Bob Minor

Robert Lee Minor (born January 1, 1944 in Birmingham) is an actor and stunt performer.

Minor was born in Birmingham but raised in Los Angeles, California. He played baseball, basketball and football and ran track at Manual Arts High School. He earned a scholarship to Pepperdine University in Los Angeles where he set a college record in the high hurdles. After graduating he set his sights on bodybuilding and applying to become a police officer. He won the Mr Los Angeles, Mr Venice Beach and Mr Southern California titles in 1969.

That year Minor he read about a call for stunt performers for a western starring Jim Brown and Racquel Welch and immediately enrolled in horse riding classes. He missed out on that opportunity, but redoubled his efforts to train himself in all aspects of stunt performance such as fencing, staging falls, stunt driving and SCUBA diving. He was hired as a performer for the Universal Studio tour's western show where he gained exposure.

He made his film debut as a stunt double in Russ Meyer's 1970 feature Beyond the Valley of the Dolls and returned with a speaking role in his 1973 film Black Snake. He performed dozens of stunts in the feature Come Back Charleston Blue and became the first African American member of the Stuntman's Association of Motion Pictures.

Having established himself, he worked as both an actor and stunt coordinator in the 1970s blaxploitation films "Coffy" and "Foxy Brown". He continued to find work as a performer and stunt double on a number of films and television shows. For six years he was the stunt coordinator and a second-unit director for "Magnum P.I." His largest production as a stunt coordinator was the 1989 Civil War drama Glory.

Minor suffered a serious head injury on set while working on Blues Brothers 2000 in 1997. He recovered, though, and returned to work.

References

• Williams, Cressendra (January 10, 1990) "Call to Glory". The Tuscaloosa News
• Gryphon, A. W. (September 27, 2010) "Bob Minor: A Stunt Performer/Miracle Man Breaking Down Barriers On and Off the Set." Examiner

External links

• Bob Minor at IMDB.com