Tony Hawk was born on May 12, 1968 in San Diego, California to Nancy and Frank (d. 1995) Hawk. He has two sisters, Lenore and Patricia and one brother Steve. [Note: His father, upset with the way skating was being organized, helped create and organize the California Amateur Skateboard League and later the National Skateboard Association.

As a kid, Tony loved to do everything. He would go everywhere, and do just about anything, many times to the chagrin of his parents. He was never scared to try anything new and was determined to any task he set his mind to. He was very smart, and even was placed in an advanced class in elementary school.

In 1977, the future of skateboarding, as we know had its roots when Tony’s brother Steve gave him his first “skateboard,” a blue fiberglass Bahne board. Even from the early age of nine, it was apparent that he was very good at what he was doing.

With the help of his father, he practiced almost every waking of the day he was not in school (he attended Torry Pines High School, Del Mar, California). They built ramps to help him with his skills. His father would drive, sometimes hundreds of miles, so that Tony could enter skating competitions in other cities.

In 1980, Tony became sponsored by Dogtown Skateboards and turned professional two years later. By 1984, at age 16, he was ranked #1 amongst all skaters.

In 1990 he married Cindy Dunbar. They had a son, Hudson Riley Hawk in 1992. He was named after Tony’s ancestor, Hudson Riley, the explorer that discovered the Hudson River.

The Early 1990’s were very lean years for Tony and skating. The industry dried up, and the sport hit a low in popularity. In 1992, he also divorced Cindy. He tried to bounce back by forming his own skateboard company, Birdhouse Projects with skateboarder Per Welinder. By the mid-1990’s he was going to get out of the skateboarding business altogether.

Just before he called it quits, the popularity of skateboarding exploded out of nowhere and Tony was at the forefront of it. He began selling skating gear at an unprecedented rate and started to market himself to the new generation of skaters. This included doing advertisements and various promotions around the country. By the end of 1996, he was at the top of the sport and married once again – this time to Erin Lee. In 1998, he began a clothing line marketed to young skaters called Hawk Clothing (sold to Quicksilver in 2000), then reached god-like status amongst skating enthusiasts when Activision released the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater video game for PlayStation. The first game and all of its successors have been huge successes for playing and for profit.

He also wrote an autobiography, HAWK: Occupation Skateboarder, which was a national bestseller.

In 1999, his wife gave birth to his second son, Spencer. His third son, Keegan was born two years later, in 2001. [Note: He divorced Erin in 2004, but remains an active father]

Tony “retired” from competitive skating in 1991. After winning 72 out of 103 competitions (a percentage no one has even come close to, including 6 gold medals at the ESPN X-Games) and coming in second in 19 of the remaining contests, he goes down as the greatest skateboarder of all time. In one of his last competitions, he successfully performed a 900 – the first person to do so and accomplished since by a very select few. However, he is not out of skating. He is very involved in the industry and its promotion. Even his video games are some of the most popular each year. But now he can balance his business life with being a father. 

Some of his promotions included the creation of the Boom Boom HuckJam, an annual event started in 2002, in which the best skateboarders, BMX riders and Motocross riders performed in a country-wide tour. Part of his time is spent working with his self-named charity, the Tony Hawk Foundation, in which money is given to non-profit organizations in low income areas to build public skating parks. 

Credit: popstarsplus.com