According to Britannica, Ridgway was born on February 18, 1949, in Salt Lake City, Utah. His father worked as a bus driver, while his mother was a sales clerk. In 1960 the family moved to the Pacific Northwest, taking up residence in the city of SeaTac, Washington. 

His home life was far from perfect. According to A&E, Ridgway’s parents often argued. Ridgway also suffered from urinary incontinence until he was a teenager. He later alleged that his mother would berate him and wash him inappropriately when this occurred. Coincidentally, bedwetting is a part of the MacDonald Triad, a set of traits once used to assist in profiling serial killers which also included harming animals and setting fires. Ridgway reportedly did all three.

As a teenager, Ridgway stabbed a neighborhood child, with the victim later testifying that Ridgway’s words to him following the attack were, “I always wanted to know what it felt like to kill somebody.”

Still, those who knew Ridgway after as a kid wouldn’t recall anything particularly unusual about him. His high school football coach described him to the Tacoma News Tribune as “A somewhat smallish kid. Wispy hair. Nondescript.”