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Surf
History. |
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Below is some info to give you a taster of the
history of surfing.. and some of the legends that have made surfing what it is today. |
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Regarding the south coast
"It needed a brave spirit to tote a surf board around the
South coast in the late 50s/early 60s. It provoked mirth. After
all 'everyone knows there is no surf in the South of England'
!!! It took an even braver soul to try and take a board on a
bus.
There was one unexpected source of rare waves in those days:
the Atlantic liners. The original Queen Mary and Queen
Elizabeth, together with the American equivalents, would just be
starting to speed up as they headed out towards the Nab Tower.
Their sailing times would be given in a local paper. If their
transit coincided with a Spring low tide on Southsea beach there
would be several bow waves that were still 1 or 2 feet high by
the time they arrived. They were a kind of micro Severn Bore for
optimists. I managed to ride them on a couple of occasions (and
failed more often) It would be a paddle out until about level
with the end of South Parade Pier. and then a long careful ride
in. It needed a big board to stay with it.I have a feeling that
today's big container ships are subject to more severe speed
restrictions. It is forgotten just how fast those liners were.
They could be doing 25-30 knots as they headed out of Spithead".
Words from Peter. Sent in by Mark
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'This board would have been
about 1962. The board was built by Rob Jewell. He was only in his teens when
he built it and it was a superb bit of carpentry. I believe it is still
in his family, somewhere.' Words from Peter. Sent in by Mark
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My uncle's surf wagon. He moved to Wales
in the early 60's and bought this Austin hearse as a surf wagon!
He
left Portsmouth with his new wife and dropped out of society, smoked
home grown and surfed and bummed around Wales discovering breaks. In the
summer would surf for the crowds on the beach in a purple felt trilby!
"Above" Pictures of some of his home
made boards from when he was a teenager! Sent in by Mark.
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Surf Wagons from the 60's here |
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"Bilbo ... a name from the era of British soul
surfing" |
BILBO .... the genesis of a
life-style |
The story of Bilbo is very much the story of the
early history of British
Surfing. The genesis of the Bilbo surfboard becoming synonymous with the
discovery of a new fun ocean life-style being forged on the beaches of
Britain in the Sixties.
The early development of surfing in Great Britain was
crucially influenced
by the time spent, money invested and ethos shared by all those involved in
the Bilbo clan.
By the late sixties it was like a tribe with its shapers, laminators, shop
workers and competition team all innovating, working hard, having fun and
surfing at every chance. |
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The following is very much their story:-
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In the year of 1962 in Cornwall, two Newquay
lifeguards were making their
entry into the world of wave riding, firstly on wave skis, then hollow
wooden paddleboards. They'd heard of 'malibus', a new modern surfboard idea
originating from California, with a foam core covered by fibreglass, but
never seen one .......that is until McDonald hit town!
The American, Doug McDonald, impressed Bailey with
his surfing skill and
good advice. He was on his way home to the States and offered his
Californian built 10'6'' foam and fibreglass Bragg surfboard for sale.
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Bill bought the board and his yellow Ford van too!
Now he was a surfer with
a mobile home in which he could live at the beach. The first, but by no
means the last in the following decades!
Within days of this event four young Australian
life-savers, one of them Bob
Head, turned up on the beach at Great Western with newly built surfboards
manufactured by Barry Bennett in Sydney.
Once the local lifeguards Bailey and Wilson had seen
the Aussies in action
in the waves their sole aim was to obtain similar boards. Their only real
option was to make them! |
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Bailey the technical minded craftsman was plotting
the next move. After much
experimentation he succeeded in producing foam blanks that would enable
modern surfboard production to commence. |
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Bill Bailey started producing his custom model boards
in a Newquay garage in
1963, and Bob Head quite separately was making his 'Friendly Bear'
surfboards in a chicken shack up the coast. |
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Everything built was bought immediately by a new
audience of aspiring
British surfers hungry to ride the waves. Surf fever had begun to hit
Britain! |
Bob Head proved himself to be the finest surfer seen
in British waters at
that time and he and the three other Aussies gave many exhibitions of
surfing at Watergate Bay and Tolcarne beach in Newquay, popularising the
sport in the publics eye. |
In 1965 Bill Bailey, Bob Head, Doug Wilson and
Plymouth businessman Freddy
Blight who had experimented building a couple of boards for his sons,
decided to join forces as a company dedicated to advancing the development
of surfing in Europe. The name Bilbo was born, derived from the Christian
names of Bill Bailey and Bob Head. |
Production of Bilbo surfboards started in the spring
of 1965 in temporary
buildings at Pargolla Road in Newquay. Over the next few years new buildings
were erected and by 1970 the factory at Pargolla Road had grown to become
one of the finest surfboard factories in the world. The shaping rooms were
custom built, including such refined features as dust extraction, profile
lighting and central heating. There were separate finishing rooms for
glassing, sanding, glossing and polishing. |
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Bilbo had diversified to also produce quality
skateboard decks fitted with
imported U.S. Hobie trucks with clay wheels. This marked the very beginning
of skateboarding in Britain!
In the spring of 1967 the door was opened to the
public at the Bilbo Surf
Shop on the Station Forecourt Newquay, marking the first fully stocked
dedicated surf shop in the country. |
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A year later a further Bilbo shop was opened in
Mumbles in south Wales
managed by top Team Rider Dave Friar. The hunger for information andsurfboards from the newly emerging mass of Welsh wave riders had to be fed! |
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Most of the products sold at the shops were designed
by Bilbo and
manufactured in the United Kingdom. One good example was the first purpose
designed surfing wetsuits produced by the newly formed GUL Wetsuits were
originally sold exclusively through the Bilbo outlets. |
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Under the brand name of Big Gun, Doug Wilson started
a company to produce
surfwear including shorts, jackets and T-shirts for sale through the Bilbo
Shops, marking the start of distinctive clothing for British surfers to
wear. |
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Big Gun eventually became the manufacturer under
licence of Hang Ten from
Long Beach in California, the most famous American surf clothing company of
the time.
Many of the best designs produced for Bilbo at the time never reached the
surfing market due to the lack of close register silk screen printing
facilities. However many of the designs and ideas created by Bilbo still set
the standards for present day surfwear. |
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During these formative years Bilbo was a breeding
ground of talent; for many
individuals, in the factory, shop or competition team who would grow with
surfing to become innovators in the world of surfing in their own right.
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The factory always welcomed visiting surfers, such as
international stars
Rodney Sumpter, Keith Paull and Bob Cooper, plus many lesser-known others
who passed on their travelled knowledge and adventures to the local
workforce. |
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Production shaper Chris Jones grew to become one of
the most experienced
custom shapers in Europe, having earlier contributed enormously to the
introduction and development of shortboard designs in the late sixties.
Shop-worker Paul Holmes evolved via Tracks 'the surf paper' in Australia to
become editor of Surfer magazine in California, where he pioneered the
introduction of a surf programme to US network TV. Competition Team member
and occasional shaping room cleaner Roger Mansfield progressed to pioneer
the development of the surf school concept in Europe in the early Eighties. |
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Bilbo was very much about open communication and
constant innovation. |
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Many of the techniques pioneered at the Bilbo factory
were passed on to the
general surfing community as it grew, enabling other similar manufacturing
ventures to start up in different parts of the country. |
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It is in this light that Bilbo can claim to be the
singlemost influential
force in the development of British surfing and it is through their Pioneering efforts that the sport of surfing has become so well established
in the UK. |
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Then as now, Bilbo is an original and authentic force
for quality, both in
the waves and in the world of surfing. |
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"Bilbo ... a name from the era of British soul
surfing" |
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Text written by Roger
Mansfield/www.bilbosurf.com |
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A few words from Matt 'buffalo'
Hammersley |
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My family own the porth sands holiday flats
and the blue doored garages there, they were the site of the first ever
surfboard factory in the uk |
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It was Bill and Bob who founded bilbo, they
had a factory there. the defunked wavelength magazine FSO ( for surfers
only) has a photo and write up in issue one, they then went onto to Pargola
road to start the full time factory properly as mentioned above. |
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The first two garages have just been
demolished for the new building of the porth sands holiday flats, but the
last two, finishing and glossing, are being kept intact with a view for a
'blue' plaque to be erected to tell of their heritage and use. |
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I still own a board we believe was made
there. The board i have mentioned is a 10 foot bilbo/bickers pre 63' with a
hatchet fin on the tail similar to the boards ridden by phil edwards, velzy,
jacobs, vanartstalen etc in the early 60's. no logos but roger cooper recons
he knew when the board was made as it has a slight twist in it due to early
lighting in the garages being not quite
level when the blank was shaped, and hence the slight twist....it still
surfs great though! |
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The Seven Bore words by Matt 'buffalo'
Hammersley |
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'Severn Bore' and the surfing there, its a
huge part of the uk surf scene and uk surfing heritage. I have been surfing
it for over 12 years myself and 26 years surfing in the uk.
Rod Sumpter had the original record for world distance surfing there, it
featured in the surf film ''the pure outer-most limits of fun'' in the 70's
and has seen countless surfers world wide having a go to beat the record,
namely Steve king, Dave Lawson, Guts Griffiths, James Jones, the gill, Pj,
the Malloy brothers and most recently several very famous Hawaiians, South
Africans and Aussies!!!......our own Steve king still holds the record at 7
miles! my personal record is 4 and 3/4 miles.
It was first surfed by 'mad' Jack Churchill, brother of Winston Churchill,
who had just returned from Australia after the second world war! one of the
first surfers in the uk!!! he rode it for 1/2 mile at 'stonebench'...the
worlds first unofficial surfing distance record, and it even has a roman
temple (now in ruins) to the river godess sabrina - the local surf crews
name for the river still - as the wave drowned a legion of roman soldiers
trying to cross the river, as the river goddess rode her chariot up the
river on the face of the wave screaming at them - we think it must have been
a local fisherwoman in her corrical out of control being bounced along the
face of a big wave. |
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Some California History. |
 Click
to enlarge.
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This Hobie "Phil Edwards" Model decal
(above) came with my board when it was purchased from "Chapter Surf Shop in Braunton
North Deven UK" around 1990. The board was said to be one of the last that Phil
Edwards shaped before he damaged his elbow at home whilst working on a toilet! Apparently
after he had surgery on it, he had trouble holding the plainer properly so he only made a
few boards since. It was used once and taken back to the shop as it was "too
fast"! It is a 9'6" nose rider with a channelled nose which runs back about two
3rds of the board. With a 1" balsa stringer it really is a work of art... Phil
Edwards was born on 10th of June 1939 and became known in 1953 he was just a kid when he
rode "Killer Dana" he cruised around on a 13ft wave and made it look easy when
some of the locals were having trouble. He grew up surfing with names like the late, Miki
"Da Cat" Dora 1934 -2002, surfing with a unique style that many other surfers
tried to copy. In 1963 he was voted the worlds number 1 surfer from a readers pole in
"Surfer" magazine. He was also the first person to ride
"Pipeline"........ |
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This Hobie
Phil Edwards 9'6" longboard pictured is now Sold
More Board pics here |
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Hobie Alter, was among the best
surfers he opened the first surf shop in southern California and employed some of the best
shapers of the time like of course Phil Edwards, together they invented the famous Hobie
catamaran, which became a big sport called boat surfing. Hobie was also one of the best if
not the best at tandem surfing.
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On the left is the surfers poll showing the worlds best surfers from
Surfer Magazine 1963.
Click photo to enlarge. |
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Recently I have been talking to Denny "The River
Rat" Waller, he surfed in the "Dave Sweet" surf team up against big names
like Dewey Weber,Corky Carroll and Mark Martinson etc; He also managed the Dave Sweet surf
shop for a number of years. |
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Denny Waller in his words,......
'I
am intending to go down as the last dinosaur in the sport. Not only have I only ridden
boards with single fins and at least 9' in length, I also have a virgin ankle (never been
leashed), ride only on paraffin wax, shun the use of rubber, and wear my surf trunks at
mid thigh only. It worked in the 50's and 60's........it works now!' |
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For more information on Denny Waller, a master of
riding a surfboard backwards check out his website www.hawaiian.net/~neptoon |
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Above are a few of the bits I have
about my house starting at the top a Cal bus timetable from the 70's, Surfer magazine from
60's,70's & 80's. Everything along the bottom is from the 60's inc these price lists
from, Rick surfboards, Jacks surf shop, and Shore surfboards at this time Jacks surf shop
was at Anaheim, California rather than in Huntington beach, Shore and Rick were both from
Hermosa Beach. These were the days when you could get a longboard for about $120 - $140
and you could have T-bands using a 3"Balsa stringer for an extra $10....2 film schedules one from John Severson promoting his film 'Angry Sea' and one from Bruce
Brown presenting 'Water Logged' and finally a poster for Bruce Browns Slippery When Wet. |
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Nat Young 2000 |
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This is a pic of me (looking a bit rough after
spending the night on the beach) with Nat Young (The Animal) taken June 2000 he was in
the uk to sell a book on surf rage. Nat has done more for surfing than I have space for on
this site! enough said.. |
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Jeff Clark & Mavericks 2002. |
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Me with Jeff Clark |
Mavericks is said to be the most
dangerous big wave spots in the world partly to do with the jagged rock bottom and
treacherous currents, not to mention it's pretty much in the middle of Great White Shark
breeding ground. Jeff Clark pictured (left with me 2002) was the first person to ever surf
Mavericks the year was 1975 and it was 15 years before anyone joined him in the cold
merkey waters.
Mavericks named by Jeff Clark, is today considered one of the most challenging waves in
the world. The wave can be found at Pillar Point, Half Moon Bay, California. To read more
about the Ledgend Jeff Clark Click on link.
http://www.maverickssurf.com/jeffclark.html
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Mavericks at Low tide and with little swell!! |
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If
you have anything to add to this page just email it to us. |
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