Wayne McLaren

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Wayne McLaren (12 September 1940 – 22 July 1992) was an American actor. In 1976, he did promotional work for the famous Marlboro cigarette advertising campaign as the "Marlboro Man". He smoked a pack-and-a-half every day before developing lung cancer at the age of 49. Chemotherapy and the removal of one of his lungs did not stop the cancer spreading to his brain, killing him two years after the initial diagnosis.

McLaren started an anti-smoking campaign after learning of his condition. Just before his death, a television spot was filmed showing images of him appearing as the cowboy juxtaposed with those of him on his hospital bed; his brother, Charles McLaren, gave a voiceover about the dangers of smoking, and noted that the tobacco industry promoted an 'independent lifestyle', before finally summarizing 'Lying there with all those tubes in you, how independent can you really be?' ^[1]

During the time of McLaren's anti-smoking activism, Philip Morris denied that McLaren ever appeared in a Marlboro ad. It later partially backed off from that claim to maintain that while he did appear in Marlboro ads, he was not the Marlboro Man.