Steve McQueen 1963 Illustration

Steve McQueen 1963 Illustration, drawn here with the actor wearing his classic bone Harrington “Baracuta G9” Jacket in 1963, age 33.
The Baracuta jacket became a wardrobe staple when Thomas Crown (Steve McQueen) was seen circling weightlessly in a yellow glider in the 1968 film, The Thomas Crown Affair, wearing a navy Harrington.

Terrence Stephen McQueen was an American actor who was nicknamed “The King of Cool”. His antihero persona developed at the height of the counterculture of the 1960s made him a top box-office draw during the 1960s and 1970s.

Born in Beech Grove, Indiana in a troubled home, McQueen never knew his father, who left his mother after 6 months of marriage. His mother (an alcoholic) eventually remarried 3 times. McQueen was raised by his grandparents.
Throughout his youth, he spent years living on the streets and committing petty crime. At age 16, he spent some time with the Merchant Marines and served on a ship. At 18, he joined the Marines for 2 years and was honorably discharged in 1950.

In 1952, he began to study acting and earned money competing in weekend motorcycle races (winning about $1,000 each weekend).
He earned his first movie role in a bit part in “Somebody Up There Likes Me” directed by Robert Wise and starring Paul Newman.
His first leading role was in the sci-fi movie “The Blob” in 1958. He was hired for his break-out role in the western television series “Wanted Dead Or Alive” in late 1958.

At age 29 he got a significant break and appeared in the movie “Never So Few” with Frank Sinatra, directed by John Sturges.
Sturges cast him as a lead in his next movie, “The Magnificent Seven” (1960) with an all-star cast, which launched McQueen as a major star.

McQueen played the top-billed lead role in the next big Sturges film, 1963’s “The Great Escape”, Hollywood’s fictional depiction of the true story of a historic mass escape from a World War II POW camp. To join the film, McQueen insisted on filming some type of motorcycle scene in the film, which was added to the film and became one of the iconic scenes in the movie.

McQueen would become the world’s highest-paid actor with such films as: “Love With A Proper Stranger”, “Nevada Smith”, “The Cincinnati Kid”, “The Sand Pebbles” (earning him an Academy Award nomination), “Bullitt”, “The Thomas Crown Affair”, “The Reivers”, “Le Mans”, “Junior Bonner”, “The Getaway”, “Papillon”, “The Towering Inferno” and his last film, “Tom Horn”.

McQueen was married 3 times.

McQueen developed a persistent cough in 1978 and was diagnosed with pleural mesothelioma, a cancer associated with asbestos exposure for which there is no known cure.

In the last year of his life, McQueen became a Christian. This was due in part to the influences of his flying instructor, Sammy Mason, Mason’s son Pete, and McQueen’s wife Barbara. McQueen attended his local church, Ventura Missionary Church.

On November 7, 1980, McQueen died of heart failure at 3:45 a.m. at the Juárez clinic, Chihuahua, Mexico, 12 hours after surgery to remove or reduce numerous metastatic tumors in his neck and abdomen. He was 50 years old.

When he died, McQueen was clutching a Bible – one given to him by Billy Graham.