Jane Seymour's son was named after him.
Hal Ketchum's "Hang in There, Superman" was written about him.
1979: After meeting Reeve at the Academy Awards, John Wayne turned to Cary Grant and said, "This is our new man. He's taking over.".
1992: Son, with Dana Reeve, Will Reeve born.
5/18/05: Was posthumously awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters by Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, in New Brunswick, and an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree at Stony Brook University's commencement on 5/20/05. His degree was accepted by Stony Brook graduate student Brooke Ellison, whose life and struggle against paralysis was the subject of a made-for-TV movie directed by the late actor just before his death in 2004.
5/27/95: Paralyzed in a horseback-riding accident near Charlottesville, VA.
5/3/02: He and wife Dana Reeve opened a center devoted to teaching paralyzed people to live more independently in Short Hills, NJ. Known as the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Resource Center, the facility operates a website, publishes "Paralysis Resource Guide" and houses the largest U.S. collection of paralysis-related publications. The Reeve Family Foundation has also distributed grants to paralysis researchers totaling some $22 million.
A picture of him as "Superman" appears at the end credits of European Vacation (1985).
A Superbowl XXXIV commercial for a medical company, set in the future, portrayed Reeve as being able to walk, via computer animation. The next day, the company was flooded with phone calls from people asking how they had cured him.
After he died, a number of memorial cartoons to commemorate his death were Superman-themed. Many artists drew Reeve as Superman flying away from the wheelchair. In one picture, Superman came to Reeve's grave with flowers. In another picture, a grief-stricken Superman reads the news of Reeve's death in The Daily Planet newspaper and says to the reader, "He was my hero." In another, Captain America, Spider-Man, and Batman come to Reeve's grave with Batman, commenting, "He really was a super man." In another, a young boy in a wheelchair tells the reader, "He was the Man of Steel. He had incredible vision. He used his powers to save people. Nothing could stop him. And I think before that he acted in some Superman movies." Some pictures depicted Reeve arriving in heaven dressed as Superman; in one, he says to Gabriel, "You can keep the wings." In another, dressed as a regular angel, he declines the wings by saying, "No thanks, I'd rather walk.".
After the critical and box-office failure of Superman III (1983), he was reluctant to do a fourth Superman film, especially if it was going to be treated as a farce. He eventually agreed to do it when the producers promised him story input and that they would finance a longtime pet project of his, the gritty crime drama Street Smart (1987), in which he played an amoral reporter.
Along with Margot Kidder, Jackie Cooper, and Marc McClure, he is one of only four actors to appear in the first four Superman films: Superman (1978), Superman II (1980), Superman III (1983), and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987).
Among the lead roles turned down were Julian Kaye in American Gigolo (1980), Richard Lestrange in The Blue Lagoon (1980), Ned Racine in Body Heat (1981), T.S. Garp in The World According to Garp (1982), Jeff Spicoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), Allen Bauer in Splash (1984), Daniel Jack T. Colton in Romancing the Stone (1984), Dan Gallagher in Fatal Attraction (1987), Martin Riggs in Lethal Weapon (1987), Edward Lewis in Pretty Woman (1990) and Fletcher Christian in The Bounty (1984) (when David Lean was attached as director).
At the height of his popularity as Superman, a group of children who recognized him in a park purposefully threw their Frisbee over a fence and then asked him to fly after it. Trying hard not to hurt their feelings, Reeve replied he couldn't fly after the Frisbee because his cape was in the washer, so they settled for him just reaching over the fence and handing it back to them.
At the time he was paralyzed, he had been doing a film on horseback-riding safety.
At the time of his death, he had regained partial movement in his fingers and toes, and said he could feel a pin prick anywhere on his body as well as differentiate hot and cold temperatures.
Attended Cornell University, where he lived in Risley Hall, as a member of the class of 1974, leaving for Juilliard after his junior year.
Attended Julliard with actor Kevin Conroy, who later went on to provide the voice of Batman for the animated Bruce W. Timm series.
Attended the Supergirl (1984) premiere with Helen Slater.
August 2000: Broke his leg after falling out of his wheelchair during a workout.