Early Life
Hackman was born in San Bernardino, California, the son of Lyda (née Gray) and Eugene Ezra Hackman. He has a brother, Richard. According to a plaque in a city park, he worked for a time as a dog catcher for the local animal shelter. His family moved frequently, finally settling in Danville, Illinois, where they lived in the house of his English-born maternal grandmother, Beatrice. Hackman's father operated the printing press for the Commercial-News, a local paper. Hackman's parents divorced in 1943 and his father subsequently left the family.
Gene lived briefly in Storm Lake, Iowa and his sophomore home room photograph is in the 1945 Storm Lake High School "Breeze" year-book. At the age of sixteen, Hackman left home to join the United States Marine Corps, where he served four-and-a-half years as a field radio operator. After his discharge, he moved to New York, working in several minor jobs. His mother died in 1962 as a result of a fire she accidentally set while smoking.
Read more about this topic: Gene Hackman
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or life:
“Probably more than youngsters at any age, early adolescents expect the adults they care about to demonstrate the virtues they want demonstrated. They also tend to expect adults they admire to be absolutely perfect. When adults disappoint them, they can be critical and intolerant.”
—The Lions Clubs International and the Quest Nation. The Surprising Years, I, ch.4 (1985)
“Most of a modest woman’s life was spent, after all, in denying what, in one day at least of every year, was made obvious.”
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)