For nearly half a century, Henry Fonda distinguished himself in both theater and film, winning acclaim in each medium. He typically played thoughtful men of integrity. He is indelibly associated with the iconic American characters he portrayed, among them young Abe Lincoln, lawyer Clarence Darrow, marshal Wyatt Earp, and in what many consider his finest performance, the dispossessed farmer Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath. As an actor, Fonda was noted for his seeming naturalness and ease, an illusion he worked hard to convey, and his distinctively flat Midwestern accent. He was a versatile performer, equally effective in comedic and dramatic roles.

While noted for his professionalism and the quality of his concentration, Fonda remarked that he was most able to relax when he was acting. He claimed it was therapeutic to pretend to be someone else. Though he often appeared in Westerns, Fonda didn't like working with horses.

Fonda was born May 16, 1905, in Grand Island, NE, and was still an infant when his family moved to nearby Omaha. As a young man, he was encouraged to try acting by a friend of his mother's, Dorothy Brando (at that time the mother of baby Marlon). After giving up his plans to become a journalist, Fonda moved to the East Coast, where he continued his theatrical apprenticeship. He and a friend, Jimmy Stewart, became roommates in Depression-era New York.

Soon after establishing himself in the Broadway theater, Fonda became a film star. He was praised in a New York Times review of Young Mr. Lincoln (1939) for the "warmth and kindliness, the pleasant modesty, the courage, resolution, tenderness, shrewdness, and wit" he brought to his performance. He was nominated for an Academy Award for his work in The Grapes of Wrath (1940). He played opposite such leading ladies as Barbara Stanwyck in The Lady Eve (1941), a masterpiece of screwball comedy, and Bette Davis in Jezebel (1938).

When the United States entered World War II, Fonda enlisted in the Navy, saying, "I don't want to be in a fake war in a studio." After serving for three years as an air combat intelligence officer, Fonda appeared on Broadway in Mister Roberts, a comedy about the Navy, wearing his own officer's cap to play the title role. The play was a hit, and Fonda won a Tony Award in 1948 for his acting; he reprised his role on tour and in the film version.

Some of Fonda's other memorable stage roles were in First Monday in October, in which he played a Supreme Court justice, and in a full-length solo show, Clarence Darrow. In film, Fonda's most celebrated late work was On Golden Pond (1981), in which he played Norman Thayer, a retired professor facing old age, opposite Katharine Hepburn as his wife. Both Fonda and Hepburn won Academy Awards in 1982 for their work; Jane Fonda, for her performance as their daughter, received an Academy Award nomination.

Henry Fonda received many other honors, including a special Oscar for his contribution to film in 1981 and a special Tony Award for his contribution to American theater in 1979. He was the patriarch of a noted family including his daughters Jane and Amy, son Peter, and grandchildren Bridget Fonda, Troy Garity, Vanessa Vadim, and Justin Fonda. He died in Los Angeles on August 12, 1982, at age 77.