He was born to sharecroppers at the end of World War II, in a tar-paper shack.
Leonhard Ennen's parents were simple farmers, the equivalent of share-croppers in German agricultural society.
In the final episode of the series, set during Reconstruction, a former Confederate States Senator named Arthur Johnson (played by Burl Ives) arrives in the local county to begin several business ventures including buying up all available land and keeping the black population from leaving through heavy interest on sharecropping supplies.
After the abolition of slavery, sharecropping was the primary means of income for low income families in the area.
Born in the town of Racalmuto, Sicily, Italy to a sharecropping father, Joe Pantalone is the second oldest of 7 children.