabic hard men heroes that were to become fertile ground for the likes of Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme.

But the biggest hero in his life who inspired him to play the characters he did.

Chuck Norris suffered a medical emergency on March 19, 2026, while in HawaiiCredit: Instagram/chucknorris The legendary actor rose to fame in the 70s, appearing in numerous action filmsCredit: Moviepix – Getty Chuck arrives at the premiere of The Expendables 2 in 2012Credit: AFP

His 1984 film, Missing in Action, in which he played a lone-wolf commando invading Vietnam to locate and liberate US prisoners of war, was a love-letter to his younger brother, Wieland, who died fighting in Vietnam in 1970.

“He was cut down by the Vietcong while leading his squad through enemy-held territory at the age of 27,” said Chuck, . “It was the saddest day of my life.”

He only took roles in which he played the good guy, risking all for his belief and the good of his country, celebrating what he called “old fashioned patriotism.” He was, he said, “following the example of my brother.”

Chuck was born Carlos Ray Norris on 10 March, 1940. He grew up in poverty in Oklahoma with his two younger brothers Wieland and Aaron, raised mostly by their mother as his alcoholic father was barely around.

“My father was negligent, abusive, exactly the kind of person I didn’t want to be,” he recalled.

It was while he was serving in Korea with the US Air Force that he got into martial arts. It was here that he acquired the nickname “Chuck.” After leaving the military, he opened a chain of karate schools.

He held the title of middleweight karate champion for six years. It was through this that he became friends with fellow martial artist, Bruce Lee, who invited him to play his nemesis in the classic 1972 movie, The Way of The Dragon. It was one of the very few roles in which he played a baddie.

One of his karate pupils was Steve McQueen, who encouraged him to have a proper go at making acting his career.

He took the starring role in the film Breaker Breaker! In 1977 which cost just $250,000 and made some $12 million.

After watching it, McQueen gave him one piece of advice that was to remain with him throughout his life – “Movies are visual and when you try to verbalise something, you’re going to lose the audience.”

The film was the perfect kick-start to action movies in similar vein that followed – including Lone Wolf McQuade (1983) in which he plays a reckless but brave Texas Ranger who defeats an arms dealer played by David Carradine, Missing In Action and its two sequels (1984-88), Invasion USA (1985), gamely stopping communists taking over America by blowing them up, The Delta Force (1986), solving Middle Eastern Terrorism by firing missiles from his motorbike.

“I screened Delta Force for former President Bush in the White House,” he said.

His films were later to be hugely popular for a younger generation as cut-price videos, giving him a huge cult following.

Flowers are left on the actor’s Hollywood Walk of Fame starCredit: AFP Chuck is best known for his appearance in Way of the DragonCredit: Getty Chuck also played karate-kicking lawman Cordell Walker in CBS show Walker, Texas RangerCredit: Refer to source

One of his biggest roles was on TV – playing karate-kicking lawman Cordell Walker in Walker, Texas Ranger, which ran on CBS from 1993 to 2001.

In the second of The Expendables movies he teamed up with the likes of Stallone, Schwarzenegger, and Dolph Lundgren playing a team of mercenaries sent to retrieve a computer from a plane that went down in Albania where they are captured by bounty hunters.

A staunch Republican, he became increasingly political. He became friends with former President Bush and was a supporter of Presidents Regan and Trump.

A gun-rights activist, anti-abortionist and Christian who did not believe in evolution, he believed in America having a strong military and an aggressive foreign policy.

In 1986, following the hijacking of TWA flight 847 from Cairo to San Diego by Hezbollah, demanding the release of 766 Shia Muslims from Israeli custody, he railed that the US was becoming a “paper tiger” in the Middle East.

“What we’re facing here is the fact that our passive approach to terrorism is going to instigate much more terrorism throughout the world,” he said. “I’ve been all over the world, and seeing the devastation that terrorism has done in Europe and the Middle East, I know eventually it’s going to come here. It’s just a matter of time. They’re doing all this devastation in Europe now, and the next stepping stone is America and Canada. Being a free country, with the freedom of movement that we have, it’s an open-door policy for terrorism.”

As his screen persona and that of his private life began to merge into one, he saw himself as an example of how US patriots should be.

While promoting his film Lone Wolf McQuade in London in 1983, he said, “What I want to be is the hero to the kids of this world, show them right from wrong and that there is a way out of the ghetto.

“In my films I only resort to violence when all else fails. I want the kids to see me as the real Chuck Norris up there on the screen. The good guy, the poor kid from Oklahoma, who stays off drugs and stands for what’s right in the world.”

Chuck Norris had two children – Mike and Eric – with his first wife, Dianne, who he married when he was 18 and she was a year younger. They separated in 1988, after 30 years of marriage.

Chuck, seen at The Expendables 2 premiere on August 15, 2012, saw a resurgence in popularity in the 2000s via memesCredit: Getty Chuck Norris married Gena O’Kelley in 1988 after splitting from his first wifeCredit: Getty – Contributor The actor was known for his black-belt martial arts skillsCredit: Aquarus Collection

He married Gena O’Kelley, a model 23 years his junior that same year, and they had two children, twins Dakota and Danilee, born in 2001. He also had a daughter, Dina (born 1962), from an extramarital relationship.

He lived on a sprawling 640-acre ranch in Texas, where he loved the fresh air and the expanse of wildness.

In 2005, his tough-guy persona turned him into a star on the internet on the satirical site, Chuck Norris Facts, that supposedly documented absurd feats of strength and endurance that he was capable of.

It resulted in six books, some of them New York Times bestsellers as well as two video games, and several appearances on talk shows, such as Late Night with Conan O’Brien, in which he good-naturedly, joined in with the joke.

In a moment of navel gazing, he told a journalist: “I’ve never been in a real fight in my life.”

Of his action movies that were often derided by critics, he once said, “I’m a people’s actor, not a critics’ actor, and I always have been. Truthfully, I’m proud of each of my films in a certain way.”