Harry Dean Stanton (born July 14, 1926) is an American actor of film and television.
Stanton was born in West Irvine, Kentucky, the son of Ersel (née Moberly), a hair dresser, and Sheridan Harry Stanton, a tobacco farmer and barber. His parents divorced when Stanton was in high school and later re-married. He has two younger brothers, Archie and Ralph, and a younger half-brother, Stan. Stanton attended the University of Kentucky in Lexington, Kentucky, where he studied journalism and radio arts. He also studied at the Pasadena Playhouse in Pasadena, California, where his classmates included his friends, Tyler MacDuff and Dana Andrews.
Stanton is a U.S. Navy veteran of World War II. He served as a cook aboard an LST ship during the Battle of Okinawa.