It was on this day in M(ichigan)M(ovie)H(istory), January 29, 1945,  American actor and film producer Thomas William “Tom” Selleck was born.

Born in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Martha Selleck (née Jagger), a housewife, and Robert Dean Selleck (d. 2001), an executive and real estate investor, Selleck worked as a model, while attending the University of Southern California on a basketball scholarship where he played for the USC Trojans men’s basketball team.

He then studied acting at the Beverly Hills Playhouse, under Milton Katselas. When, while majoring in business administration, a drama coach suggested Selleck try acting.

He is best known for his starring role television series Magnum, P.I. (1980–1988) as the Hawaiian based private investigator Thomas Magnum and also in a series of made-for-TV movies based on Robert B. Parker novels as Police Chief Jesse Stone . Since 2010, he has also been a primary cast member on CBS Blue Bloods as NYPD Commissioner Frank Reagan.

Selleck has appeared in more than 50 film and television roles since Magnum, P.I.  Most noteworthy among these being Three Men and a Baby, Quigley Down Under, Mr. Baseball, and Lassiter. Selleck appeared as Dr. Richard Burke on Friends, where he played the on-again, off-again love-interest of Monica Geller (Courteney Cox), and as A.J. Cooper on the TV series Las Vegas.

Today Tom Selleck turns 72.