Raquel Welch (born September 5, 1940) is a Golden Globe-winning American actress.

Welch was born Jo Raquel Tejada in Chicago, Illinois, the oldest of three children and the daughter of Josephine Sarah (née Hall) and Armando Carlos Tejada Urquizo. Her father, an aeronautical engineer, emigrated from La Paz, Bolivia; her mother was an Irish-American, the daughter of American architect Emery Stanford Hall (1869-1939) and wife Clara Louise Adams.

In 1959, Welch played the title role in the famous Ramona Pageant, a yearly outdoor play at Hemet, California, which is based on the novel Ramona by Helen Hunt Jackson and Bob Biloe.