At the age of three, Bonanno immigrated to New York City with his family, where he lived for about 10 years before he moved back to Italy.

He later slipped back into the United States in 1924, by stowing away on a Cuban fishing boat bound for Tampa, Florida.

When Magliocco gave the contract to one of his top hit men, Joseph Colombo, he revealed the plot to its targets.

[1] Joseph's uncles, Giuseppe Bonanno and his older brother and advisor, Stefano, led a clan in Castellammare del Golfo.

[3][5] Bonanno slipped back into the United States in 1924, by stowing away on a Cuban fishing boat bound for Tampa, Florida with Peter Magaddino.

He had become active in the Mafia during his youth in Italy, and he fled to the United States after Benito Mussolini initiated a crackdown.

[6] During the Castellammarese War, between 1930 and 1931, Maranzano and Bonanno fought against a rival group based in Brooklyn, led by Joe Masseria and Giuseppe Morello.

This group of "Young Turk" mafiosi was led by Masseria's second-in-command, Lucky Luciano, and included Frank Costello, Vito Genovese, Joe Adonis, Carlo Gambino and Albert Anastasia on the Masseria side and Joe Profaci, Tommy Gagliano, Tommy Lucchese, Joseph Magliocco and Stefano Magaddino on the Maranzano side.

[7] His son, Bill developed a severe mastoid ear infection at the age of 10; his parents enrolled him in a Catholic boarding school in the dry climate of Tucson, Arizona.

[12] Bonanno allegedly attended the Grand Hotel et des Palmes Mafia meeting in Palermo in October 1957.

[16] A month later, in November 1957, the Apalachin Conference was called by Vito Genovese to discuss the future of Cosa Nostra, which Bonanno was reported to have attended.

[17] However, the meeting was aborted when police investigated the destination of the many out-of-state attendees' vehicles and arrested many of the fleeing mafiosi.

[20][23] In 1963, Bonanno made plans to assassinate several rivals on the Mafia Commission—bosses Tommy Lucchese, Carlo Gambino, and Stefano Magaddino, as well as Frank DeSimone.

[25] Magliocco was assigned the task of killing Lucchese and Gambino, and gave the contract to one of his top hit men, Joseph Colombo.

The Commission spared Magliocco's life, but forced him to retire as Profaci family boss and pay a $50,000 fine.

[26] In October 1964, he returned to Manhattan, but on October 21, 1964, the day before Bonanno was scheduled to testify to a grand jury inquiry, his lawyers said that after having dinner with them, Bonanno was kidnapped, allegedly by Magaddino's men, as he entered the apartment house where one of his lawyers lived on Park Avenue and East 36th Street.

In 1968, after a heart attack, Bonanno ended the family warfare by agreeing to retire as boss and move to Arizona.

[30] In the late 1970s, his two sons, Bill and Joe Jr., brought high heat[31] in Northern California after getting involved with Lou Peters, a Cadillac-Oldsmobile dealer, in San Jose, Lodi and Stockton.

[32] In April 1983, Joseph Bonanno and his son Bill appeared on the CBS News TV program 60 Minutes to be interviewed by correspondent Mike Wallace.

[36] During Bill Bonanno's trial, he gave interviews to author Gay Talese that formed part of the basis of his 1971 true crime book Honor Thy Father.

Bonanno justified his decision to write A Man of Honor on the grounds that omertà represented a lifestyle and tradition greater than or beyond just the code of silence it is generally understood to be: as he had not been compelled to reveal his secrets by becoming an informant or government witness, Bonanno reasoned, he did not violate his code of honor.

This book was eventually converted to the 1993 Lifetime network film Love, Honor & Obey: The Last Mafia Marriage.

[47] In 2014, "Eldorado", the series finale of Boardwalk Empire, Joe Bonanno, played by Amadeo Fusca, has a non-speaking cameo role.

He is seen sitting at the table as Lucky Luciano gathers the country's most powerful crime bosses and forms The Commission.

In the 2019 film The Irishman, Frank Sheeran (played by Robert De Niro) compares Bonanno's "kidnapping", in a telephone conversation with the wife of Jimmy Hoffa, to her husband's disappearance.