Born William Claude Dukenfield on January 29, 1880, the on-screen portrayal of W.C. Fields curmudgeonly, tight-fisted, child-hating boozer was so tightly played and exploited by the movie-studio machine that a lot of people considered him not to be acting at all. His life does seem to have been filled with paradoxes with peers and aquantainces each contradicted the other as to his real character. W.C. Fields died on Christmas Day in 1946.