“The way you really find out about the performer's seriousness about the cause is how long they stay with it when the spotlight gets turned off. “ – Robert Redford

“People say I've gone against Hollywood, but I've tried to be independent within Hollywood, tried to be my own person.” – Robert Redford

A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history’s most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees? In Charles River Editors’ American Legends series, readers can get caught up to speed on the lives of America’s most important men and women in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known.

When Robert Redford first entered the national spotlight in the early 1960s, he was hardly viewed as a serious actor, and with his red hair, blonde complexion, and athletic build, he was seen more as a handsome man than a skilled one. On top of that, he came a time in which most Hollywood stars were tall, dark, and slender, like one of his most famous co-stars, Paul Newman, and by comparison, Redford looked more like a surfer. It was an unfortunate stereotype, because he had already studied acting and even performed on Broadway even as people initially had great difficulty in taking him seriously. The acting roles for which he first became famous, such as Barefoot in the Park, featured him in what Elisa Leonelli has referred to as “golden boy” roles, and this was something that would take years to overcome, but it also gave him a chip on his shoulder. As he later noted half in jest, “I think a lot of people thought my career started with Butch Cassidy.”