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Blake Pierce Biography & Facts

This is a list of characters from the M*A*S*H franchise, covering the various fictional characters appearing in the novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors and its sequels, the 1970 film adaptation of the novel, and the television series M*A*S*H, AfterMASH, W*A*L*T*E*R, and Trapper John, M.D. M*A*S*H is a media franchise revolving around the staff of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital as they attempt to maintain sanity during the harshness of the Korean War. Overview Main characters Benjamin "Hawkeye" Pierce Captain Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce (Jr. in the novel) was played by Donald Sutherland in the film, and by Alan Alda in the television series. Between long sessions of treating wounded patients, he is found making wisecracks, drinking heavily, carousing, womanizing, and pulling pranks on the people around him, especially Frank Burns and "Hot Lips" Houlihan. In the novel, he serves as a moral center and author's alter ego, chiding Trapper John for calling Major Houlihan "Hot Lips," which he never does himself. Although just one of an ensemble of characters in author Richard Hooker's MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors, in the television series Hawkeye became the center of the MASH unit's medical activity. In the television series, he becomes the Chief Surgeon of the unit early in the first season. Pierce was born and raised in New England, most often mentioning Crabapple Cove, Maine, as a place that his family had a summer home and with a few references (primarily in the early seasons) to Vermont. His father graduated from medical school and settled as a doctor in Crabapple Cove in 1911. His mother is deceased and he has a sister (like Vermont, they are mentioned in some early episodes and then never again; although, in season 4, he says he was an only child), and he is close to his father. In the novel and film, Hawkeye is married with children, but in the TV series, he is a bachelor and something of a ladies' man (although he fakes being married to Vanessa Pierce Girlfriend On romantic commitment in episode 1/23 "Ceasefire".) He was given the nickname "Hawkeye" by his father, Benjy (Sr.), in the novel and in the series from the character in the novel The Last of the Mohicans, "the only book my old man ever read". His birth name is taken from a member of Hooker's own family named Franklin Pierce. Alternatively, in the lobby of Memorial Hall at Harvard University, the names of Harvard men who died in the Civil War are inscribed. Among those from the Medical School is listed one Benjamin Franklin Peirce [sic]. Although he had a rather unremarkable boyhood, by his own admission he had had several experiences he never forgot. Once when young, he fell overboard in a pond and nearly drowned as a result of a cruel practical joke (which left him with lifelong claustrophobia). When he was 14, his father was angered to find him in bed with a girl and smoking a cigarette. When he was 12, he discovered his father was dating a female bookkeeper; to keep his father's attention all to himself, Hawkeye selfishly ruined their relationship so they couldn't marry. He attended the fictional Androscoggin College. In the book and the film, Hawkeye had played football in college; in the series, he is non-athletic. After completing his medical residency (possibly in Chicago; he has a familiarity with the city that implies extended time spent there, e.g., "Adam's Ribs"); he had a common law marriage with a nurse, Carlye Breslin, but they broke up after a year. In 1950 he was drafted into the US Army Medical Corps and sent to serve at the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) during the Korean War. He became Chief Surgeon instead of Burns because Hawkeye specialized in cardiothoracic surgery in addition to general surgery, whereas Burns was only qualified in general surgery. Alda said of Pierce, "Some people think he was very liberal. But he was also a traditional conservative. I mean, he wanted nothing more than to have people leave him alone so he could enjoy his martini, you know? Government should get out of his liquor cabinet". Pierce has little tolerance for military red tape and protocol, feeling they get in the way of his doing his job, and has little respect for most Regular Army personnel. He never wears rank insignia on his fatigues, usually wears a bathrobe instead of uniform, never polishes his combat boots, and only wears his Class A uniform when he believes appearance can achieve greater good – but does not wear any of the decorations to which he is entitled. (Based on what was told and shown in the course of the series, these would include the World War II Victory Medal, the Army of Occupation Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korean Campaign Medal, the U.N. Service Medal, the Meritorious Unit Commendation, the Commendation Medal, the Purple Heart, and possibly a Legion of Merit; plus the Combat Medical Badge for his periodic service at battalion aid stations.) On occasion, he assumes temporary command of the 4077th in the absence or disability of Colonels Blake or Potter. As a surgeon, he does not like the use of firearms and he refuses to carry a sidearm as required by regulations when serving as Officer of the Day. When he is ordered by Colonel Potter to carry his issue pistol on a trip to a ROK aid station and they are ambushed on the road, he fires it into the air rather than at their attackers. This was after he told the gun "You're fired." He is also a chronic alcoholic, for three years in Korea drinking every day three times more heavily than the average person [his homemade still; daily tabs at the MASH Officers' Club, and Rosie's Bar] and also drinks 12 year old Scotch Whiskey and Seagrams (Canadian whisky); the latter so heavily that in the episode "Bottle Fatigue" Klinger decides to buy stock in Seagrams! In the series finale, "Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen", Hawkeye experiences a mental breakdown when a Korean woman responds to his frantic demand that she quiet her infant child lest enemy soldiers hear it and discover them, by suffocating it. In talking to psychiatrist Sidney Freedman he first says that the woman had suffocated a chicken, until Freedman led him to admit the repressed memory – the horror of a mother smothering her own baby. He recommended that Hawkeye return to the 4077th for the end of the war to come to terms with what he had endured. (In real life, Pierce would have been up for a Section 8 discharge because of his emotional breakdown after serving in Korea for at least two years in a MASH unit.) In an episode earlier in the series, Hawkeye is mistakenly reported dead. He boards a Quartermaster Corps bus/hearse which has dead soldiers aboard, saying he has just about had his fill of war, and admits he is tired of seeing death every day. In one episode, a temporary replacement surgeon from Tokyo General Hospital, who cut his teeth performing meatball surgery under impossible conditions in .... Discover the Blake Pierce popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Blake Pierce books.