Actor Peter Fonda died on Friday, August 16, 2019, after suffering respiratory failure due to lung cancer. He was 79 years old.

Fonda had a long career in film, which included his best known role as Wyatt in the 1969 classic Easy Rider. Pulling triple duty, Fonda also co-wrote the script (for which he was nominated for an Academy Award) and produced the movie. Not only did the movie make him a star it also made him a counterculture icon.

Fonda hails from an acting family that includes his father Henry Fonda, sister Jane, and daughter Bridget. His son Justin Fonda is also in the industry, though behind the camera.

Born February 23, 1940, Fonda studied acting in his father’s hometown of Omaha, Nebraska. He went to the University of Nebraska Omaha and joined the Omaha Community Playhouse, then he went to Westminster School in Connecticut and graduated in 1958. Fonda joined New York’s Cecil Wood Theater in 1960, then appeared in Broadway productions like Blood, Sweat and Stanley Poole.

After doing a few TV guest spots, he made his film debut in Tammy and the Doctor then was in the World War II saga The Victors. Before Easy Rider, he was in The Wild Angels with Nancy Sinatra and Bruce Dern, and The Trip, which was directed by Roger Corman and written by Jack Nicholson.

His roles in the ’70s included The Hired Hand (that he also directed), Open Season, Fighting Mad, Outlaw Blues, and High-Ballin’. Fonda was featured in the 1981 action-comedy The Cannonball Run, followed by other ’80s movies like Hawken’s Breed and The Rose Garden.

He starred in the John Carpenter cult film Escape from L.A. and followed that up with Ulee’s Gold, which earned his second Oscar nod and a Golden Globe win. Fonda appeared in biker-based movies, Ghost Rider and Wild Hogs, then was in 3:10 to Yuma and The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day. Later in his career, he was in CSI: NY, Hawaii Five-0, Cooperhead, and The Blacklist, and his final film was The Last Full Measure.