A letter from Matt Warshaw, Executive Director of Encyclopedia of Surfing. Hello surfers and all lovers of surf culture. The 2022 Encyclopedia of Surfing fundraiser is ON (December 12 - 21), and if that alone is enough to trigger the philanthropic reflex, click here to donate and here to subscribe or buy a gift sub. Big plans are afoot for EOS in 2023, and we'll get to that in a moment, but firs...
"Amplified," by Matt Warshaw, ran in the January 1989 issue of SURFER. This version has been slightly edited. * * * Two months ago in these pages, Richie Collins seemed to give a dying era the final boot when he said, “I’m not a soul surfer—I only surf for competition.” Maybe he means it. Maybe he just understands good copy. Twenty-year-old surfers, by tradition, have had little use for subtlety...
Elliot Teaford's article on Ocean Pacific's decision to drop the women's event from the upcoming Op Pro Surfing Championships ran in the May 5, 1989, issue of the Los Angeles Times. A backlash followed, and the women's event was quietly reinstated. * * * The Op Pro Surfing Championships, the annual summer showcase for the world’s top surfers held in Huntington Beach, have dropped their concurren...
"They Look Alike, The Surf Alike: Jorja and Jolene Smith Compete on the Pro Surfing Tour, but Not Against Each Other—They're in This Thing Together," by Sarah Smith, ran in the August 28, 1986, issue of the Los Angeles Times. This version has been slightly edited. * * * Jorja and Jolene Smith of San Clemente are starting only their second year on the women’s professional surfing tour, but they h...
Russ Spencer’s profile on Kemp Aaberg ran in the Summer 1999 issue of Surfer’s Journal. This version has been slightly edited. * * * Kemp Aaberg paddled by in the steel blue light, the body still ropy and confident at 58, head down in concentration. A serious early-evening fog had settled onto Rincon, lending the chest-high waves a diffuse perfection, as if they had been created in a factory som...
Nick Carroll's profile on Danny Wills ran December 1998 issue of Australia's Surfing Life. This version has been slightly edited. * * * He could be world champion. Does anybody really get it? That Danny Wills could be the world champion? The list of names is enough, maybe. Peter Townend. Shaun Tomson. Wayne Bartholomew. Mark Richards. Tom Carroll. Tom Curren. Barton Lynch. Martin Potter. Damien...
Matt Warshaw's feature on the history of surfing in the movies ran in the Winter 1998 issue of Surfer's Journal. This version has been slightly edited. * * * The Bridge Theater audience pulled together for the San Francisco premier of In God’s Hands and turned the evening into a minor event, the high point coming about mid-way through TriStar’s handsome and thoroughly boneheaded film, when a lov...
Marc Rubel's Big Wednesday review ran in Surfing magazine's February 1980 issue, which was itself a review of the 1970s. This version has been slightly edited. * * * For the 1970s, the dream went something like this: A major Hollywood motion picture about surfing would take the country by storm, putting the nation's youth back on the Gidget track of surf fever. Soon no self-respecting kid, no ma...
Janet Maslin's review for Big Wednesday ran in the July 28, 1978, issue of the New York Times. * * * It wasn't very long ago that John Milius's expensive, ambitious "Big Wednesday" was one of the more widely touted movies on the horizon, so what's it doing sneaking into Flagship theaters for only a weeklong run? The honorable thing, that's what. "Big Wednesday" isn't even a tiny fraction of what...
"Is Surfing Hip?" by Sam George, ran in the June 1998 issue of Surfer. This version has been slightly edited. * * * In a world of MTV Sports, X Games and Mountain Dew commercials, with Spandexed sky divers hopping out of planes with video cameras on their heads, with brain-dead bungee-jumpers falling off bridges for fun, with gang-baggy, shambling skaters scraping up against greasy parking lot p...