Archive Note
Gill Montie was born in Traverse City, Michigan, on December 18, 1954, grew up between Detroit, Chicago, and Southern California, and started tattooing by hand in 1969. He served in the Marine Corps in the early 1970s and apprenticed in Southern California in 1974 under a tattooer remembered as Doc Dog. After working in Daytona Beach, Florida, he left in 1989 and opened Tattoo Mania on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, which became one of the best-known tattoo shops in Los Angeles and an early workplace for artists including Mark Mahoney. He co-produced the Inkslingers' Ball convention and became a featured artist for Sullen Clothing. The Sunset Strip shop still operates under later ownership; Montie himself now runs Gill Montie's Tattoo Mania in Palm Bay, Florida.