54 Facts About Bob Marley

In 1976, Bob Marley survived an assassination attempt in his home, which was thought to be politically motivated.

Bob Marley supported legalisation of marijuana, and advocated for Pan-Africanism.

Around this time, Bob Marley relocated to London, and the group embodied their musical shift with the release of the album The Best of The Wailers.

In 1977, Bob Marley was diagnosed with acral lentiginous melanoma; he died as a result of the illness in 1981, shortly after baptism into the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Bob Marley was posthumously honoured by Jamaica soon after his death with a designated Order of Merit by his nation.

Robert Nesta Bob Marley was born on 6 February 1945 at the farm of his maternal grandfather in Nine Mile, Saint Ann Parish, Jamaica, to Norval Sinclair Bob Marley and Cedella Malcolm.

Norval Bob Marley was from Crowborough, East Sussex in England, then resident of Clarendon Parish, Norval claimed to have been a captain in the Royal Marines; at the time of his marriage to Cedella Malcolm, an Afro-Jamaican then 18 years old, he was employed as a plantation overseer.

Bob Marley attended Stepney Primary and Junior High School which serves the catchment area of Saint Ann.

In 1955, when Bob Marley was 10 years old, his father died of a heart attack at the age of 70.

Bob Marley's mother went on later to marry Edward Booker, a civil servant from the United States, giving Bob Marley two half-brothers: Richard and Anthony.

Bob Marley left Nine Mile with his mother when he was 12 and moved to Trenchtown, Kingston.

Bob Marley and Thadeus Livingston had a daughter together whom they named Claudette Pearl, who was a younger sister to both Bob and Bunny.

Bob Marley formed a vocal group with Bunny Wailer, and Peter Tosh.

In 1966, Bob Marley married Rita Anderson, and moved near his mother's residence in Wilmington, Delaware, in the United States for a short time, during which he worked as a DuPont lab assistant, and on the assembly line and as a fork lift operator at a Chrysler plant in nearby Newark, under the alias Donald Bob Marley.

Bob Marley approached producer Leslie Kong, who was regarded as one of the major developers of the reggae sound.

An artist yet to establish himself outside his native Jamaica, Bob Marley lived in Ridgmount Gardens, Bloomsbury, during 1972.

In 1972, Bob Marley signed with CBS Records in London and embarked on a UK tour with soul singer Johnny Nash.

Bob Marley travelled to London to supervise Blackwell's overdubbing of the album at Island Studios, which included tempering the mix from the bass-heavy sound of Jamaican music and omitting two tracks.

Taylor and Bob Marley's wife sustained serious injuries but later made full recoveries.

Bob Marley received minor wounds in the chest and arm.

Nonetheless, the concert proceeded, and an injured Bob Marley performed as scheduled, two days after the attempt.

Bob Marley left Jamaica at the end of 1976, and after a month-long "recovery and writing" sojourn at the site of Chris Blackwell's Compass Point Studios in Nassau, Bahamas, arrived in England, where he spent two years in self-imposed exile.

In 1978, Bob Marley returned to Jamaica and performed at another political concert, the One Love Peace Concert, again in an effort to calm warring parties.

Bob Marley's songs were his memories; he had lived with the wretched, he had seen the downpressers and those whom they pressed down.

Confrontation, released posthumously in 1983, contained unreleased material recorded during Bob Marley's lifetime, including the hit "Buffalo Soldier" and new mixes of singles previously only available in Jamaica.

In July 1977, Bob Marley was diagnosed with a type of malignant melanoma under his right great toe.

Bob Marley had to see two doctors before a biopsy was done, which confirmed acral lentiginous melanoma.

Bob Marley rejected his doctors' advice to have his toe amputated, citing his religious beliefs, and instead, the nail and nail bed were removed and a skin graft was taken from his thigh to cover the area.

Bob Marley collapsed while jogging in Central Park and was taken to the hospital, where it was found that his cancer had spread to his brain, lungs, and liver.

Shortly afterward, Bob Marley's health deteriorated as his cancer had spread throughout his body.

The rest of the tour was canceled, and Bob Marley sought treatment at the clinic of Josef Issels in Rottach-Egern, Bavaria, Germany, where he underwent an alternative cancer treatment called Issels treatment, partly based on avoidance of certain foods, drinks, and other substances.

Bob Marley was given a state funeral in Jamaica on 21 May 1981 that combined elements of Ethiopian Orthodoxy and Rastafari tradition.

Bob Marley was buried in a chapel near his birthplace in Nine Mile; his casket contained his red Gibson Les Paul guitar, a Bible opened at Psalm 23, and a stalk of ganja placed there by his widow Rita Marley.

Bob Marley's voice was an omnipresent cry in our electronic world.

Bob Marley was an experience which left an indelible imprint with each encounter.

Bob Marley is part of the collective consciousness of the nation.

In 2008, a statue of Bob Marley was inaugurated in Banatski Sokolac, Serbia.

Internationally, Bob Marley's message continues to reverberate among various indigenous communities.

Bob Marley evolved into a global symbol, which has been endlessly merchandised through a variety of media.

That the machine has utterly emasculated Bob Marley is beyond doubt.

Bob Marley is discussed in the 2007 action thriller I Am Legend, where the protagonist named his daughter after him.

Bob Marley was replaced by Jonathan Demme, who dropped out due to creative differences with producer Steve Bing during the beginning of editing.

Kevin Macdonald replaced Demme and the film, Bob Marley, was released on 20 April 2012.

In 2011, ex-girlfriend and filmmaker Esther Anderson, along with Gian Godoy, made the documentary Bob Marley: The Making of a Legend, which premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

In October 2015, Jamaican author Marlon James's novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings, a fictional account of the attempted assassination of Bob Marley, won the 2015 Man Booker Prize at a ceremony in London.

Bob Marley was a member for some years of the Rastafari movement, whose culture was a key element in the development of reggae.

Bob Marley became an ardent proponent of Rastafari, taking its music out of the socially deprived areas of Jamaica and onto the international music scene.

Bob Marley began to use cannabis when he converted to the Rastafari faith from Catholicism in 1966.

Bob Marley was arrested in 1968 after being caught with cannabis but continued to use marijuana in accordance with his religious beliefs.

Bob Marley was a Pan-Africanist and believed in the unity of African people worldwide.

Bob Marley's beliefs were rooted in his Rastafari religious beliefs.

Bob Marley held that independence of African countries from European domination was a victory for all those in the African diaspora.

Bob Marley married Alpharita Constantia "Rita" Anderson in Kingston, Jamaica, on 10 February 1966.

Bob Marley surrounded himself with people from the sport, and in the 1970s made the Jamaican international footballer Allan "Skill" Cole his tour manager.