Tim Baker's profile on Shane Herring ran in the May 2005 issue of Australia's Surfing Life magazine. This version has been slightly edited. * * * I first met Shane when he was a barely pubescent 15-year-old at Grajagan, Indonesia. I’d never heard of him, but marveled at this tiny kid who jumped straight off the boat and paddled determinedly into thumping eight-to-10-foot reef-bottom barrels. It ...
Tim Baker's profile on Shane Herring ran in the August 1992 issue of Australia's Surfing Life. This version has been slightly edited. * * * Legendary Dee Why surf photographer Peter Crawford was frantic. "Where's Shane? Twenty of the Dee Why boys are downstairs and they won't let 'em in," he reported. It was 10:00 pm on the Sunday of Shane Herring's historic Coke Classic win and the Dee Why lad ...
The Stomp was an American-launched dance craze that made it to every rock-loving nation in the world during the early 1960s. It was described as "the world's easiest dance"—something you could learn in 30 seconds. Also attractive to stomp-happy teens who filled the dance halls was the sheer noise produced by the dance, as dozens or even hundreds of kids would smash their feet down in unison, right...
Renny Yater's take on the Hollister Ranch and the origins of the Ranch-privileged Santa Barbara Surf Club originally appeared in the Summer 2002 issue of the Surfer's Journal, as part of much longer feature titled "Loner: California's Reclusive Trim Master, Reynolds Yater, Tells His Story." The text below has been slightly edited. * * * Here’s what happened up there. Clinton Hollister [grandson ...
This article ran in the New York Times Sunday Magazine, on November 15, 1998. * * * About a million California surfers don't own land on the private and utterly sublime Hollister Ranch, located on Point Conception, just up from Santa Barbara, Calif. A hundred do. That ratio helps explain why Ranch surfers are so often described in impolite terms—as self-indulgent trust-fund brats, bloodsucking be...
“The Super Short, Uptight, V-Bottom, Tube Carving Plastic Machines and Other Assorted Short Subjects,” by Drew Kampion, ran in the September 1968 issue of SURFER. The version has been slightly edited. * * * If nothing else were to occur in surfing for the remainder of this year, if 1968 were to end tomorrow, then it would still be the most productive year in surfing’s history. This has been the...
The following is an excerpt from Morning Glass, Mike Doyle's 1993 autobiography. While Doyle refers to the 1965 contest as the Peruvian International—which it was—it doubled as the second World Surfing Championships. * * * In January 1965, I traveled with twelve other surfers from the Long Beach Surf Club to Lima, Peru, to compete in the Peruvian International. Our team was sponsored by Catalina...
“The Great Nose Riding Contest,” by Tom Morey, ran in the Summer 1994 issue of The Surfer’s Journal. This version has been slightly edited. * * * The Tom Morey Invitational. This is a docile little story about a small-time surfing event three decades ago in seldom visited Ventura. The waves were poor and few could even hear announcements over the cheap PA system. Yet even so, much of what surfi...
“The Adventures of a Ranch Addict,” by Ron Stoner, ran in the November 1968 issue of SURFER. This version has been slightly edited. * * * This is a story about one of those places that always looks better on the other side of the hill. I’ve been there, and believe me, it is. After one trip and seeing those perfect waves, I was hooked. I couldn’t stay away. I only wish my trips had been as flawle...
This article by Dick LaRue ran in the July 1972 issue of SURFER. One year earlier, the first Ranch parcels were put on the market. For over a century before that, the Hollister Ranch, with its eight-plus miles of beachfront housing some of the best surf in America, had been privately held and virtually inaccessible to the public. LaRue, noted below as the "ranch manager," worked for the Mortage Gu...