The American Spectator

HESTON’S VOICE WAS as impressive when speaking spontaneously as when reading from a script. At a dinner in the early 1990s hosted by The American Spectator — Heston was a supporter of the magazine for many years — the actor stood up and gave a ten-minute impromptu speech on the great issues of the day. He spoke with “great moral urgency and utter eloquence,” remembered editorial director Wlady Pleszczynski.

Heston’s moral urgency was seldom greater than when speaking in defense of the Second Amendment. The NRA added millions of new members during Heston’s tenure as president, and he brought them to their feet to applaud what became one of his most famous lines.

It was just an old bumper-sticker slogan, familiar to everyone in the gun-rights movement, but somehow it had a magic effect when Heston said it. Standing at the lectern, he held a musket over his head and, in his famous rumbling baritone, Heston declared that if anyone wanted to take his guns, his answer could be summed up in five words: “From my cold, dead hands.”

His hands are cold now. His voice is silent. He will be missed. Requiescat in pace.