Principal Joe Louis Clark, whose tough-as-nails method was the topic of the film “Lean on Me,” has died.
Joe’s household says he handed away Tuesday at dwelling in Gainesville, FL after an extended battle with an undisclosed sickness. He was surrounded by relations, however can even be mourned by lots of, if not 1000’s, of graduates from his time as a legendary principal in Northern New Jersey.
Morgan Freeman performed Joe within the 1989 movie which chronicled his hard-nosed efforts to enhance Eastside High School in Paterson, NJ. The college was described as crime and drug-ridden when Joe took over as principal there in 1983.
The former Army Reserve sergeant and drill teacher took no crap from the coed physique, and as soon as expelled 300 youngsters in sooner or later for preventing, vandalism, abusing academics and medicines.
The picture of Joe roaming college hallways with a bullhorn and baseball bat wasn’t simply one thing Hollywood cooked up for Freeman’s function … it’s how Joe rolled in actual life.
His model earned him nationwide headlines and made him controversial … critics felt he was manner too aggressive, however his admirers pointed to constructive outcomes on the college.
Joe was 82.
RIP
