Most film fans know that John Ford gave John Wayne his big break with 1939's "Stagecoach," much to the young actor's surprise . Having met in the 1920s when Wayne was working as a prop man (a meeting at which Wayne literally knocked over Ford ) the pair would work together sporadically over the ensuing years, but only with the Duke in small non-speaking roles. Ford actually waited well over a decade to bring Wayne into the big leagues with "Stagecoach" and after that his acting career and life in general was never the same.

But that's only part of how the legend of John Wayne began. The actor, whose real name was Marion Robert Morrison, received the backing of yet another influential director early in his career when Raoul Walsh gave him his first starring role in "The Big Trail." T

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