Eric Harris - Encyclopedia Columbine (2024)

Eric David Harris was born on April 9, 1981 in Wichita, Kansas and died on April 20, 1999 in the Columbine High School library at the age of 18. Eric was the youngest of two sons born to Kathy and Wayne Harris. At the time of his death, Eric's older brother, Kevin Harris, was 21 years old.

On April 20, 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 students and one teacher at Columbine High School and directly injured twenty-one people. Their plan was to explode two 4.5-gallon LPG (propane) canisters in the cafeteria and shoot survivors as they fled. When their bombs failed to detonate, they stormed the school with two sawn-off shotguns, a 9mm semi-automatic Hi-Point rifle, and an Intratec DC9M semi-automatic pistol.

Eric was a "military brat"

Eric's father was an Air Force pilot, which meant his family had to move frequently. They moved to Dayton, Ohio in 1983; they moved to Oscoda, Michigan in 1989; they moved to Plattsburgh, New York in 1992; and settled in Littleton Colorado in 1993. These frequent moves had a negative impact on Eric and he lamented in his writings about always having to start over as the new kid in school.

While stationed in Plattsburgh, New York, and having achieved the title of Major, Wayne Harris was forced to retire because of cutbacks that closed the Plattsburgh base. A Colorado native, Wayne moved his family to Littleton, Colorado in July 1993. The Harris family rented an apartment until 1996 when they purchased their home on South Reed Street.

Eric's life before moving to Colorado

Before his family moved to Colorado, Eric had a normal life and plenty of friends he enjoyed spending time with outdoors. His friends from Plattsburgh, NY have fond memories of Eric.

Although he didn't consider himself an athlete, Eric grew up playing soccer and started playing baseball in Plattsburgh, NY. Although he was good confident at playing soccer, he was an exceptionally timid baseball player and often refused to swing at pitches. His coach, Terry Condo, said, "he was afraid to strike out and let his teammates down. It struck me as him really wanting to fit in."

Eric's new life begins in Colorado

After moving to Colorado, Eric began attending Ken Caryl middle school in 1993, where he met Dylan Klebold long before the pair discussed their desire for death and destruction. Although Eric was smart, he wasn't in the gifted program (CHIPS) like Dylan.

In junior high, Eric became interested in computers and computer games.

When the Harris' moved into their new home on S. Reed Street in 1996, Eric got a sweet deal by having the basem*nt as his bedroom. He lined his shelves with boxes of fireworks and a mini car collection. A KMFDM poster was taped to the ceiling.

Parents

Eric's friend Kevin Hofstra said Eric's parents wouldn't let him or his brother hang out with friends until their homework was completed. Eric's friends always had nice things to say about his parents, including Derek Holliday, who graduated in 1996. "His parents were always 100% awesome to me," he said. "The Harris' are great parents."

Eric loved animals

Eric was particularly fond of animals and loved the family dog - a Yorkshire terrier named Sparky. Sparky suffered from seizures and Eric's friends said he was always concerned.

Sophom*ore year at Columbine High School

While attending Columbine High School, Eric would often walk to school with his neighbor and classmate, Sarah Pollock. She remembers him being a nice kid, very polite, but a bit "preppy" and a "dork."

Eric was well-liked at first

It wasn't until his sophom*ore year that Eric began to have problems at school with other students treating him poorly and administrators who allowed the mistreatment to continue.

Friends noticed a change in Eric during his sophom*ore year. One classmate, Ryan Whisenhut, said Eric liked him freshman year and stopped talking to him sophom*ore year. "He just sort of changed," Ryan said. "He gave you this look like he could kill you."

Blackjack Pizza

At the end of their sophom*ore year, Eric and Dylan started working at Blackjack Pizza where they spent slow nights setting off fireworks and homemade explosives behind the store with co-workers, including manager Kim Carlin. Although, most of the time the explosives were relatively harmless dry ice bombs. The store's owner, Bob Kirgis, often participated.

"We used to make dry ice balls behind the store," said Carlin. "You just put dry ice and hot water in a 2-liter bottle. It just shoots up. We stole a cone one time when they did road construction in the parking lot. We would see how high we could shoot the cone."

While Eric kept the explosives at work harmless, sometime around July 4, 1997, Dylan brought a pipe bomb into work and was written up. Not long after, Dylan quit.

Eric worked as a cook earning $7.65/hour. Fast forward to April 16, 1999 - four days before the massacre - when Eric was promoted to shift manager by the new owner, Chris Lau. With his promotion came a $200 advance for his March 8-April 18 pay period, which he used to fund supplies for the massacre.

TCM associates who worked at Blackjack Pizza:

• Brian Sargent
• Charles (Chuck) Phillips
• Chris Morris
• Nate Dykeman
• Phil Duran
• Robert Perry
• Zach Heckler

The bullying started sophom*ore year

At work, Eric often complained of being bullied. His co-workers and classmates, Kim Carlin and Sara Arbogast, couldn't figure out why people didn't like Eric. "No one ever gave him a chance," Kim said. "People always looked at me because I would go over and hug him in the morning."

Sara never saw Eric being harassed, but she saw people give Eric weird looks and figured it was because he was now dressing in black cargo pants and black t-shirts. Eric and Sara had a fun friendship, and he would always call Sarah "Ohzay bobo," a funny phrase he got from the comedy Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.

Both Sara and Kim enjoyed Eric's company and thought he was cute. When Eric complained about looking stupid in his senior photos, Sara and Kim told him he was cute and helped him choose his prints. However, when they invited him to hang out or go bowling, Eric often declined because he felt like he wouldn't fit in with the rest of their friends.

During junior year, on homecoming night, Eric went with Kim, Sara, and some other friends to the Old Spaghetti Factory in downtown Denver. When Kim and Sara came to pick up Eric, his mom wasn't home yet and he didn't want her to worry about him being gone. He made them wait about ten minutes until she came home so he could tell her where he was going.

Junior year at Columbine High School

When his junior year ended, Eric worked at Tortilla Wraps in Southwest Plaza Mall until September 1998 with Nate Dykeman and Chad Laughlin. His shift supervisor, David Cave (also a CHS student) described Eric as a "really good worker" and nice to the customers. He said Eric was quiet and never lost his temper at work.

Cave said Eric always dressed appropriately for work and it was Nate Dykeman who wore his black trench coat to work. Nate was promoted to shift manager, but quickly demoted for closing the store two hours early. Nate claimed he closed the store because he was dehydrated.

Senior year at Columbine High School