Origins: The above-quoted bit of purported dialog from the Tonight Show does have some elements of truth to it, but although actor Lee Marvin was a guest on that late-night talk show at least seven times during Carson's tenure as host, most of what is reproduced above is an outright fiction or a transcript based on someone's badly flawed memory.

Lee Marvin did enlist in the U.S. Marines, saw action as Private First Class in the Pacific during World War II, and was wounded (in the buttocks) by fire which severed his sciatic nerve. However, his injury occurred during the battle for Saipan in June 1944, not the battle for Iwo Jima, which took place several months later in February 1945. Marvin also received a Purple Heart and was indeed interred at Arlington National Cemetery (but he was not, as some versions of this piece claim, awarded a Navy Cross).

Bob Keeshan, later famous as television's "Captain Kangaroo," also enlisted in the U.S. Marines, but he did so too late to see any action during World War II. Keeshan was born on 27 June 1927 and enlisted two weeks before his 18th birthday, several months after the fighting at Iwo Jima. In a 1997 interview, Keeshan explained that he "enlisted in the U.S. Marines but saw no combat" because he signed up "just before we dropped the atom bomb."