Mark Harmon's Real Name: Thomas Mark Harmon

Quick answer: Mark Harmon's documented full name is Thomas Mark Harmon. The Los Angeles Times Hollywood Star Walk and Biography.com both record that form and date his birth to September 2, 1951, in Burbank, California (Los Angeles Times; Biography.com).

Real name and early life

He is known professionally as Mark Harmon. Both sources name his parents as Tom Harmon, a Heisman Trophy-winning football player and later a sports broadcaster, and Elyse Knox, a film actress. Biography.com says he was the youngest of three children and later the starting quarterback at UCLA for two seasons, graduating with a degree in communications in 1974. The Times likewise calls him UCLA's star quarterback. He turned down professional football offers, briefly considered law school, and began acting after a walk-on role on Ozzie's Girls (1972–73), which Biography.com traces to a family connection with the Nelsons.

Career highlights

Jack Webb helped him land a guest spot on Adam-12, Biography.com says, and he received an Emmy nomination for the 1977 television film Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years. A leading role on the prime-time soap Flamingo Road (1981–82) followed. In 1983 he joined St. Elsewhere as plastic surgeon Dr. Robert (Bobby) Caldwell; the Times and Biography.com both note that the character was written off after contracting AIDS, a plot Harmon supported as a way to challenge assumptions about the disease. He later played Ted Bundy in the television film The Deliberate Stranger. The Times dates his People magazine "Sexiest Man Alive" title to 1986, as does Biography.com's later narrative, though that site's opening summary says 1985. Film leads included Summer School (1987), The Presidio (1988), with Sean Connery, and Stealing Home (1988). He returned to series television on Reasonable Doubts and Chicago Hope, then earned another Emmy nomination in 2002 as Secret Service agent Simon Donovan on The West Wing. The Times and Biography.com both record that in 1996 he used a sledgehammer to free two teenagers from a wrecked vehicle near his home. In 2003 he was cast as Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs on NCIS, a JAG spin-off that both sources describe as a top-rated network drama drawing more than 20 million viewers a week.

Name notes for searchers

Thomas Mark Harmon is the documented full name; the professional name is Mark Harmon. Searchers looking for UCLA's former quarterback, the doctor on St. Elsewhere, or Gibbs on NCIS are usually aiming at the same person.