A showman to the very end

RONALD REAGAN, the B-movie star who became the 40th President of the United States, was the only professional actor to have reached the White House.

Named Ronald Wilson Reagan, he was born in a rented apartment above a bakery in Tampico, Illinois, on February 6, 1911. His father, an itinerant salesman and a heavy drinker, took one look at his bawling child and said: "For such a little bit of a fat Dutchman, he makes a hell of a lot of noise."

The nickname "Dutch" stuck. He lived in various Illinois communities, with his father barely able to eke out a living for his wife and two sons.