Indiana Jones

"It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage."

- Indiana Jones

Dr. Henry Walton Jones, Jr. was a bullwhip-toting, fedora-wearing archaeologist with overdeveloped ophidiophobia. He was most famously known as Indiana Jones or Indy, and adopted the name Henri Defense during World War I. He was married at least once, conceived a daughter, and had several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Born July 1, 1899 in Princeton, New Jersey, Jones' life was forever changed when he accompanied his parents, Henry Sr. and Anna Jones on a world lecture tour from 1908 to 1910. Throughout his travels, Jones encountered many important figures in history who shaped his outlook on life. After the return home, his mother became ill and died. The death changed the family as father and son moved to Utah in 1912. Without her, their relationship began to slowly deteriorate. As Henry Sr. withdrew into his studies, Indiana found himself in various locations as his father lectured once again.

Following a move back to Princeton, Jones quit High School in 1916 and briefly joined the Mexican Revolution before spending three years fighting in World War I. After the conflict, he attended the University of Chicago and from there he went on to France to gain an undergraduate degree in linquistics. Once a graduate, he briefly became an archaeology teacher in London where he met student Deirdre Campbell. The pair romanced and married in 1926, but a plane crash took Deirdre's life.

Jones eventually took a teaching post at Marshall College in the years leading up to a second World War. In 1936, the US Government asked him to find the Ark of the Covenant. Throughout his career he found numerous famous artifacts, including the Sankara Stones, the Holy Grail, and the crystal skulls, which placed him in conflict with different groups across the globe. Jones' lifetime of adventures eventually took a toll, as he lost an eye in the process and was forced to walk with a cane during his old age.

Early life
"Henry was a... remarkable boy, who shows every sign of growing up to be a remarkable man."

- Helen Seymour

Indiana Jones was born Henry Walton Jones Jr. to a Scottish-born professor of medieval studies, Henry Jones, and his wife Anna on July 1, 1899, in Princeton, New Jersey. While still in the crib, his parents introduced him to a Malamute puppy named Indiana. The two quickly bonded and the dog was a friend and companion throughout the earliest decades of Jones' life.

Following the success of his books, Professor Jones was invited on a two year long lecture tour of schools and universities. From 1908 to 1910, "Junior" and Anna were to accompany him on his travels around the globe. By this time, aged 9, young Henry had adopted the name of his beloved dog for himself (though his father would continue to refer to him as "Junior" well into his adult life).

So "Indiana" wouldn't be losing out on his studies, Professor Jones decided to hire his old Oxford tutor Miss Helen Seymour. As such, their first port of call was to her home in England. Still living in the city of Oxford, Miss Seymour was introduced to the boy then declined Professor Jones' offer. She believed him too young. Nor did Indiana want to see any more of her. But Henry Sr was determined for his son to have the best tutor he could get. Seymour eventually relented and the family began the two year stretch. It would be nine days of study before Indiana saw his first adventure.

The Jackal's Curse
They crossed the Mediterranean and landed at Alexandria in Egypt before moving on to Cairo. While Professor Jones lectured at the university, Miss Seymour took Indiana to see the great pyramids but hadn't paid their guide enough. He stole their camels as they scaled one of the ancient structures and left them stranded. Alone and unsure what to do next, the appearance of a figure heading in their direction on a bicycle surprised Miss Seymour as she recognized he was an old acquaintance: T. E. Lawrence.

With Lawrence's supplies, the three camped at the base of the pyramid to see the night through. Indiana was fascinated by Lawrence's account of opening a tomb and suggested he'd like to be an archaeologist. Lawrence was happy to entertain the idea, but admonished the boy when Indiana brought up the possibility of becoming rich from the profession, encouraging him instead to see archaeology as something to be shared with the world. The conversation led to Lawrence inviting Indiana and Miss Seymour to join him on a trip near the Valley of the Kings where his friend Rasheed Sallam was working on a dig site alongside Howard Carter.

Having aquired Professor Jones' permission and a thick journal imparted to him to chronicle his journey, Indiana and his tutor accompanied Lawrence up the Nile river the following day to reach their destination. The stretch would earn him another lesson as Lawrence showed him the importance of learning the language of any country he visits.

Sallam greeted them on their arrival to the camp where they discovered work was stalling after word had spread that a curse had befallen the site following the recent excavation of a tomb belonging to the Ancient Egyptian architect/engineer known as Kha. Neither Sallam nor Carter entertained the notion of a curse, and Indiana was shown some of the artifacts that has been discovered in the area as part of Carter's desire to find the tomb of boy king Pharaoh, Tutankhamun. Treasures that attracted the attention of onsite photographer, Pierre Duclos, and Demetrios, demolitionist and chief proponent of the curse's threat.

"He that enters my tomb I shall burn with my fire."

- Inscription within Kha's tomb

Carter allowed Indiana to be the first to enter Kha's tomb. Inside, they found the entrance to the burial chamber inscribed with a curse but pressed on and, when intructed, Sallam pried the door open to reveal a room scorched black surrounding the stone coffin of Kha. Lawrence suspected the room had already been searched when the coffin revealed no artifacts had been placed with the preserved corpse of Kha, and Duclos considered grave robbers but Carter was sure the door seals hadn't been broken and so there had to be another room. He was right, within the wall was secreted another chamber but poison gas was released so Indiana and the group had to abandon the search to seek fresh air and safety.

To give the gas time to clear, Sallam was posted as a night watchman over the tomb's entrance and Indiana asked to help, but the man, while grateful, rejected the suggestion so Indiana retired for the evening. Sallam disappeared. Indiana joined the search the next day as the group re-entered the chambers and found that Kha was missing aswell. Lawrence came across Sallam's charred body further on but deduced it was in fact a trauma to the head that killed the man. He was also covered in a unknown white powder. Collecting some, Lawrence couldn't see any motive so Indiana presented one person who might have an agenda: Kha.

Demetrios and the workers fled the site in panic while Indiana, Lawrence and Miss Seymour decided to investigate the tomb further which led them to the secret chamber containing a statue of Kha and more inscription that revealed the Egyptian had been rewarded a jewel encrusted Jackal headpiece by a Pharaoh for his services. Lawrence assumed that it was a part of the statue but Indiana told him it wasn't there. Closer inspection showed part had been broken off and Lawrence was sure they'd found the murderer's motive even if he couldn't understand where Kha himself went.

The three ruled out the workers when Lawrence remembered the powder. By putting a flame to it, the puff of smoke that followed implied it was Duclos' flash powder. Indiana was woken the next morning by a hand clamped over his mouth. It was Lawrence, and he needed him stand guard while he searched Duclos' tent. Indiana kept an eye on the photographer walking through the site and followed him as Duclos went inside Kha's tomb. The camera flashed within the chambers and seeing Duclos may be heading back in his direction so he ducked inside an alcove. The wall creaked and he fell backwards into the upright body of Kha. The skeleton collapsed on top of him and, pinned to the floor, Indiana screamed fearing Duclos was coming to kill him.

Lawrence and Miss Seymour rushed in. His tutor pushed the body off him as Lawrence held Duclos against the wall with his gun. Duclos proclaims his innocence in the murder of Sallam and reveals he was taking pictures within the tomb for the newspaper story. Lawrence questions the magnesium powder recovered from Sallam's corpse to which Duclos points out that he was not the only who used it. Indiana looks at Kha and finds it clutching a detonator plunger, revealing Demetrios as having embellished the curse inscription so he could steal the Jackal. Inside the demolitionist's tent, the four find the box for the plunger and powder used in flares, evidence in proving Demetrios' guilt.

Duclos laments that the murderer and thief must be at the docks by now, which Lawrence refuses to believe. He quickly sets out on his bicycle to intercept Demetrios, asking Indiana not to forget him, and promises to write. Nevertheless, Indiana, Miss Seymour and Duclos follow and catch up to find Lawrence holding Demetrios. But Demetrios has hidden the artifact, and manages flee the country soon after. Indiana and his tutor reunite with Professor and Anna Jones, departing Egypt for the next leg of the tour: Morroco.

When Indy was twelve, he accompanied his father to New Orleans where he got to listen to the jazz greats of that era.

In 1912, Indy's mother Anna died of scarlet fever, an event which created a rift in the family that survived her. To allow himself time to recover, Henry Sr. moved himself and his son to Utah. Here Indy kept busy as a member of the Boy Scouts, having achieved the rank of "Life Scout." It was here, while attempting to secure the Cross of Coronado from thieves, that Indy learned to use a bullwhip—his first crack of the whip left the scar on his chin—and also where he received his trademark fedora. This adventure also led to his aversion to snakes.

Jones and his father moved back to Princeton when Indy was fifteen. By February 1916, Jones was working as a soda jerk and going to the local high school. The prom was approaching, and he hoped to get a nice car to drive his prom date in. The engine was broke on the car he borrowed, so he took it to Thomas Edison, who offered to fix it for free. However, Indy soon uncovered a plot by the Germans to steal some secret plans Edison had been working on for a new motor. Indy and girlfriend Nancy Stratemeyer were eventually able to locate the plans and trace them to Edison's assistant, who was then taken to jail. In an expression of his gratitude, Edison loaned Indy a Bugati, which Indy then took Nancy to the prom in.

Soon after, school was let out for spring break, so Indy and his father took a train to New Mexico to visit family members. Once at their destination, Indy and his cousin Frank secretly hitched a ride south across the border to "see the senoritas". Caught in a border clash with Mexican revolutionaries, and impulsively trying to get back a screaming woman's stolen dresses, Indy took off on horse back after the receding marauders. Hopelessly outnumbered and outmatched, Indy was captured and almost shot; however, at the last moment he was released by Pancho Villa himself.

He joined this army of revolutionaries, playing a part in the Mexican Revolution of 1916. It is during this time that he met the Belgian Remy Baudouin, and the two quickly became friends. After learning the truths about revolution and warfare, and becoming disillusioned, Indy decided to join Remy in heading for the Great War in Europe, a war he felt had to be fought. After settling a score with an old enemy, Demetrios, and recovering an Egyptian artifact that had been lost to Howard Carter and Indy during his first archaeological adventure in 1908, Indy and Remy left Mexico, departing from Veracruz for Europe and war.

World War I
"The truth is, when you're seventeen and ya' see a fight goin' on, ya' tend to think it'd be a good idea to join in. It wasn't that good an idea, but I didn't know that then."

- Indiana Jones speaking to a tax agent in 1993

After a brief stopover in Ireland in time to witness 1916's Easter Rising, and engage in fisticuffs with future prime minister Sean Lemass, Indy and Remy reached London and the recruiting office of the Belgian Army (as this was not only Remy's country of birth, but the only army that wouldn't ask awkward questions about age). Enlisting under the pseudonym Henri Defense, Indy, along with Remy, settled in to wait for their call-up papers. Indy spent this time falling in love with the young suffragette Vicky Prentiss, but his proposal was rebuffed and, heartbroken, Indy joined a newly-married Remy (to Suzette, a war widow with a number of kids) at the train station to head for Le Havre and basic training.

After seeing action first at Flanders, where all their superior officers were wiped out, Indy and Remy were sent to join with French troops at the Somme. Here, Indy and Remy were subjected fully to the horrors and pressures of trench warfare, and were engaged in several pushes, a gas attack and the terror of German flamethrowers. Mistrust was rife in Indy's unit, but after some initial difficulties the unit pulled together enough to take their target. Victory did not last long as German reinforcements were quick to swamp the combined French/Belgian defense and Indy was swiftly captured while most of his unit was killed. Remy vanished in the confusion, apparently hit.

Indy was sent to a prison camp, where he joined an escape attempt already in progress. However, he was quickly recaptured and moved to a maximum security prison at Dusterstadt. After many escape attempts Indy, with the help of Charles De Gaulle, broke free and, after a brief flirtation with the idea of heading home to America and continuing high school, rejoined what was left of his unit, including a recovering Remy, who Indy was happy to see still alive.

In an effort to get out of the trenches, Indy joined a courier unit attached to French High Command. But when forced to deliver orders that would result in the pointless death of thousands of his fellow soldiers at Verdun, Indy sabotaged his own bike, thereby postponing the massacre, at least for a week or so. This action got Indy fired from courier duty and thrown back to the trenches, rejoining Remy.

While on leave in Paris, Indy engaged in a tumultuous sexual affair with Mata Hari, a first for young Indy. While it ended badly, Mata advised Indy to request a transfer to the somewhat tamer fight in East Africa. Indy followed her advice and, with Remy in tow, arrived on the African continent in November 1916.

African revelations
Indy was promoted to lieutenant, and assigned to a unit near Lake Victoria. Indy's ego and haste, however, led to the two getting lost in transit, and while trying to get back to their unit and avoiding a court martial, Indy managed to get caught up with a team of old men under British Command, the 25th Royal Fusiliers. Here Indy was tricked into helping destroy a giant cannon mounted on a train and also fooled into kidnapping the German military genius Paul Erich von Lettow-Vorbeck (whom they were eventually compelled to release).

Jones and Remy finally managed to make it to Lake Victoria and join their new unit. During October, Indy and Remy join what Indy believed to be a fight for the indigenous population against the German aggressors. Indy quickly became a skilled, talented and rather vicious officer. During one charge, he disobeyed direct orders, continuing the charge despite an order to retreat. Because of Indy's quick thinking, however, the battle was won and he was subsequently promoted to captain, much to the chagrin of Major Boucher, his direct superior. His unit's next mission was to march across the Congo to retrieve a weapons shipment that ran aground in West Africa. The unit set off, and traveled through Christmas 1916 and into the first weeks of 1917. Unfortunately, the entire unit became seriously ill, and only a fraction of the unit survived. With the death of Major Boucher, Indy assumed command. However Indy had come to realize that this fight in Africa was between White men, fighting for African land, and began to wonder what he was doing there. Devastatingly at the units destination they were denied extra troops for the journey back and, still feverish and exhausted, Indy and a dozen men headed back onto the river.

Indy and his men promptly fell to the fever, but luckily were rescued by the doctor and humanitarian Albert Schweitzer, a German who ran a hospital in the jungle. Indy initially distrusted Schweitzer due to his nationality, but soon saw reason. From Schweitzer Indy learned lessons that would turn his life around: up until meeting Schweitzer, Indy thought he was becoming a man that would demand respect, a military man whose life revolved around orders and discipline. Schweitzer taught Indy a reverence for life and he and Remy pledged themselves to ending the war and the bloodshed.

The Secret Service
To that end Indy and Remy joined the Belgian secret service before forging their own transfer to the far more efficient French secret service. The two were split up, Remy being sent to Brussels to become the French contact with the Belgian resistance, known as the White Lady. Indy was shuffled around to various fronts and missions, as French intelligence initially knew not what to do with him. After a brief sojourn as a reconnaissance photographer with the American volunteers of the Lafayette Escadrille, Indy was assigned a series of courier missions, such as a defection plea letter for the aircraft designer Anthony Fokker, and a desperate attempt for a separate peace with Austria. Indy then spent a few months in St. Petersburg in the Analyst Department, and he and his friends there become caught up in the Bolshevik revolution.

A promotion to military intelligence saw Indy back in Western Europe, and then as the main French agent in Cairo, where his skills were brought to bear by his old friend T.E. 'Ned' Lawrence in the liberation of Beersheba in Palestine. Later, while in Italy, Indy struck up a rivalry with Ernest Hemingway for the affections of a beautiful Italian girl, who eventually married someone else, leaving Indy and Ernie with a lasting friendship.

War's end
"I'm goin' home."

- Indiana Jones, after discussing his future with Bronisław Malinowski

As the war drew to a close, Indy saw missions in Eastern Europe. At one point, he was engaged to Molly, an American school teacher in Istanbul. Tragically, however, she was killed by a bullet meant for Jones. Indy's depression was somewhat lifted by his reunion with Remy; and the war's end found the two on assignment in the trenches to arrest an Indian officer. This snowballed into a post-war quest for Alexander the Great's lost diamond, the "Treasure of the Peacock's Eye." The adventure took them from Alexandria to India and on to the South China Seas. However, after an illuminating run in with the Polish anthropologist Bronisław Malinowski, Indy realized that finding the diamond would have very little impact on his future plans, which was to finally start studying as an archaeologist. In fact, by continuing this wild search, he was only delaying what he had wanted since the age of nine. So he and Remy parted ways, with Remy's obsession with the Peacock's Eye leading him to unknown ends.

Indy headed home, but before he reached Le Harve for the homeward voyage he was brought on to work as a translator at the Paris Peace Conference, where his disillusionment with the war and politics became complete. He saw not only the seeds of a second world war, but also a war in Vietnam and every conflict in the Middle East for years to come. Indy was finally ready, after four years, to head home.

Indy's homecoming found his father emotionally unmoved. Henry Sr. acted as though nothing had transpired. This seeming lack of emotionality did not, however, outlast Indy's declaration that he would not be studying in Princeton, as his father had wished, but rather in Chicago. Indy left his father cold, and would not speak to him again for years.

College years
At the University of Chicago and under the tutelage of Professor Abner Ravenwood, Jones studied archaeology. During his off-campus hours, Indy waited tables at Colosimo's Restaurant, and frequented jazz bars with his reluctant roommate Eliot Ness and jazz clarinetist Sidney Bechet. With Ness and Ernest Hemingway, Indy investigated the murder of his boss, nearly ending up a victim of Chicago's nascent mob families. During the summer of 1920, Indy earned money for his tuition in New York theaters and back west in Hollywood where Indy took a job working for Carl Lemle head of Universal pictures. There while trying to get Erich Von Stronhiem to finish his film he encountered Irving thalberg, Jack Warner and John Ford. Indy eventually graduated from Chicago in 1922 and moved onto a graduate program in linguistics at the Sorbonne in Paris.

In Greece, on his first properly qualified archaeological dig with his professor Dorian Belecamus, Indy became embroiled in a plot to kill King Constantine and the Oracle at Delphi. This experience refocused Indy's archaeological aims, which had been flagging somewhat after the routines of college, where only the lecturer Abner Ravenwood managed to make the subject exciting.

In 1925, Indy took his first teaching job as a doctor of archaeology at London University for the summer program. Here he romanced one of his students, Deirdre Campbell  as, over the following two years, they were swept up in various mysteries involving Stonehenge and the Mask of Comototz in Guatemala. Their turbulent relationship culminated in marriage aboard a boat off New Orleans. Sadly, during a search for the hidden city of the Ceiba, and the long lost explorer Percy Walcott, Deirdre Jones was killed in a plane crash that Indy only survived due to the grace of forces unknown.

Later that year, in 1926, while still in a bad emotional state, Indy joined his old archaeology professor, Abner Ravenwood, on a dig in Jerusalem. The pair found an artifact known as the headpiece to the staff of Ra. Still reeling from the death of his wife, Indy romanced Abner's daughter Marion. This led to a falling out with Dr.Ravenwood. The intense courtship was cut short as Dr. Jones abruptly left the Ravenwoods; he would not see Marion again for ten years.

High adventure
The next ten years in the Indiana Jones' life were spent scouring the globe, getting involved in many different adventures: the quest for Noah's Ark on Mount Ararat, the search for the last unicorn's horn, the Philosopher's Stone and the interior world of Easter Island; cavorting with the likes of the Sky Pirates, giants, dinosaurs, sea devils, vampires, and looking for the Heart of the Dragon in 1935. All the while, Indy worked as a lecturer in various colleges around America and Europe, eventually settling in Marshall College in order to fund his expeditions into the world of archaeology.

In the latter adventure, the search for the Heart of the Dragon, Indy encountered Wu Han, who became a close friend, and also found, attempting to pick his pocket, the homeless orphan Short Round. Wu Han would be killed later that year when Dr. Jones faced the gangster Lao Che in Shanghai after Lao demanded the remains of Nurhachi. Dr. Jones, along with nightclub dancer Willie Scott and Short Round, escaped to India, where they ran into a plot by the Thuggee cult to steal the Sankara Stones. After an action-packed adventure to destroy the Thuggee and get the Sankara Stones, they all make it to America. After placing Short Round in the care of an American orphanage, Indy took off again, unable to keep still.

In 1936, Jones narrowly escaped with his life after retrieving the Golden Idol of Fertility in Peru. That same year, Jones was contacted by the United States government to beat the Nazis in retrieving the Ark of the Covenant. During this adventure he encountered Marion Ravenwood for the first time in ten years. Indy also learned that Abner, his mentor, had apparently been killed in a landslide some years before. He had dragged his daughter half way around the globe and had died, leaving her his cantina, the Raven, on the side of a mountain in Nepal, all due to his obsessive search for the lost Ark. Indy and Marion briefly rekindled their relationship, and though Indy helped Marion set up a new, jazzier version of the Raven in Manhattan, the relationship did not last.

The adventures continued, as Indy became as accustomed to danger as he was to breathing. He moved to Barnett College and continued his adventures with academic help from his close friend and colleague Marcus Brody, a friend of his father who followed Indy from Marshall to Barnett. In 1938, Indy retrieved the Cross of Coronado on a freighter during a hurricane, a quest, for Indy, as old as his hat. Later that year, he was hired by Walter Donovan to help search for the Holy Grail, and rescued his father from the Nazis also seeking the relic, during which he finally healed the rift between him and his father that had been created with the death of his mother.

Older years
Jones' adventures continued well into his older years, as did his teachings. The winter of 1950 saw him in Wyoming, fleeing armed goons with his close friend, an old American Indian named Grey Cloud&mdash;to whom Indy told tales of his experiences as a waiter in 1920 Chicago. By 1957, Jones had returned to Marshall College. That year, he competed with the Soviets&mdash;led by Agent Irina Spalko&mdash;in a search for the crystal skull. He was reunited once again with Marion Ravenwood, who accompanied Jones on his journey, along with his friend Mac and the greaser Mutt Williams.

Jones went on to write several books on Archaeology. Sometime during the years between 1957 and 1992, he suffered a wound to his right eye, which required him to wear an eyepatch. He eventually had a daughter, three grandchildren (Caroline, Spike, and Lucy) and two great-grandchildren (Annie and Harry). By 1992, Jones was living in upstate New York with his daughter and grandchildren. He drove a 1952 Plymouth, and used a cane to aid in walking. Still giving the occasional college lecture, he enjoyed relating stories of his youth to anyone he could get to listen.

Personality and traits
From a young age, Indy liked to play baseball. He traded some baseball cards to Leo Tolstoy in 1909, taught the sport to Jiddu Krishnamurti in 1910, and played on his high school's baseball team in 1916. Jones was also an aficionado of the soprano saxophone, which he was introduced to while in basic training in La Havre. He later utilized his saxophone skills in 1918 Italy in an effort to impress a girl he liked. In 1920 Chicago, Jones played the soprano sax with Sidney Bechet&mdash;an event he looked back on fondly in 1950 while hiding from a group of thugs who were trying to steal his friend Grey Cloud's peace pipe.

On his early journeys around Europe, Africa and Asia, he learned to speak, read, and write 27 languages, including French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Greek, Arabic, Turkish, Vietnamese, Swahili, Latin and Chinese, as well as some Hindi. Learning the language of the country was a lesson imparted to him on his first adventure in Egypt, by a young T.E. Lawrence&mdash;a life long friend Indy would call Ned, though the world would eventually call him "Lawrence of Arabia". Jones had type O blood.

Behind the scenes
"You know, he's a man's man and a lady's man&mdash;together."

- Sean Patrick Flanery

Since his introduction in 1981's Raiders of the Lost Ark, the character of Indiana Jones has become a cultural icon for adventure. His popularity has allowed him to make appearances in three more feature films, a three-season TV series, dozens of novels, comic books, and video games, and theme park attractions.

Raiders was followed by a prequel Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), and a sequel Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). Produced by George Lucas and directed by Steven Spielberg, the series starred Harrison Ford as Jones. The television series, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, aired from 1992 to 1996. Many of these episodes were edited into made-for-TV and made-for-video movies, mostly featuring Sean Patrick Flanery as young Indy. Young Indiana Jones and the Mytery of the blues features a cameo appearance by Harrison Ford, reprising the role of Indy as a man in his 50's. The upcoming Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, will be released on May 22, 2008.

The character has been officially portrayed by nine people:

Appearances

 * The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles
 * Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
 * Raiders of the Lost Ark
 * Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
 * Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull