42. Although he seemed much taller in his films, his height was only 5 feet 9½ inches. He’d likely be much smaller if it weren’t for the training and dietary regimen he received while in the Marine Corps. When he entered the Marines, at 17 years old, he was only 5 feet 6½ inches tall and weighed 135 pounds. In addition to the extra 3 inches, he also gained 30 pounds by the time he left the service!
43. Steve learned his shooting skills and natural gun-handling ability while in the Marines; it wasn’t just acting! He qualified as a sharpshooter with both the M-1 rifle and the Colt .45 pistol. He worked with firearms in many of his films, and unlike other actors who needed to learn how to use them for the job, it was already a part of his skillset.
44. When Steve was living in Los Angeles and running the streets, a Coke bottle was thrown at his head and he received a serious cut to his lower lip that never healed properly. The wound, which had become a small mass, was discovered by a doctor during an examination while McQueen was in the Marines.
45. While serving, he also had the misfortune of falling off a tank and reinjuring the same spot, causing it to swell and scar even more, until a plastic surgeon removed it. What does this have to do with his films and acting? Even with the mass removed, he still had a slight mumble when he spoke and had difficulty pronouncing some words. This is why he speaks in monosyllabic dialogue in his films.
46. The same Marine buddy, Cliff Anderson, who nicknamed Steve “Tough Shit McQueen,” learned of his former comrade’s fame years later while flipping through a copy of TV Guide magazine. In it, there was a letter in which a fan asked about Steve McQueen. According to Marshall Terrill’s book, Steve McQueen: The Life And Legend Of A Hollywood Icon, Anderson remarked upon discovering the letter, “Holy cow, that’s Tough Shit McQueen! The son of a bitch is famous!”
47. On March 24, 1944, Steve’s 14th birthday, Allied prisoners of war attempted the largest escape attempt of World War II and inspired the film The Great Escape, starring Steve McQueen.
48. Steve was born the same year as fellow film icon Clint Eastwood, and they even got their big breaks around the same time. McQueen’s came in 1958 with Wanted Dead or Alive and Eastwood’s was a year later with Rawhide.
49. Having starred in similar roles throughout their careers, although he was always one step behind McQueen, Eastwood’s career provides an important insight into what Steve’s could have looked like had he not died at a young age. Today, most fans remember McQueen from his most popular films in the late 1960s and early 1970s; it’s strange to think that he’d be nearly 90 years old today. Using Clint Eastwood as a reference provides assistance in that thought process.
50. Thanks to his stern upbringing on a Midwestern hog farm under the tutelage of his tough uncle Claude, Steve always felt that acting was not an appropriate job for a man. Much of his show of masculinity throughout his life and his desire to excel in racing came from the fact that he considered male actors, himself included, as sissies. After he had become an accomplished actor and he and wife Neile (prounced kneel, as in to kneel down) visited Uncle Claude, they never once spoke of Steve’s acting career.
51. One of Steve’s favorite actors as a young boy was James Cagney, who was well known for gangster movies. Similar to a character McQueen eventually played, Josh Randall, Cagney’s characters were always small but tough and not afraid to stand up to bigger foes.
52. Steve once used his best Cagney impression while running on the streets when he was approached by a bigger, older street kid. The older kid was so impressed by young Steve’s toughness that he invited him to join his gang.
53. Making James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart impressions became lucrative for a young Steve McQueen when he stood on a street corner and started acting for money. He put his hat down in front of him and people dropped in a few coins here and there as he ran through skits. Even though he was able to show that he earned money from it, Uncle Claude didn’t approve of acting as a profession for men.
AUTOMOBILE COLLECTION
54. Growing up in Southern California, McQueen fell heavily into the hot rod scene. His first car was a hot rod with a Model A frame and a Ford 60 engine with Edelbrock manifolds. He remembers that car accelerating “like the J-2 Allards that some of the sports car people owned.” His hot rod didn’t handle all that well, but it did have “stark acceleration; when the engine stayed in it.”
55. One of young McQueen’s first experiences with motorcycles came when he was a young teenager in California and he hopped on a police bike that was parked outside a restaurant in Hollywood. He tossed the officer’s gloves and helmet on the ground and made “vroom, vroom” noises according to a friend who was with him at the time. When he got off, he snapped off the bike’s radio antenna and took it with him. His friend thought they’d be arrested on the spot!
56. As an homage to his student number at Boys Republic, 3188, when he was in his late 40s, he used a custom license plate on his everyday cars that read MCQ3188.
57. Because of Steve’s interest in and experience with engines and automobiles, he was assigned the job of a tank crewman/driver on an M4 Sherman tank. “I’d often wonder if a tank could be speed converted,” he said. “We figured on havin’ the fastest tank in the division. What we got was plenty of skinned knuckles. I found out you can’t soup up a tank.”
58. After receiving disciplinary action due to going AWOL in the Marines and winding up in a civilian jail, Steve was assigned to a work detail in the engine room of a ship. His primary responsibility was cleaning and renovating it, and it was further life experience that he could use later on, such as in the movie The Sand Pebbles.
59. Part of Steve’s job while in the brig was removing ripped asbestos liner from the pipes and ceilings. He recalled that the air was so thick with asbestos particles that he could hardly breathe. Experts later pointed to this experience as a major cause of his death from mesothelioma.
60. A love of automobiles ran through the Thomson family long before Steve McQueen came to be. His grandmother, Lillian, was one of the few women of the day to not only drive a car, but own her own car! This was especially uncommon in the rural area in which they lived, where roads were barely glorified horse trails and most people couldn’t afford a car. Lillian drove her Ford to her work as a stenographer and typewriter.
61. Uncle Claude’s stepdaughter, Jackie, began dating Huston Gigger after he got out of the Navy following World War II. When Huston came to the farm to take Jackie out, a young Steve complained that he wanted to go too, and certainly to the young couple’s dismay, Eva, Claude’s wife, made them take Steve with them. They quickly devised a way of keeping Steve out of their business by sharing a bottle of wine with him and putting him in the trunk of the car once he passed out. They’d check on him every so often, but he’d be safely fast asleep in the trunk. When it came time to head home, the booze had worn off and Claude and Eva were none the wiser.
62. Steve may have been well known for his off-road racing Triumph motorcycles, but he also owned a 1938 5T Speed Twin. The 500-cc, 355-pound machine was one of the sportiest and most attractive motorcycles in its day, a fact not lost on the actor when he purchased the bike in the early 1970s.
63. Perhaps most notable about the Speed Twin is that it was beautifully restored by famed racer, stuntman, and Triumph dealer Bud Ekins at McQueen’s request. In addition, it is believed, but has not been proven, that the intricate pinstriping on the bike was done by the legendary Von Dutch. Recognizing the motorcycle as not only a monument in itself but also a machine with historically significant provenance, it was purchased at a Bonhams auction in 2019 for $175,000!
64. Even a bike as rare and beautiful as his 1927 Indian Big Chief could not escape McQueen’s desire to make engines run better and faster. While undergoing a complete restoration in the late 1970s by personal mechanic Sammy Pierce, McQueen requested that his Big Chief be upgraded with racing cams, a later-model Linkert carburetor, wasted spark ignition system, and a later-model headlight. A few additional odds and ends received a chrome treatment.
65.