Dominick Scialo was born in Brooklyn in 1927, he had two older sisters and a kid brother. The New York census of 1940 shows his mother as the head of the household, his father was not present when he grew up. He seems to have been given the nickname "Mimi" at an early age, his family lived in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn, in a modest home at 2827 West 15th street, located just a couple of blocks south of the restaurant where Giuseppe "Joe the Boss" Masseria was gunned down in 1931.