Jeff Chandler (actor)
Encyclopedia
Jeff Chandler was an American film actor and singer in the 1950s.

Early life

Chandler was born Ira Grossel to a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York, the only child of Anna (née Shapiro) and Phillip Grossel. He attended Erasmus Hall High School
Erasmus Hall High School
Erasmus Hall Campus High School is a four-year public high school in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, United States operated by the New York City Department of Education....

, the alma mater of many stage and film personalities. Later, he took a drama course at the Feagin School of Dramatic Art in New York. He worked in radio briefly and spent two years in stock companies. He served in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, mostly in the Aleutians. His enlistment record for the Cavalry on November 18, 1941 gave his height as six foot four inches and his weight as 210 pounds. After being discharged from the military, he was a busy radio
Radio programming
Radio programming is the Broadcast programming of a Radio format or content that is organized for Commercial broadcasting and Public broadcasting radio stations....

 actor both in drama (such as episodes of Escape
Escape (radio program)
Escape was radio's leading anthology series of high-adventure radio dramas, airing on CBS from July 7, 1947 to September 25, 1954. Since the program did not have a regular sponsor like Suspense, it was subjected to frequent schedule shifts and lower production budgets, although Richfield Oil signed...

, Academy Award Theater
Academy Award Theater
Academy Award was a CBS radio anthology series which presented 30-minute adaptations of plays, novels or films.Rather than adaptations of Oscar-winning films, as the title implied, the series offered "Hollywood's finest, the great picture plays, the great actors and actresses, techniques and...

, The Whistler
The Whistler
The Whistler was an American radio mystery drama which ran from May 16, 1942 until September 22, 1955. It was sponsored by the Signal Oil Company: "That whistle is your signal for the Signal Oil program, The Whistler." The program was adapted into a film noir series by Columbia Pictures in...

, and the radio detective series Michael Shayne
Michael Shayne
Michael Shayne is a fictional private detective character created during the late 1930s by writer Brett Halliday. It was the title of a series of 12 films starring Lloyd Nolan, a radio series under a variety of names, between 1944 and 1953, and later in 1960-1961, a 32 episode NBC television series...

) and comedy (playing bashful biology teacher Phillip Boynton on Our Miss Brooks
Our Miss Brooks
Our Miss Brooks is an American situation comedy starring Eve Arden as a sardonic high school English teacher. It began as a radio show broadcast on CBS from 1948 to 1957. When the show was adapted to television , it became one of the medium's earliest hits...

). His first film appearance was in Johnny O'Clock
Johnny O'Clock
Johnny O'Clock is an American crime film noir written and directed by Robert Rossen, based on a story by Milton Holmes. The drama features Dick Powell, Evelyn Keyes, and Lee J. Cobb.-Plot:...

(1947).

Career

In the 1950s, Chandler became a star in western and action movies. His first important role was in Sword In the Desert (1948), as an Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i freedom fighter. He was nominated for an Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...

 for his role as Cochise
Cochise
Cochise was a chief of the Chokonen band of the Chiricahua Apache and the leader of an uprising that began in 1861. Cochise County, Arizona is named after him.-Biography:...

 in Broken Arrow
Broken Arrow (1950 film)
Broken Arrow is a western Technicolor film released in 1950. It was directed by Delmer Daves and starred James Stewart and Jeff Chandler. The film was nominated for three Academy Awards, and won a Golden Globe award for Best Film Promoting International Understanding. It made history as the first...

(1950). The first of three screen appearances as the legendary Apache
Apache
Apache is the collective term for several culturally related groups of Native Americans in the United States originally from the Southwest United States. These indigenous peoples of North America speak a Southern Athabaskan language, which is related linguistically to the languages of Athabaskan...

 chief, he repeated the role in The Battle at Apache Pass
The Battle at Apache Pass
The Battle at Apache Pass is a 1952 Universal-International western film starring Jeff Chandler as Cochise, the Apache chief of Broken Arrow....

(1952) and in a cameo in Taza, Son of Cochise
Taza, Son of Cochise
Taza, Son of Cochise is a 1954 western film directed by Douglas Sirk and starring Rock Hudson and Barbara Rush. The film was shot in 3D, but only released in 2D at the time.-Plot synopsis:...

(1954). He was the first actor nominated for an Academy Award for portraying an American Indian. His agent was Doovid Barskin of The Barskin Agency in the late 50's.

During the latter part of the decade and into the early 1960s, Chandler became a top leading man
Leading man
Leading man or leading gentleman is an informal term for the actor who plays a love interest to the leading actress in a film or play. A leading man is usually an all rounder; capable of singing, dancing, and acting at a professional level, but never outshining his female co-star...

. His sex appeal, prematurely gray hair, and ruggedly handsome tanned features put him into drama and costume movies. Among the movies of this period are Female on the Beach
Female on the Beach
Female on the Beach is a Universal-International feature film starring Joan Crawford and Jeff Chandler in a story about a widow and her beach bum lover. The screenplay by Robert Hill and Richard Alan Simmons was based on the play The Besieged Heart by Robert Hill...

(1955), Foxfire (1955), Away All Boats
Away All Boats
Away All Boats is a 1956 American war film produced by Universal Pictures. It was directed by Joseph Pevney and produced by Howard Christie from a screenplay by Ted Sherdeman based on the 1953 novel by Kenneth M. Dodson....

(1956), Toy Tiger (1956), Drango
Drango
Drango is a 1957 American motion picture produced by Jeff Chandler's own production company Earlmar Productions, written and directed by Hall Bartlett, and released by United Artists. Starring Chandler in the title role, the film also features Ronald Howard, Joanne Dru, Julie London and Donald Crisp...

(1957), The Tattered Dress (1957), Man in the Shadow
Man in the Shadow
Man in the Shadow is a 1957 crime film starring Jeff Chandler, Orson Welles, Colleen Miller, Ben Alexander, and John Larch.-Plot summary:...

(1957), A Stranger in My Arms (1959), The Jayhawkers! (1959), Thunder in the Sun
Thunder in the Sun
Thunder in the Sun is a 1959 western film made by Carrollton Inc and Seven Arts Productions and distributed by Paramount Pictures. It was directed by Russell Rouse and produced by Clarence Greene from a screenplay by Russell Rouse and...

(1959), and Return to Peyton Place
Return to Peyton Place (film)
Return to Peyton Place is a 1961 drama film produced by Jerry Wald and directed by José Ferrer. The screenplay by Ronald Alexander is based on the 1959 novel Return to Peyton Place by Grace Metalious...

(1961).

His leading ladies included June Allyson
June Allyson
June Allyson was an American film and television actress, popular in the 1940s and 1950s. She was a major MGM contract star. Allyson won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress for her performance in Too Young to Kiss . From 1959–1961, she hosted and occasionally starred in her own CBS anthology...

, Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....

, Rhonda Fleming
Rhonda Fleming
Rhonda Fleming , is an American film and television actress.She acted in more than 40 films, mostly in the 1940s and 1950s, and became renowned as one of the most beautiful and glamorous actresses of her day...

, Maureen O'Hara
Maureen O'Hara
Maureen O'Hara is an Irish film actress and singer. The famously red-headed O'Hara has been noted for playing fiercely passionate heroines with a highly sensible attitude. She often worked with director John Ford and longtime friend John Wayne...

, Kim Novak
Kim Novak
Kim Novak is an American film and television actress. She began her career with her roles in Pushover and Phffft! but achieved greater prominence in the 1955 film Picnic...

, Jane Russell
Jane Russell
Jane Russell was an American film actress and was one of Hollywood's leading sex symbols in the 1940s and 1950s....

, Esther Williams
Esther Williams
Esther Jane Williams is a retired American competitive swimmer and MGM movie star.Williams set multiple national and regional swimming records in her late teens as part of the Los Angeles Athletic Club swim team...

, and his Brooklyn friend Susan Hayward
Susan Hayward
Susan Hayward was an American actress.After working as a fashion model in New York, Hayward travelled to Hollywood in 1937 when open auditions were held for the leading role in Gone with the Wind . Although she was not selected, she secured a film contract, and played several small supporting...

.

Chandler had a concurrent career as a singer and recording artist, releasing several albums and playing nightclubs. In 1955 he became only the second star to play at the Riviera
Riviera (hotel and casino)
The Riviera is a hotel and casino located on the Las Vegas Strip in Winchester, Nevada. The hotel has over 2,100 rooms, many located in a 23-story tower. The casino has of gaming space.-History:...

, after Liberace
Liberace
Wladziu Valentino Liberace , best known simply as Liberace, was a famous American pianist and vocalist.In a career that spanned four decades of concerts, recordings, motion pictures, television and endorsements, Liberace became world-renowned...

 was the featured headliner. In her autobiography Hold the Roses (2002), Rose Marie
Rose Marie
Rose Marie is an American actress. As a child performer she had a successful singing career as Baby Rose Marie....

 wrote that “Jeff Chandler was a great guy, but he was no singer. He put together an act and we opened at the Riviera. He came with a conductor, piano player, light man, press agent, and manager. None of it helped”. And “Everybody raved about Jeff’s singing, but let’s face it: He really didn’t sing very well. He definitely had guts to open in Vegas”. He left to work on a movie after three and a half weeks.

Personal life

Chandler married actress Marjorie Hoshelle (1918–1989) in 1946. The couple had two daughters, Jamie Tucker (1947–2003) and Dana Grossel (1949–2002), before divorcing in 1954. Both his daughters died of cancer, as did his mother, maternal aunt, uncle and grandfather.

When his friend Sammy Davis, Jr.
Sammy Davis, Jr.
Samuel George "Sammy" Davis Jr. was an American entertainer and was also known for his impersonations of actors and other celebrities....

 lost an eye in an accident and was in danger of losing the other, Chandler offered to give Davis one of his own eyes. Chandler himself had nearly lost an eye and had been visibly scarred in an auto accident years earlier.

He was romantically linked with Esther Williams
Esther Williams
Esther Jane Williams is a retired American competitive swimmer and MGM movie star.Williams set multiple national and regional swimming records in her late teens as part of the Los Angeles Athletic Club swim team...

, who claimed in her 1999 autobiography that she broke off the relationship when she discovered that Chandler was a cross-dresser.

His former lover Esther Williams, in her tell-all 1999 biography, put Chandler back in the headlines after asserting that he was a cross-dresser. She told him, "Jeff, you're too big for polka dots." Esther later admitted privately that this had no basis in fact.
.

Death

Shortly after completing his role in Merrill's Marauders
Merrill's Marauders (film)
Merrill's Marauders is a 1962 Cinemascope war film directed and co-written by Samuel Fuller based on the exploits of the jungle warfare unit of the same name in the Burma Campaign. The source is the non-fiction book The Marauders, written by Charlton Ogburn Jr., a communications officer who served...

in 1961, he injured his back while playing baseball with U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers who served as extras in the movie. Chandler entered a Culver City hospital and had surgery for a spinal disc herniation
Spinal disc herniation
A spinal disc herniation , informally and misleadingly called a "slipped disc", is a medical condition affecting the spine due to trauma, lifting injuries, or idiopathic, in which a tear in the outer, fibrous ring of an intervertebral disc allows the soft, central portion A spinal disc herniation...

, on May 13, 1961. There were severe complications; an artery
Artery
Arteries are blood vessels that carry blood away from the heart. This blood is normally oxygenated, exceptions made for the pulmonary and umbilical arteries....

 was damaged and Chandler hemorrhaged
Bleeding
Bleeding, technically known as hemorrhaging or haemorrhaging is the loss of blood or blood escape from the circulatory system...

. In a seven-and-a-half-hour emergency operation over-and-above the original surgery, he was given 55 pints of blood. Another operation followed, date unknown, where he received an additional 20 pints of blood. He died on June 17, 1961. His death was deemed malpractice
Malpractice
In law, malpractice is a type of negligence in, which the professional under a duty to act, fails to follow generally accepted professional standards, and that breach of duty is the proximate cause of injury to a plaintiff who suffers harm...

 and resulted in a large lawsuit and settlement for his children.

Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis was an American film actor whose career spanned six decades, but had his greatest popularity during the 1950s and early 1960s. He acted in over 100 films in roles covering a wide range of genres, from light comedy to serious drama...

 and Gerald Mohr
Gerald Mohr
Gerald Mohr was an American radio, film and television character actor who appeared in over 4,000 radio plays, 73 films and over 100 television shows....

 were among the pallbearers at Chandler's funeral. He was interred in the Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery
Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery
The Hillside Memorial Park and Mortuary is a Jewish cemetery located at 6001 West Centinela Avenue, in Culver City, California, USA. Many Jewish people from the entertainment industry are buried here.-Notable interments:*Irving Aaronson, composer...

, in Culver City, California
Culver City, California
Culver City is a city in western Los Angeles County, California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 38,883, up from 38,816 at the 2000 census. It is mostly surrounded by the city of Los Angeles, but also shares a border with unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County. Culver...

.

For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Chandler has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...

, at 1770 Vine Street
Vine Street
Vine is a street in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California that runs north-south from Melrose Avenue up past Hollywood Boulevard. The intersection of Hollywood and Vine was once a symbol of Hollywood itself...

.

Filmography

Year Title Role Notes
1947 Johnny O'Clock
Johnny O'Clock
Johnny O'Clock is an American crime film noir written and directed by Robert Rossen, based on a story by Milton Holmes. The drama features Dick Powell, Evelyn Keyes, and Lee J. Cobb.-Plot:...

Turk Uncredited
1947 The Invisible Wall Al Conway, henchman
1947 Roses Are Red Knuckles
1949 Mr. Belvedere Goes to College Police Officer #66 Uncredited
1949 Sword in the Desert
Sword in the Desert
Sword in the Desert is a 1949 American war film directed by George Sherman.-Overview:The film presents the moral struggle of an American Captain, played by Dana Andrews, who ferries illegal Jewish immigrants into Palestine to fight against the British authorities there.The Evening Standard claimed...

Kurta
1949 Abandoned
Abandoned (1949 film)
Abandoned is a 1949 American crime film noir directed by Joseph M. Newman. The drama features Dennis O'Keefe, Gale Storm, and others.-Plot:...

Chief MacRae Alternative title: Abandoned Woman
1950 Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion
Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion
Abbott and Costello in the Foreign Legion is a 1950 film starring the comedy team of Abbott and Costello.-Plot:Bud Jones and Lou Hotchkiss are wrestling promoters. Their star, Abdullah , no longer wishes to follow the script for their crooked matches, especially since he is supposed to lose his...

Narrator Uncredited
1950 Broken Arrow
Broken Arrow (1950 film)
Broken Arrow is a western Technicolor film released in 1950. It was directed by Delmer Daves and starred James Stewart and Jeff Chandler. The film was nominated for three Academy Awards, and won a Golden Globe award for Best Film Promoting International Understanding. It made history as the first...

Cochise
1950 Deported Vic Smith
1950 The Desert Hawk
The Desert Hawk
The Desert Hawk is a Columbia film serial. It was the 23rd serial produced by Columbia.-Cast:* Gilbert Roland - Kasim, The Desert Hawk and Hassan, his Evil Twin Brother...

Opening Off-Screen Narrator Uncredited
1950 Two Flags West
Two Flags West
Two Flags West is a 1950 Western drama set during the American Civil War, directed by Robert Wise and starring Joseph Cotton, Jeff Chandler, Linda Darnell, and Cornell Wilde...

Major Henry Kenniston
1951 Double Crossbones Narrator Uncredited
1951 Bird of Paradise
Bird of Paradise (1951 film)
Bird of Paradise is a 1951 drama film directed by Delmer Daves. It stars Debra Paget and Louis Jourdan.-Plot:Andre Laurence takes a trip to a Polynesian island with his college roommate Tenga . He assumes the native life and marries his friend's sister, Kalua...

Tenga
1951 Smuggler's Island Steve Kent
1951 Iron Man Coke Mason
1951 Flame of the Desert Tamerlane Alternative title: Flame of the Desert
1952 The Battle at Apache Pass
The Battle at Apache Pass
The Battle at Apache Pass is a 1952 Universal-International western film starring Jeff Chandler as Cochise, the Apache chief of Broken Arrow....

Cochise
1952 Red Ball Express
Red Ball Express (film)
Red Ball Express is a 1952 World War II war film directed by Budd Boetticher and starring Jeff Chandler. The film is based on the real Red Ball Express convoys that took place after the D-Day landings in Normandy in June 1944...

Lt. Chick Campbell
1952 Son of Ali Baba
Son of Ali Baba
Son of Ali Baba is a 1952 film starring Tony Curtis. In it he has a line about the palace of his father, which an urban legend has transferred to his better known film The Black Shield of Falworth. This was Tony Curtis' first film in the lead....

Opening Narrator Uncredited
1952 Yankee Buccaneer Cmdr. David Porter
1952 Because of You Steve Kimberly
1953 Girls in the Night Off-Screen Narrator at Finish Uncredited
Alternative title: Life After Dark
1953 The Great Sioux Uprising
The Great Sioux Uprising
The Great Sioux Uprising is a 1953 western film directed by Lloyd Bacon and starring Jeff Chandler.-Plot synopsis:During the Civil War, in Wyoming, horse dealers Joan Britton and Stephen Cook are competing to supply the Union Army with horses...

Jonathan Westgate
1953 East of Sumatra
East of Sumatra
East of Sumatra is a 1953 Technicolor Universal-International Pictures adventure film directed by Budd Boetticher and starring Jeff Chandler and Anthony Quinn.-Plot synopsis:...

Duke Mullane
1953 War Arrow
War Arrow
War Arrow is a 1953 western film directed by George Sherman and starring Jeff Chandler and Maureen O'Hara.-Plot synopsis:Major Howell Brady , a cavalry officer, is sent to Fort Clark, Texas, to subdue a Kiowa uprising that has been raiding villages on Seminole reservations...

Major Howell Brady
1954 Taza, Son of Cochise
Taza, Son of Cochise
Taza, Son of Cochise is a 1954 western film directed by Douglas Sirk and starring Rock Hudson and Barbara Rush. The film was shot in 3D, but only released in 2D at the time.-Plot synopsis:...

Cochise Uncredited
1954 Yankee Pasha
Yankee Pasha
Yankee Pasha is a 1954 romantic adventure film starring Jeff Chandler and Rhonda Fleming, and featured Mamie Van Doren. The movie was released by Universal Pictures.-Cast:*Jeff Chandler as Jason Starbuck*Rhonda Fleming as Roxana Reil...

Jason Starbuck
1954 Sign of the Pagan Marcian
1955 Foxfire Jonathan Dartland
1955 Female on the Beach
Female on the Beach
Female on the Beach is a Universal-International feature film starring Joan Crawford and Jeff Chandler in a story about a widow and her beach bum lover. The screenplay by Robert Hill and Richard Alan Simmons was based on the play The Besieged Heart by Robert Hill...

Drummond Hall
1955 The Spoilers
The Spoilers (1955 film)
The Spoilers is a 1955 film directed by Jesse Hibbs, adapted to sceen by Oscar Brodney and Charles Hoffman from the novel and play by Rex Beach. The movie is set in Nome, Alaska during the 1898 Gold Rush, with Anne Baxter as Cherry Malotte, Jeff Chandler as Roy Glennister, and Rory Calhoun as...

Roy Glennister
1956 The Toy Tiger Rick Todd
1956 Away All Boats
Away All Boats
Away All Boats is a 1956 American war film produced by Universal Pictures. It was directed by Joseph Pevney and produced by Howard Christie from a screenplay by Ted Sherdeman based on the 1953 novel by Kenneth M. Dodson....

Captain Jebediah S. Hawks
1956 Pillars of the Sky First Sergeant Emmett Bell Alternative title: The Tomahawk and the Cross
1957 The Tattered Dress James Gordon Blane
1957 Jeanne Eagels
Jeanne Eagels (film)
Jeanne Eagels is a 1957 fictionalized biographical film of the life of stage star Jeanne Eagels, made by Columbia Pictures. It was produced and directed by George Sidney from a screenplay by John Fante, Daniel Fuchs and Sonya Levien, based on a story by Fuchs...

Sal Satori
1957 Drango
Drango
Drango is a 1957 American motion picture produced by Jeff Chandler's own production company Earlmar Productions, written and directed by Hall Bartlett, and released by United Artists. Starring Chandler in the title role, the film also features Ronald Howard, Joanne Dru, Julie London and Donald Crisp...

Major Clint Drango
1957 Man in the Shadow
Man in the Shadow
Man in the Shadow is a 1957 crime film starring Jeff Chandler, Orson Welles, Colleen Miller, Ben Alexander, and John Larch.-Plot summary:...

Ben Sadler Alternative titles: Pay the Devil
Seeds of Wrath
1958 Lion in the Sky Mike Dandridge Alternative titles: A Game Called Love
The Lady Takes a Flyer
Wild and Wonderful
1958 Raw Wind in Eden Mark Moore/Scott Moorehouse
1959 A Stranger in My Arms Major Pike Yarnell Alternative title: And Ride a Tiger
1959 Thunder in the Sun
Thunder in the Sun
Thunder in the Sun is a 1959 western film made by Carrollton Inc and Seven Arts Productions and distributed by Paramount Pictures. It was directed by Russell Rouse and produced by Clarence Greene from a screenplay by Russell Rouse and...

Lon Bennett
1959 Ten Seconds to Hell
Ten Seconds to Hell
Ten Seconds To Hell is a 1959 British, American and German film directed by Robert Aldrich and based upon Lawrence P. Bachmann's novel, The Phoenix...

Karl Wirtz Alternative title: The Phoenix
1959 The Jayhawkers!
The Jayhawkers!
The Jayhawkers! is a movie set in pre-Civil War Kansas starring Jeff Chandler and Fess Parker, and directed by Melvin Frank.-Cast:Jeff Chandler ... Luke Darcy Fess Parker ... Cam Bleeker Nicole Maurey ... Jeanne Dubois Henry Silva ... Lordan...

Luke Darcy
1960 A Story of David David Alternative title: A Story of David: The Hunted
1960 The Plunderers Sam Christy
1961 Return to Peyton Place
Return to Peyton Place (film)
Return to Peyton Place is a 1961 drama film produced by Jerry Wald and directed by José Ferrer. The screenplay by Ronald Alexander is based on the 1959 novel Return to Peyton Place by Grace Metalious...

Lewis Jackman
1962 Merrill's Marauders
Merrill's Marauders (film)
Merrill's Marauders is a 1962 Cinemascope war film directed and co-written by Samuel Fuller based on the exploits of the jungle warfare unit of the same name in the Burma Campaign. The source is the non-fiction book The Marauders, written by Charlton Ogburn Jr., a communications officer who served...

Brig. Gen. Frank D. Merrill

Award nominations

Year Award Result Category Film
1951 Academy Awards
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...

 
Nominated Best Actor in a Supporting Role Broken Arrow
1958 Laurel Awards 14th Place Top Male Star
-
1959 15th Place Top Male Star
-

Further reading

  • Hoffmann, Henryk. "A" Western Filmmakers. McFarland & Co., 2000.
  • Kirk, Marilyn. 'Jeff Chandler.' 1st Books Library/AuthorHouse, 2003.
  • Marie, Rose. Hold the Roses. University Press of Kentucky, 2002.
  • Wells, Jeff. Jeff Chandler: Film, Record, Radio, Television and Theater Performances. McFarland & Co., 2005.
  • Williams, Esther. The Million Dollar Mermaid. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2000.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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