My Biography

Christopher William Hansen's story begins early in 1975 in the great state of Texas. At just after sunrise, Chris was brought into this world, the first and only child of William and Michele Hansen.

San Antonio remained Chris' home for the first year and a half of his life. In August of 1976, his father was transferred to Eglin Air Force Base in Northwest Florida. The family settled in the small town of Shalimar, a place they would live in for the next 14 1/2 years.

Most of Chris' childhood memories can be traced back to the beaches along Florida's Emerald Coast. There he and his parents would often spend their days basking in the sun and fishing into the early hours of the evening. Chris learned early in life the wonders of solitude and the importance of taking life at a casual pace.

Other vivid memories include playing baseball on the community fields, running in the spacious backyard of his home with his dog and love of his life Tippa, mowing yards with his father for extra money, and coming of age with his best friend Mike.

Unexpectedly in January of 1991, one month before Chris' 16th birthday, the family moved to Gainesville, Florida, so that William could take a job at the State Fire College. The adjustment to the new locale was initially very hard for Chris, since he had left behind the only way of life he'd ever known. He went from living in a town of 500 with kids he'd known for years to a much larger town that he'd never visited prior to moving there.

After six months of living in an apartment, the family moved into a house in August of 1991. Chris left a week later for a visit with his grandparents. While Chris was in New York, his parents made the painful decision to put Tippa to sleep. Hurting inside but determined to move into the next phase of his life, Chris began his junior year in high school.

In the next two years he began taking writing much more seriously and buried himself in his work with the school newspaper. He was named Editor in Chief of the paper his senior year and he saw his creative side flourish. But as college beckoned, Chris made the decision to abandon writing for a career in film.

In August of 1993, Chris began college life at Ithaca College, a private and costly school across the gorges from Cornell. Ithaca forced Chris to grow up quickly and he learned how to fend for himself. Unfortunately he didn't have the money to stay long and withdrew from the school in December.

Unsure which direction his life was headed, Chris moved back in with his parents in Gainesville and enrolled in Santa Fe Community College. A year and a half later, after putting himself through school making pizzas, he received his Associate's degree. That was April of 1995 and there was only one place Chris wanted to go…back to where he grew up.

In August 1996, Chris started classes at the University of West Florida in Pensacola, Florida. As a child he had spent many a Saturday in Pensacola shopping at the city's two malls. He knew the area very well and felt at home for the first time since he had left five and a half years before.

He decided on majoring in English with an eye towards becoming a writing instructor. Chris reveled in various workshops and classes in Shakespeare, Chaucer, playwriting and medieval lit. He also took time for psychology classes, getting his minor in the subject. On a rainy Saturday in April 1997, he graduated with his BA in English. The following Monday he started temp work for the State of Florida.

Chris worked all summer and then started grad school at UWF in August. Unable to get into the groove of classes again, he dropped out of UWF in October. Faced with a job paying him barely over minimum wage, Chris looked for other opportunities. In December opportunity came a' knocking.

Sitting at his desk at work, Chris stumbled upon a job opening at his favorite baseball web site, Fastball.com. Deciding to take the risk (and despite his parents' objections), Chris applied for the job. A couple weeks later he was flown to Atlanta for an interview and three days later he was offered the position of producer.

Chris moved to Atlanta in February 1998. Alone in the big city, he endured the growing pains and grew more and more confident in his work. After not knowing any HTML when he started, Chris became the site's top "packager." He built such pieces as Off the Field and Road to the Show and completely overhauled the site's minor league pages.

A year and a half later, Fastball's parent company Cox Interactive Media decided to stop staffing the site. Chris stayed put, taking a position with CIM's network content staff. He helped create a shared sports backbone and then managed the Homes channel for the network's city sites.

Chris moved on to manage other channels and then looked after the relationship CIM had with its sibling Cox properties. He project managed site redesigns for newspaper and television and helped set up cable's local city network. He left the company in the summer of 2002, and now works as a Web Content Specialist for the Georgia Health Partnership portal.

In his spare time, Chris enjoys working out, golfing, traveling, playing video games, socializing with friends and dreaming of one day launching a writing career.