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Actor and producer Burt Reynolds died Thursday at the age of 82. He was probably best known for his iconic mustache and his roles in the films Deliverance, Smokey and the Bandits, The Cannonball Run.
He was not well known for his time spent in Michigan. This fact has been hidden for a while.
Reynolds used to say that he came from Waycross, Georgia. Only when Reynolds published his 2015 autobiography that he was born in Lansing.
David Votta, librarian and historian in Lansing, said he knew Reynolds' origins in 2011 through an online debate.
"Someone with the local historical society was arguing online with someone from Waycross, Georiga via Wikipedia, about where he was born. So I started doing some research and quickly, I was able to find a number of proprietary files [Lansing] when he's born, "says Votta.
Votta says the Reynolds family lived on Donora Street, about two miles south of the state capital.
After jumping between Lansing (Missouri) and Lake City (Michigan), Votta says the family has finally moved to Florida. This is where Burt Reynolds spent much of his youth.
Reynolds said in his 2015 book that he "grew up in a southern country that did not want to be a Yankee."
Votta points out that many of Reynolds' films were in the south, so it makes sense for him to identify himself as a Southerner rather than in the Midwest.
Votta is delighted that Reynolds has finally admitted to his hometown so that "Lansing can claim at least some of it".
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