1001 Steve McQueen Facts. Tyler Greenblatt

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СКАЧАТЬ 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. Pierce hid a toggle switch under the tool box as a security measure. Only someone who knows to engage the hidden switch was able to actually start the bike. Steve’s Big Chief was originally sold at the 1984 estate auction and most recently at Bonhams in 2006 for $42,120.

      66. One day, Steve and his Marine tank crew discovered that the vehicle’s hot exhaust pipe could be used to heat up a can of pork and beans. At the time, they were on a cold-weather training exercise in Labrador, Canada, where everyone was simply given K-rations, which were eaten cold and became boring rather quickly. McQueen’s crew noticed a case of canned pork and beans in their inventory, which must have seemed like a fancy gourmet meal at the time! One Marine held a can over the exhaust pipe while Steve kept the engine RPM up and another Marine kept watch for officers or others who might not be sympathetic to their cause. After becoming comfortable with the process, they eventually let a can heat up for too long, at which point it exploded and covered the entire area with pork and beans, including several other tanks and the unit’s gear.

      67. McQueen’s fascination with vehicles and his calling to find trades that involved engines continued after his time in the Marine Corps. Following his honorable discharge from the Corps, he worked as a cab driver in Washington, D.C., before saving enough money to get himself back to New York City.

      68. Steve first got hooked on motor vehicles while living with his Uncle Claude in Slater, Missouri, where he grew up working with tractors, and his uncle drove a Jeep. It was while riding in that open-top Jeep that he fell in love with motoring. In his words to author Michael Munn, “Feeling the wind in my hair and on my face was like the most free feeling I ever had. And the faster we went, the better it was. That feeling of freedom and the feeling that wherever you were going, you were leaving behind something. I’ve always loved that leaving something behind.”

RACING

      69. On Steve’s fourth birthday, his uncle Claude bought him a red tricycle to help him burn off his extra energy. Soon after, he began racing the other kids in the neighborhood on it. “There was a dirt bluff behind the farm, and I’d challenge the other kids in the area,” he said. “We raced for gumdrops. I usually reached the top first. Got some skinned knees, but I sure won a lot of gumdrops!”

      70. While working in the traveling carnival at age 13, young Steve’s favorite pastime was walking away from his job to watch the car races put on by the carnival. “Man, you should’ve seen those smashers get knocked dingy on the track,” he commented later.

PERSONAL LIFE

      71. When studying to be an actor in New York, McQueen used the Stanislavski system developed by Russian theater practitioner Konstantin Stanislavski. The principle stated that an actor’s training and preparation should go beyond simply line memorization and dramatics. An actor should actually experience the role that he or she is to play beforehand, so as to make actions and reactions more natural.

      72. In his young acting days, McQueen read an article in a celebrity magazine about an actor who commented that he often had a difficult time deciding which of his cars to take to work on a particular day. As a car lover himself, Steve got mad reading the article. Later, once he could afford any car he wanted, in multitude, he commented that he doesn’t “get sore at the stories about all the automobiles the stars own and the choices they have to make.”

      73. In his early days as an aspiring actor, while he still needed women to pay for his meals, Steve befriended a cook at a popular Greenwich Village spot called Louis’ Tavern. The cook’s name was Sal, and Steve made the deal with him that if Sal would feed him, Steve would pay him back once he landed paying acting jobs. True to his word, Sal fed Steve when he was hungry, and Steve payed him back in full whenever he got work.

      74. McQueen had his first real experience with children when he occasionally babysat for one of The Neighborhood Playhouse faculty’s baby daughter. It must have been an incredible experience for him to witness first-hand what a traditional family was like. This may have been a major factor in being considered a great parent once he had children.

      75. In late 1954, McQueen and fellow actor Richard Martin left New York in search of work in Los Angeles. The only offer they received while there was to sail on magician John Calvert’s yacht for a two-year tour. Although СКАЧАТЬ