Biography

Burke attended Baron Byng High School

Baron Byng High School

Baron Byng High School was located at 4251 St. Urbain Street, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It was named after the Julian Hedworth George Byng, 1st Viscount Byng of Vimy, the Governor General of Canada from 1921 to 1926. Byng was a World War I hero at the battle of Vimy Ridge, an important battle...

 and McGill University

McGill University

Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...

 where he earned a degree in physical education

Physical education

Physical education or gymnastics is a course taken during primary and secondary education that encourages psychomotor learning in a play or movement exploration setting....

. He wrestled and swam for Canada in the 1948 Summer Olympics

1948 Summer Olympics

The 1948 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XIV Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was held in London, England, United Kingdom. After a 12-year hiatus because of World War II, these were the first Summer Olympics since the 1936 Games in Berlin...

.

In the 1950s, Burke wrestled for nine years under the names "Sammy Berg" and "Mr Canada", and sparred with such luminaries as Primo Carnera

Primo Carnera

Primo Carnera was an Italian boxer, nicknamed the Ambling Alp, who became the world heavyweight champion.-Biography:...

, Antonino Rocca

Antonino Rocca

Antonino Rocca was an Italian-born Argentine professional wrestler. Rocca was a popular face and in some cities with both Italian-American and especially Hispanic audiences, his following was exceptionally large and loyal.He had a love for opera and was apparently described as having an excellent...

, Lou Thesz

Lou Thesz

Aloysius Martin "Lou" Thesz was a United States professional wrestler and 18-time world heavyweight champion, most notably holding the NWA World Heavyweight Championship three times. Combined, he held the NWA Championship for 10 years, three months and nine days , longer than anyone else in history...

 and Joe Lewis.

His friend Gordon Mitchell

Gordon Mitchell

Gordon Mitchell was an American actor and bodybuilder.-Biography:Charles Allen Pendleton was born in Denver, Colorado, and began working out in his Denver neighbourhood to deal with his tough companions. During World War II he served in the U.S...

 recommended Burke for the lead role of Ursus

Ursus (film character)

Ursus is a fictional character featured in a series of Italian sword and sandal films produced in the early 1960s. The character was an archetypical Greco-Roman warrior, similar to the mythical Hercules or Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian...

 in the 1961 film The Revenge of Ursus. Burke next appeared opposite Italian comedian Totò

Totò

Prince Antonio Focas Flavio Angelo Ducas Comneno De Curtis di Bisanzio Gagliardi, best known by his stage name Totò and nicknamed il principe della risata was an Italian comedian, film and theatre actor, writer, singer and songwriter...

 in Toto vs Machiste. Norman Maurer

Norman Maurer

Norman Albert Maurer , a comic book artist and writer, was also a director and producer of films and television shows.-Comic books:...

 then chose him to portray the mythical Greek

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

 hero Hercules

Hercules

Hercules is the Roman name for Greek demigod Heracles, son of Zeus , and the mortal Alcmene...

 in The Three Stooges Meet Hercules

The Three Stooges Meet Hercules

The Three Stooges Meet Hercules was the third feature film to star the Three Stooges after their 1959 resurgence in popularity. By this time, the trio consisted of Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Joe DeRita . Released by Columbia Pictures, The Three Stooges Meet Hercules was directed by long-time...

.

As the sword and sandal

Sword and sandal

The Peplum , also known as Sword-and-Sandal, is a genre of largely Italian-made Historical or Biblical Epics that dominated the Italian film industry from 1957 to 1965, eventually being replaced in 1965 by the "Spaghetti Western"...

 craze faded, Burke played Little John

Little John

Little John was a legendary fellow outlaw of Robin Hood, and was said to be Robin's chief lieutenant and second-in-command of the Merry Men.-Folklore:He appears in the earliest recorded Robin Hood ballads and stories...

 in an Italian The Triumph of Robin Hood, Polyphemus

Polyphemus

Polyphemus is the gigantic one-eyed son of Poseidon and Thoosa in Greek mythology, one of the Cyclopes. His name means "much spoken of" or "famous". Polyphemus plays a pivotal role in Homer's Odyssey.-In Homer's Odyssey:...

 in a 1968 Italian miniseries of The Odyssey

L'Odissea

L'Odissea was an Italian TV miniseries broadcast on RAI in 1968 and based on Homer's Odyssey. An Italian, Yugoslavian, German and French coproduction, it was directed by Franco Rossi, Piero Schivazappa and Mario Bava; the cast included Bekim Fehmiu as Ulysses and Irene Papas as Penelope.Each...

, a villain in a Kommissar X

Kommissar X

Kommissar X or Commissioner X is a German crime fiction series of books from the Pabel Moewig publishing house. "Kommissar X" is a private detective named Joe Louis Walker who was a counterpart of the German crime fiction FBI Special Agent Jerry Cotton...

 film Drei grüne Hunde/Death Trip, Harald Reinl

Harald Reinl

Harald Reinl was an Austrian film director. He is especially known for the movies he made based on Edgar Wallace and Karl May books .He started his career as an extra in the mountain-films of Arnold Fanck...

's Nibelungenlied films, and appeared alongside Gianni Garko

Gianni Garko

Gianni Garko is an Italian actor who found much fame as a leading man in Spaghetti Westerns...

 and Klaus Kinski

Klaus Kinski

Klaus Kinski, born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski , was a German actor. He appeared in more than 130 films, and is perhaps best-remembered as a leading role actor in Werner Herzog films: Aguirre, the Wrath of God , Nosferatu the Vampyre , Woyzeck , Fitzcarraldo and Cobra Verde .-Early...

 in both a spaghetti western

Spaghetti Western

Spaghetti Western, also known as Italo-Western, is a nickname for a broad sub-genre of Western films that emerged in the mid-1960s in the wake of Sergio Leone's unique and much copied film-making style and international box-office success, so named by American critics because most were produced and...

 Sartana the Gravedigger

Sartana the Gravedigger

Sartana the Gravedigger is a 1969 Italian Western film directed by Giuliano Carnimeo and starring Gianni Garko. The film is presented on some DVD reissues under its German title, Sartana - Töten war sein täglich Brot.-Cast:...

and a miniature imitation The Dirty Dozen

The Dirty Dozen

The Dirty Dozen is a 1967 film directed by Robert Aldrich and released by MGM. It was filmed in England and features an ensemble cast, including Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, John Cassavetes, Telly Savalas, and Robert Webber. The film is based on E. M...

war film

War film

War films are a film genre concerned with warfare, usually about naval, air or land battles, sometimes focusing instead on prisoners of war, covert operations, military training or other related subjects. At times war films focus on daily military or civilian life in wartime without depicting battles...

 Five for Hell

Five for Hell

Five for Hell is a 1969 Italian "macaroni combat" war film film starring Klaus Kinski. -Cast:* Gianni Garko - Lt. Glenn Hoffmann * Klaus Kinski - Standartenführer Hans Mueller* Aldo Canti - Nick Amadori...

.

In the 1980s, Burke relocated to Hawaii

Hawaii

Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

 worked on the show Magnum, P.I.

Magnum, P.I.

Magnum, P.I. is an American television series starring Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum, a private investigator living on Oahu, Hawaii. The series ran from 1980 to 1988 in first-run broadcast on the American CBS television network....

until it ceased production in 1988.

As of 2009, Burke is operating his personal training business in California. Burke's appearance in The Three Stooges Meet Hercules has made him a favorite of the Stooge fanbase, and he has appeared at several conventions over the last decade.

External links

• http://www.samsonburke.com/