Tony Hawk’s Biography & Life Story
Tony “The Birdman” Hawk: the Michael Jordan of Skateboarding and the World-beating Skateboarder
Anthony Frank “Tony” Hawk was born on May 12, 1968 in Carlsbad, California. He is a professional American skateboarder and deemed to be one of the most successful and influential persons of modern vertical skateboarding, the first person to perform many skateboarding tricks, and invented a whole lot more of skateboarding tricks credited to his name.
As of 2004, Tony has won 80 competitions and invented numerous historic tricks. In 1985, he landed the first “720,” a 720-degree or two full revolution spin. He was the far-famed skateboarder of his time to first land the 900 after 11 failed attempts, two-and-a-half complete rotations — 900-degree 2.5 revolution spin considered by some as the “holy grail” of skateboarding — in the air before landing back on the pipe in the June 27, 1999 televised X Games, where he received an enormous amount of attention in the competition.
He also won the Best Trick Competition by a large margin in the process. He even won a contest after a redeye flight and only three hours of sleep.
At 12 years old, Tony was under the sponsorship of Dogtown Skateboards; and during the 1980s, he was in for a lot of skateboarding competitions. Turning pro at the age of 14, and as a member of Powell Peralta’s Bones Brigade, he was one of the first skateboarders to have a pro model shoe produced by Airwalk. The first being Natas Kaupas with a shoe on Etnies, the second being Steve Caballero with a shoe on Vans, and then Tony’s. By age 16, acclaimed to be the best skateboarder in the world.
Tony was originally a member of the Bones Brigade skate team. He was also the second skateboarder to land a “McTwist,” a skateboard trick named after a Mike McGill of Bones Brigade. This raised him to the next level of fame, and “Tony Hawk” became a solid household name. He then retired from competitive skateboarding afterwards, but still very much into skating and still continues to perform.
Following immediately and as a result of what went in 17 years, Hawk has been into an estimated 103 pro contests, bagged 73 winnings out of them, and placed second in 19 of those, making it by far the best record in skateboarding’s history.
The Wish List
One of the reasons Tony decided to stop competing at the end of 1999 was that he landed the first-ever 900, two-and-a-half mid-air spins at the X Games, in fact, the last on a wish list of tricks he had written ten years earlier. The list also included ollie 540, kickflip 540, and varial 720.
[Click here to view skate tricks invented by Tony Hawk]
The Dogtown Roots: “They came from nothing to change everything.”
In the late 1950s, skateboarding was a hobby that had a short-lived gleam of excitement. Skateboarders would build their own skateboard and ride on it using clay wheels. In 1965 its popularity declined markedly on the face of the earth.
In 1972, skateboarding was reborn. Jeff Ho, Skip Engblom and Craig Stecyk opened up Zephyr Surfboard Productions shop right in the middle of Dogtown. Urethane skateboard wheels were invented. These wheels made the sport safer, smoother and more reasonable.
During this time surfboard designs had soft and calm rainbow images and pretty island scenes. Jeff Ho handcrafted surfboards and pushed greatest possible degree of ideas on surfboard designs making it unique, cutting edge and somewhat a little “crazy.” Craig Stecyk took charge of the graphic designs from local graffiti, reflecting the area they were made in.
On the south side of Santa Monica, Dogtown is a district of the city marked by poverty and inferior living conditions that covered Venice and Ocean Park Beaches. In between was an abandoned amusement park right on the water called Pacific Ocean Park Pier or “POP.” In the middle of huge wood pilings and rickety piers was the “secret cove.” This is where the local surfers of Dogtown prized their secret spot and defended it with force from outsiders who wanted to earn their way in.
During the ’70s, Dogtown was full of surfers who came from broken homes and messed up families, and kids who were poor dropouts with nowhere to go. They were aggressive and antisocial. Surfing was all they had. They knew what performance was all about. This type of mindset and lifestyle made these young people with a need to prove and acquire identity for themselves.
When the Jeff Ho and Zephyr Productions shop formed the Zephyr Surf Team, they gave these young kids only major points, provided a home and just what they wanted, surfing.
The Zephyr Team or the “Z-Boys” had 12 members:
Shogo Kubo
Bob Biniak
Nathan Pratt
Stacey Peralta
Jim Muir
Allen Sarlo
Chris Cahill
Tony Alva
Paul Constantineau
Jay Adams
Peggy Oki
Wentzle Ruml
What went on at the shop were all sketchy at best; but the real acclivity of skateboarding was led of by Stacy Peralta, Tony Alva and Jay Adams. These boys shifted their surf skills to drain pipes and empty swimming pools. Their deliberate coordinated movements commanded attention that shot them forth to being widely honored and acclaimed. It earned them fortune, and they inspired generations of teens to join the skateboarding frenzy.
This is the story of “The Z-Boys” or the Zephyr Skateboard Team, a powerful group of skateboarders who have such surpassing excellence as to suggest inspiration on the sport. Surfing had them together, but skateboarding pulled them apart. However, when that happened, the Zephyr Skateboard Team had already changed the world forever.
Tony Hawk: the Skateboarder
Tony Hawk is the son of Nancy, a homemaker and a college professor, and Frank Hawk, a retired U.S. Navy officer and a small appliance salesman. He is the youngest of four children. He has one brother, Steve, and two sisters, Lenore and Patricia. Tony Hawk has three children: Riley, Spencer and Keegan.
In April 1990 Tony married Cindy Dunbar, lived in Fallbrook, and got divorced in 1993. They had a son who was named after one of Tony’s ancestors. He is Hudson Riley Hawk who was born in December 6, 1992. The irony why they called him “Riley” to this day was because of the movie “Hudson Hawk,” which was shown at the same time he was born. Riley, too, has skated for Hawk’s own Birdhouse Skateboards.
Then Hawk was married to Erin Lee in September 28, 1996 and got divorced in 2004. They had two sons, Spencer who was born in July 16, 1999 and Keegan in March 18, 2001.
He then married Lhotse Merriam, a former Vice President of the International Free Skiers; former President of Method Media and Marketing, Inc.; and the former owner of Clover Lingerie & Gifts LLC. They tied the knots at the heart-shaped island of Tavarua, Fiji, on January 12, 2006, a year after they began dating. Rancid played at their wedding. The couples are currently expecting their first baby girl due in June 2008.
While at Tavarua, Druke, the Fijian Chief of Tavarua, requested Hawk to give a private skate demo. Two onlookers held a piece of plywood as a makeshift wall to wall ride on a tennis court wall.
The Rest of the Skateboard History that Changed Tony Hawk’s Life Forever
Mom knows best
In his own autobiography, The Birdman described himself as a “cool kid,” often frustrated, unfocused, and has a tendency of “flying off” into rages. He also described himself as a “nightmare” and saw himself as the terrible youth — hyper, rail-thin geek on a sugar buzz — but he says, “I think my Mom summed it up best when she said ‘challenging.’”
Mom knows best when it comes to her children. She accounted Tony as being pathologically determined and expected himself to do so many things. When she brought to have a swim in an Olympic-size pool at the age of six, Young Tony decided to swim the length without a breath, and was not successful in doing it. According to mom he got so frustrated and was so hard on himself.
One other incident she remembers vividly was when Tony struck out in baseball, which he was so emotionally agitated that he hid in a ravine and had to be physically cajoled out by his father.
It came to a point that his frustration with himself was so rough that his parents were prompted to have him psychologically evaluated at school. And the results? Tony was “gifted,” and school advisors recommended that he be placed in advanced classes.
Mom still remembers at that time when the psychologists unveiled the base of his frustrations; Tony had an eight-year-old body with a 12-year old mind. His mind dictated he can be able to do things his body can’t do.
Steve and the thin Bahne board
The credit goes to Tony’s brother, Steve, who introduced him to skateboarding. When he gave him a blue fiberglass banana board at the age of nine, he found the perfect link that sufficed his brain/body problem, the skateboard. In the turn of events, Young Tony’s body finally caught up with his brain. Hawk showed himself a prodigy.
He started goofing around. According to Steve he became a different guy. When he made good at skating, his personality changed. He was calm and started to think about other people and became more generous. In his words, Young Tony finally found satisfaction in something he was doing. He became brave enough to face losing at other things, though he might not be as competitive at Pac Man as he had been.
His mother, Nancy, would agree with a laugh, that she was just glad Tony was taking all his energy out on skateboarding, and not on her.
Dad’s all out support
As Tony progressed as a skater, his father, Frank Hawk, was there for him not to teach or train, but to give all his full support for his son’s athletic passion. No doubt that at least some of his determination was from his father who flew, being in the US Navy, torpedo bombers off of aircraft carriers during World War II.
More than just the genes Dad Frank provided, his major role was to drive Tony up and down the coast of California for every skate contest he competed for. Over the years, Dad Frank built myriad of skating ramps in the backyard, hoping that skateboarding would be an outlet for Tony’s energy, and they were. In fact, Hawk owned his own half halfpipe which was constructed by his father and friends at his home at Fallbrook.
Tony Hawk: “If I don’t do my best, it kills me.”
It’s not altogether clear where all of his determination came from. Tony was still beating himself up if he didn’t skate his best in a contest. Even if he won, he would be silent. When he gets home, he will be by himself with his cat Zorro up in his room.
At age 17, he was a senior student at Torrey Pines High School in Del Mar, California when he bought his own house. After two years, he bought another one, a four-and-a-half acre spread in nearby Fallbrook, built a monster skate ramp at the top of a hill, and a smaller ramp was wedged between his house and his pool.
Hawk was constantly traveling worldwide to give demos and vie for contests. He made enough money to spend for his friends’ trips to Hawaii so everyone could enjoy vacation together.
As the young adult as he was, he was an electronics nut. He unremittingly updated his computers and remained a proud computer geek to this time. He had a hit for stereo systems, video cameras, and most of all cars.
During the 1980s he grew dissatisfied with the competitive organizations. He founded the California Amateur Skateboard League and the National Skateboard Association. The sport’s soar in popularity was attributed to NSA’s high-profile contests.
The Ups and Downs of Skateboarding
Unfortunately, skating “died” one day in 1991. Tony was caught off guard and felt the bump on his helmet. He did not see it coming in order for him to plan ahead. It came like a blood-hose-out-the-nose aneurysm at the breakfast table. When he looked up and it was too late, the sky had already fallen on him.
Skateboarding is ill-famed for its peaks and valleys or highs and lows in popularity. He realized that being the world’s skateboarding champion doesn’t necessarily transform into financial security. His income plummeted; his wife became the family breadwinner as a manicurist. Times were lean that Tony has a daily Taco Bell allowance of $5.
After the skateboarding industry took a downturn and vertical skateboarding’s popularity waned in 1994 due to the rise of street skating, the next few years went by in a haze of financial instability and personal eruptions. He sold the Fallbrook house and the Lexus. He refinanced his first house and started Birdhouse Projects, a skateboard company, with former Powell pro, Per Welinder. The company is now known as Birdhouse Skateboards.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t making money and Tony’s future was still a blur. In the downfall of his skateboarding career, he thought skating was over. He figured if he won’t be able to make a living through skateboarding, he could either edit video for other companies or land a job sitting behind a computer doing programming or web design.
Through the Years with Tony Hawk’s Greatest Achievements
In the turn of events, by 1995 his dad, Frank, died. It was also during the mid 1990s that skateboarding again soared in popularity. The Hawk became the Phoenix. Birdhouse became one of the world’s largest skateboard companies. He signed a six-figure endorsement deals with Adio shoes, Jeep, and Sirius Satellite Radio.
In 1996 he again bought a new house with a new pool and waterfall. He married Erin Lee. He and his family put up Hawk Clothing in 1998, a kid’s skate clothing company and footwear line. Later it was acquired by Quiksilver in the early 2000 and now exclusively sold at Kohl’s department stores.
Being a computer geek himself, Activision and Tony created Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater and Skateboarding video game for PlayStation in 1999, expecting just decent sales. To their surprise, copies blew off the shelves and quickly made it to bestseller. When it was critically and commercially acclaimed, sequels spawned: Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4, Tony Hawk’s Underground, Tony Hawk’s Underground 2, Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland and Tony Hawk’s Project 8.
Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground was the latest addition to the series, and it has earned excellent reviews. It was launched October 16, 2007, and not a sign of slowing down.
The series were also in numerous hand-held games on the Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, PlayStation Portable, as well as Nokia’s N-Gage game phone. American Sk8land for the Nintendo DS is the latest release.
The Tony Hawk video games had sold over $1 billion in sales worldwide. Not to mention that Tony has also appeared as a secret character in Mat Hoffman’s Pro BMX and Kelly Slater’s Pro Surfer. From then on, the series was one of the best-selling video game franchises of all time. In 2002, the licensing deal between Hawk and Activision extended until 2015.
Tony’s success not only overflowed from skateboarding to video games but also into the non-electronic world when he and Sean Mortimer wrote his autobiography “HAWK: Occupation: Skateboarder.” It made its way to number 18 in the New York Times bestseller list and is currently available in paperback.
He had a second book written later, a road journal called “Between Boardslides and Burnout.” Tony Hawk’s “Tony Hawk’s Gigantic Skatepark Tour for ESPN” is only second to the X Games in viewership.
In 2002, Tony founded the Tony Hawk Foundation, a non-profit organization whose mission is to assist low-income communities across the US through the creation of well-designed skateboard parks. In four years, the Foundation gave away over a million dollars in grants and assistance. The foundation has been working with public officials and skatepark advocates to advise them on their skatepark projects. Proving Ground Stand Up for Skateparks fundraiser in October 2007 pledged $60,500 for the Compton, California skatepark project.
Now, the skateboarding legend’s nonprofit organization hits milestone in charity. The foundation has distributed more than $1,700,000 to non-profit groups for building skateparks throughout the US, from Homer, Alaska to Needles, California; to Greencastle, Indiana to Glenwood, Arkansas to Livermore Falls,
Maine. The foundation has now been a part of 336 new skateparks around the country.
Fall 2007 Tony Hawk Foundation Grant Recipients:
1. Greensboro, Alabama $25,000
2. Eureka, California $25,000
3. Yakima, Washington $25,000
4. Lake Havasu City, Arizona $10,000
5. Saint Cloud, Minnesota $10,000
6. Warrensburg, Missouri $10,000
7. Hendersonville, North Carolina $10,000
8. Bellefontaine, Ohio $10,000
9. Winston, Oregon $10,000
10. McDonald, Pennsylvania $10,000
11. Greeneville, Tennessee $10,000
12. Mineral Wells, Texas $10,000
13. Kelso, Washington $10,000
14. Clarendon, Arkansas $5,000
15. Cutler, California $5,000
16. Oakland, California $5,000
17. Sumner, Iowa $5,000
18. Shelbyville, Kentucky $5,000
19. Crane, Missouri $5,000
20. Claremont, New Hampshire $5,000
21. City of Ravenna, Ohio $5,000
22. Estacada, Oregon $5,000
23. City of Socorro, Texas $5,000
24. Navasota, Texas $5,000
25. Palacios, Texas $5,000
26. Heber City, Utah $5,000
27. Lake Delton, Wisconsin $5,000
28. Oshkosh, Wisconsin $5,000
29. Elkins, West Virginia $5,000
At the same time in 2002, Tony launched the Boom Boom HuckJam, a 30-city arena tour featuring the world’s best skateboarders, BMX bike riders and Motocross lunatics performing choreographed routines on a million-dollar ramp system while punk and hip hop music plays.
The hugely successful and massively publicized HuckJam tour has sold out arenas across the country every year since its inception. It was even featured as a Happy Meal at McDonald’s. It is currently entertaining standing-room-only crowds at Six Flags parks across the US.
In March 2007, Tony Hawk’s Big Spin, a skate park themed coaster that spins while riding around the track, revealed their latest roller coaster done by Six Flags Fiesta Texas.
Hawk is one of the founding members of Athletes for Hope, along with 11 other athletes: Andre Agassi, Muhammad Ali, Lance Armstrong, Warrick Dunn, Jeff Gordon, Mia Hamm, Andrea Jaeger, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Mario Lemieux, Alonzo Mourning, and Cal Ripken, Jr. Launched publicly on ABC’s “Good Morning America” and ESPN in April 2007, this charitable institution connects with athletes, individuals and businesses for a cause.
Hawk also owns his own film and TV production company, 900 Films. Tony and his production company, 900 Films, partnered with the Or Die Networks in 2007 to create his own action sport video-sharing site, ShredOrDie.com. It is a site launched in October 23, 2007, where top action sports athletes, filmmakers and everyday users post action sports clips.
Hawk has starred in commercials for Apple Computer, Burger King, Bagel Bites, Got Milk?, GoSnacks, The Colorado Tourism Board, and Domino’s Pizza. Television short appearances are Cyberchase, Rocket Power, Sex and the City, Viva La Bam, Action, Max Steel, Sifl and Olly, The Simpsons, CSI: Miami. In an episode of Punk’d he was tricked and believed that his son had lit an M-80 inside a bathroom and injuring an actress.
Films where he played as himself and in character are The End, Jackass: The Movie, Jackass: Number Two, Deck Dogz, The New Guy, Haggard: The Movie, Max Keeble’s Big Move, The CKY videos, xXx, Lords of Dogtown and Dogtown and Z-Boys. Hawk’s role in Dogtown was an astronaut, who attempts to stand on a skateboard and fails horribly.
Hawk worked as an extra in movies such as Gleaming the Cube and Police Academy 4. He hosted the documentary Video Game Invasion, which was showed on GSN. Hawk and Tom Kenny played the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants to search the world for Gary the Snail. He later guest starred on Hi-Jinks as a prankster andTony has also starred on the MTV show Cribs: Sports Edition, just for smelling bad.
Just recently, Hawk again played himself in the telemovie “Drake & Josh Go Hollywood.” In the fall of 2006, A feature length CGI animation, Tony Hawk in Boom Boom Sabotage was released in DVD.
In July 12, 2006, Hawk was a guest on The Colbert Report. Now, Tony hosts his own talk/music radio show on Sirius Satellite Radio Faction Channel 28, “Tony Hawk Demolition Radio.”
Outlandish Dichotomy: Switching from Skater to a Proud Responsible Parent
Though divorced, Hawk remained to be a proud and actively involved parent. He picks Riley up from school in the middle of shooting engagements. His son, Riley, performed skateboarding stunts for the movie “Max Keeble’s Big Move” and has made numerous television appearances, including an episode of MTV’s Punk’d and Nick at the Nite’s Hi-Jinks with his father.
When his two other sons were born Spencer was already attracted to skateboards. The proud father said he was riding a mini-board around the kitchen. Keegan had a tendency or had proven to be more of a lunatic daredevil when he found him inside the kitchen standing on a chair with an ice pick in one hand, a knife in the other and a small light bulb in his mouth.
Married to Lhotse Merriam in 2005, the couples are currently expecting their first baby girl due in June 2008.
Though he retired at age 31, according to Hawk, in skateboarding it doesn’t mean he stops skating or simply put he stopped competitive skating. He still skates almost every day, learns new tricks, and still does public demos. He was recently voted as the Best Vert Skater by readers of Transworld Skateboarding Magazine.
From the Birdman himself, “I’m pretty happy with the way things turned out. I mean, I never thought that I could make a career out of skateboarding.”