In the early 1940s, Carter (Hawkman) Hall and Shiera (Hawkgirl) Saunders met Perry Carter. An acquaintanceship based originally on the similarity of names developed into a close friendship. What the Hawks did not at first realize was Perry Carter's point of origin, the planet Thanagar. He was Paran Katar, an agent of Thanagar sent to study this active source of radio signals called Earth.
Perry was eventually brought into the Hawks confidence, and he soon realized that the "ninth metal" that powered their wings was really an ancient technological secret his people had run across before. He developed the process and left for home in 1943, returning in 1947 for another tour of duty. When the Hawks retired, he invited them to his planet. They went with him in 1951. There they met Paran Katar's son, Katar Hol, conceived during the 1943 visit home. The Hawks stayed on Thanagar for five years, finally returning home. Inspired by the bond between Paran Katar and his son, they decided they had waited long enough to have a family and after some effort (they were, after all, in their 40s by this time) their son Hector was born.
In 1963, the same year Hector was born, Katar Hol and his new wife Shayera (named after Shiera by a friend of Paran Katar's) arrived in pursuit of a Thanagarian criminal. Since the Halls were busy raising a new son, they asked the Thanagarians to step in and take up the slack of the Hawkman heritage. This they did for 15 years, serving with both the JLA and JSA, until unsettling turmoil in Thanagar forced them to return home. When they returned home (1978 on Earth) they started their own family. Their first born was a daughter, Triana, who shared her parents' interest in archaeology and is now married to the human archaeologist also known as Templar..