Raised by foster parents in Brooklyn and Long Island, the young Dallesandro was expelled from school for punching the principal, which was followed by a spate of petty gangland crime. He had a successful escape from a rehabilitation center for boys in New York’s Catskill Mountains, where he had been held for a year after crashing a stolen car. A pioneering figure in the sexual revolution, he was a teenage tearaway turned icon of rebellious youth and sexuality. Perhaps now best known as the torso on The Smiths’ debut album or as that bulge on the cover of The Rolling Stones’ Sticky Fingers.
Joe Dallesandro
