Top Chuck Norris Fact that’s actually true

The legendary Chuck Norris turns 80 years old today (March 10) and he’s still kickin’ it.

Martial artist, actor, screenwriter, film producer and all ‘round dude Norris is so famous, he’s also an internet sensation with his own collection of memes and Chuck Norris Facts – things so outrageous they could only be achieved by someone as tough as he (although a shirtless Vladimir Putin may try).

However, there is one actual Chuck Norris Fact that not a lot of people know: he is a veteran.

At the age of 18 in 1958, Carlos Ray “Chuck” Norris joined the Air Force as an Air Policeman. His goal was to train in the Security Police and ultimately have a career in law enforcement. While stationed at Osan Air Base in South Korea Norris developed an interest in martial arts. He is famously quoted as saying that while on duty one night, he realized he wouldn’t be able to arrest a rowdy drunk without pulling his weapon — but of course, that’s if you think the only weapon you have is a firearm. Norris learned otherwise.

Norris studied Korean martial arts Tang Soo Do and Tae Kwan Do, and became the first Westerner to be awarded an eighth-degree Black Belt in Tae Kwan Do.

He completed his service at March Air Force Base in California until his discharge in 1962. Norris applied for a position as a police officer in Torrance, CA and while on the waitlist, worked for Northrop Aviation and moonlighted as a karate instructor.

Soon Norris was teaching martial arts full-time and running a number of schools, counting among his students celebrities such as the Osmonds, Priscilla Presley and Steve McQueen.

Norris was the world middleweight karate champion six years, and was named Black Belt magazine’s “Fighter of the Year” in 1969. By that time, he had founded 32 martial arts schools.

It was through his teaching that Norris met Bruce Lee, who eventually cast him in his 1972 movie, “The Way of the Dragon.” Norris played Colt, a world-class martial arts expert brought in by the movie’s bad guys to stop Lee’s character after he made fools of all the local mobsters.

Norris continued acting for the next decade or so in B-movies — albeit as a bonafide action star and karate expert. Then in 1985 came his breakout role in “Code of Silence” that showed the world that he had major movie star potential.
After “Code of Silence” Norris starred as an elite U.S. military operative in the 1986 movie “Delta Force” but it is his iconic role as “Walker, Texas Ranger” that cemented his tough as nails persona. The series ran for eight full seasons, a single three-episode “pilot season” and spawned a 2005 made-for-TV movie.

In early 2005, Chuck Norris Facts began circulating on the internet containing satirical factoids about about his toughness, attitude, virility, sophistication, and masculinity, and have since become widespread in popular culture.

Here are some highlights:

Unsurprisingly, Norris was invited to join Sylvester Stallone and the rest of Hollywood’s best action heroes in ‘Expendables 2″ in 2012. By this time, he was so much of an internet legend that a Chuck Norris Fact even made its way into the film:

“I heard you got bitten by a king cobra,” says Stallone.

“Yeah,” replies Norris. “But after several days of excruciating pain, the cobra died.”

Here’s the moment in all of its glory (at about the 3:20 mark).

Happy 80th birthday Chuck! May you continue to kick it for many more years.