Emblematic actor and stark advocate for stem cell research Christopher Reeve was born September 25, 1952 in New York City, New York. Although he will always be remembered as Superman, Reeve actually had a very long movie career that saw him suit up for various roles.

At an evening horse riding competition in Culpeper, Virginia in 1995, Reeve fell from his horse and landed on his neck, suffering extreme spinal cord injuries. He became a quadriplegic and required both a wheelchair and breathing machine until his death in 2004.

After the accident, Reeve launched himself into the movement for furthering research into stem cell technology. He is known to have said that he has led a fuller life since thew accident and today, both his Reeve-Irvine Research Center and Christopher Reeve Foundation continue to do great work in the field of spinal injuries and stem cell research.

Before suffering the world's biggest brush with irony, the actor made famous by Superman was the quintessential “smart” kid, born into an incredibly intellectual family. Reeve was raised by his father Franklin, a poet, scholar, novelist and teacher, and his mother Barbara was a journalist and the granddaughter of Supreme Court Justice Mahlon Pitney.

A young Christopher was expected to be an academic and maybe even a politician, but after his parents divorced and his father began dating a young graduate student, Reeve's ambitions were all over the place, and he began playing sports and acting. He landed his first major play at age 9 with The Yeomen of the Guard.

Reeves career path was set, and at only 15 years of age, he was accepted to an apprenticeship at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts. The following summer, Christopher was hired to perform at the Harvard Summer Repertory Theater Company.

However, in 1970 at age 18, Reeve's mother urged him to put acting on the backburner and to attend college. Always the academic, Reeve was accepted to Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, Brown, Princeton, Northwestern and Cornell. He settled on Cornell and promptly joined the school's theater department.

As Reeve's final year at Cornell approached, his love for acting shone through. After sweet-talking the dean of the school, they reached an agreement that Reeve's freshman year at Juilliard would count as his final year of Cornell.

While at Juilliard, Reeve's acting talents were well on display. In fact, only he and one other student were accepted into the school's advanced program (Robin Williams). In 1975, Reeve landed a role on Broadway with Audrey Hepburn. The two became very close friends.

Reeve landed his first Hollywood role in a film called Gray Lady Down, and then right after, with friend William Hurt, he starred in an ongoing play entitled My Life. After the play ran its course, Reeve was approached by Stark Hesseltine who told him that he had been asked to audition for the role of Superman.

It was a conflict in production. The producers didn't want Reeve, but the casting director kept putting his picture on top of the pile. Eventually, they agreed to have a screen test with Reeve. With other actors such as Marlon Brando and Gene Hackman starring in the film, a relative unknown like Reeve was not the first choice.

After landing the role of Superman, Reeve became an international phenomenon. He suited up to play the superhero in four movies. Reeve has other great movies to his credit, including The Aviator, The Bostonians, Street Smart, The Remains of the Day, Village of the Damned, Above Suspicion, and dozens of television productions.