Strode (far right) with Ernest Borgnine and amigos in The Revengers.

Robert Ryan went first, in 1973; Lee Marvin followed some 14 years later. Now, within a month of Burt Lancaster's passing, the final member of the four-man team of Richard Brooks' classic 1967 western, The Professionals, has quietly bid the silver screen farewell.

Most people, especially those under 30, will blink and say "Who?" at the mention of the man's name. Remind them of the most famous gladiatorial combat ever filmed and, even if they haven't seen Spartacus, they know the scene. They will nod, impressed, and say, "Oh, yeah. That guy."

Woodrow Wilson Woolwine Strode was born in Los Angeles in 1914. Though conscious of his Native American heritage (one quarter Blackfoot, one eighth each Cherokee and Creek -a "Negro-Indian breed", to use his words), Strode knew that in the eyes of white audiences he would always be "a colored boy." Nevertheless, his striking physiognomy, high-planed cheekbones and droop-lidded eyes, worked to his advantage in Hollywood. As Strode put it, "because of my nixed background I could play anyone from the third world," and he did (a Comanche in Two Rode Together, an Apache in Shalako, a Chinese in 7 Women and a Mongol in Genghis Khan).

In viewing many of Strode's films one feels a pang of loss all too often. His was the part of the stalwart sidekick or imposing secondary villain. He undoubtedly could have been, at the very least, a lead character actor (picture him in any of Boris Karloffs roles - Frankenstein's monster!), if not a genuine action hero. Watching him in his early roles, you get the feeling a young Woody Strode could have unceremoniously knocked Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze, Steven Seagal and company on their collective ass.

Strode's autobiography, "Gold Dust" (Madison, 1990), is nearly 75% finished before its author gets around to discussing his life in the film industry. No surprise. His highly distinguished career began as a track-and-field and football star at UCLA, where he competed against the likes of Jackie Robinson and Jesse Owens. Leni Riefenstahl called his "the greatest physique of any athlete I have ever seen." On the audio commentary on if the Criterion laserdisc edition of Spartacus, Peter Ustinov describes him as "frightfully athletic," and notes that Strode was cast as the gladiator in part because he could actually hurl the trident  in the film's climactic fight scene.

It was through his stint on the professional wrestling circuit that Strode was first noticed and offered film parts. His first real break came in 1956 as the King of Ethiopia in DeMille's remake of The Ten Commandments. Interestingly, Strode was originally cast and has substantially more screen time as one of Nina Foch's palanquin-bearers, a part for which he receives no on-screen credit.

In Lewis Milestone's Korean war film, Pork Chop Hill (1959), Strode got his first chance to shine in a meaty supporting role. The viewer's initial impression of Strode's Private Franklin is that of a coward; this verges on unbelievability, given Strode's obvious virility and stature. But Strode was a good enough actor to overcome the limitations of his outward appearance.

During the course of the battle, it becomes apparent that Private Franklin is asking himself the timeless question asked by all soldiers: is this foreign soil worth dying for? Private Franklin's commanding officer, played by Gregory Peck, shares these doubts, as it turns out. However, the question acquires considerably more weight coming from Strode's character, who significantly points out that he wouldn't fight and die for what he has at home either.

Strode's most significant actordirector collaboration was with John Ford, with whom he made four films and whose close friend he remained until the director's death in 1973. The best of these was their first picture together, Sergeant Rutledge (1960). The film's timeliness with regard to the Civil Rights movement is striking: in the title role, Strode plays a black soldier on trial for the murder of a white man and his daughter. Though he only received fifth billing (?!), Strode was unquestionably the lead. His performance is real, electric. (He would later refer to this scene as "the most emotional moment in my acting career.")

He would only play one other lead role in his life, in Seated at His Right, Italy's Cannes entry for 1968. In the early seventies, during the height of the blaxploitation trend, the film was finally released in this country under the evocative title Black Jesus (it is currently unavailable on home video).

Strode was a star in Italy, where he lived between 1969 and 1973. Though well into middle-age in films like Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) and The Deserter (1971), Strode still looks extraordinarily vital, fitter than most men half his age. Even in his later films, like Vigilante (1982) and Jungle Warriors (1984), the 70 year-old Strode looks like he could believably and seriously kick your ass. Only toward the end, in Storyville (1992) and Posse (1993), does he appear sufficiently aged to play old men. His final film, Sam Raimi's The Quick and the Dead, opened in February.

Strode's attitude toward his craft was characteristically modest: "I was strictly a mechanic. They told me what to do; I did it, took the money and got out of there."