*~*John was born on December 5, 1965.
*~*He was an orphan by the time he was 15 years old.
*~*Before he became an orphan, he lived in a "tightly knit" community in Buffalo.
*~*He grew up on the corner of Clark and Kent Streets; as kids he and his four older sisters called it "Superman Corner."
*~*When his mailman father and school teacher mother died within a year of each other (his father of alcoholism; his mother, according to him, of loneliness), John's life took a dramatic turn.
*~*He got an apartment on his own and started hanging out with "shady people." Rzeznik was the only "punk" (he says) at Buffalo's McKinley Vocational High School, where he studied to be a plumber.
*~*He made himself a target with a mohawk and a penchant for everything from the Cure to Depeche Mode to the Damned and the Replacements.
*~*John is married to an ex-model named Laurie, about whom he wrote some of his songs about.
*~*Johnny has been with the band since the beginning. He was playing in a band called the Beaumonts (with Robby's cousin) when he was picked up by Robby and George to form the Sex Maggots (who became the Goo Goo Dolls). He was attending a vocational school as an aspiring plumber when the band formed.
Many thanks to Alex of The World of Goo for the information!!