In his curriculum vitae, John Hawkes lists his research interests as geometric measure theory, probability (Lévy processes), and potential theory (probabilistic). In fact, he made significant contributions to all three areas, and there are strong relationships between them. He used both geometric measure theory and potential theory as tools for his study of the trajectories of particular Lévy processes, but in many cases he needed to develop the tool before it was ready to be used. We will summarise his research later, but first we discuss what is known of his life history.