History of Surfing: From Polynesia to the Present

Surfing as we know it today likely began around 1000 AD with the Polynesians. It quickly became a mainstay of the Polynesian culture with everyone from peasants to kings getting involved. The history of surfboards begins with the paipo, the alaia, and the olo for royalty.

James Cook, an 18th century British explorer was the first westerner to take note of this sport when he came across a Tahitian canoe surfer in 1777. Upon American Calvinist's colonization of Hawaii surfing became regarded as unproductive, dangerous, and immoral. An eventually by the late 19th century surfing had almost vanished from the Hawaiian islands.

However in the early 20th century as religious authority waned surfing was revived. This is when the Hawaiian legend Duke Kahanamoku first took to the waves. Duke is also noted for his gold medal swimming efforts in the 1912 Olympics. Fellow surfer Alexander Hume Ford also took to the waves and formed surfing's first organization, the Outrigger Canoe Club.

America recieved it's first written account of surfing in Jack London's feature in Woman's Home Companion. Not the magazine you'd expect to introduce surfing to the mainland huh. Even Mark Twain was noted for giving surfing a try, unfortunately for American literature he failed at learning to surf.

George Freeth is the man credited for bringing surfing to America when he held demonstrations at Venice, Redondo, and Huntington beach. While Duke took surfing to the East Coast, Australia, and New Zealand. Surfboards by this time had evolved to flat redwood plank boards and had found its way to Hollywood in Bird of Paradise and Waikiki Wedding. The chill culture associated with surfing is rumored to have arisen from the professional beach boys of Hawaii who worked as tour guides and spent their down time surfing, making music, and sharing stories.

Tom Blake introduced his own hollow board design in the Pacific Coast Surf Riding Championships in San Onofre. This design quickly caught on while Tom Blake also became surfing's original surf photographer and the introducer of the fin.

A new surfboard innovation came into being in 1937 when John Kelly and Wally Froiseth created the narrow tailed hot curl board which allowed surfers to ride waves of never before ridden heights, 12 to 15 feet.

Then inspired by the experimentation of Bob Simmons, Joe Quigg, Matt Kivlin, and Dale Velzy surfboard construction became dominated by resin fiberglass layered balsa boards. These new Malibu chips allowed for better maneuverability, carves, and cutbacks. The balsa would soon be replaced by polyurethane foam which remains the material of choice for surfboards today.

During the boom, three large surfshops, Hobie Surfboards, Velzy Surfboards, and Jack O'neill's Surf Shop opened and introduced wetsuits to the market.

In the 60's, Surfer magazine became the mag of choice for surfers while George Downing, Wally Foiseth, Buzzy Ternt, and Walter Hoffman, and the infamous Greg Noll began pioneering big wave surfing. Surfing also boomed like never before with The Beach Boys, Surfwear manufacturers, Advertising, and surfing tv shows. Arguably the greatest surf movie ever, The Endless Summer, was also introduced in 1966 by Bruce Brown where the guys set around the globe looking for the perfect wave. The movies introduction surely set off the exotic surf travel specialty of the late 60's and early 70's.

While hanging ten and Hollywood's Gidget, the beginning of surfing girls in the mainstream, gave a glamourized view of the sport. It flamed in the 60s while Bob Mctavish and George Greenough were leading the New Era movement with their sharp turns and cutbacks. Mctavish quickly began the shortboard revolution. The shortboard revolution quickly spread to Australia and hanging ten was quickly replaced by tube riding as the move of choice.

While professional surfing was around in the mid 60's it didnt really kick off until the 70's with the likes of Mark Richards, Larry Bertleman, Michael Peterson, Dane Kealoha, and Peter Townend. Mark Richards also began experimenting with board design and introduced the stubby twin fin board which he soon rode 4 consecutive world pro championships. This was later expanded by Simon Anderson to the tri-fin thruster in the early 80's which became the setup of choice to this day.

The infamous big wave rider Eddie Aikau's death in 1978 brought about the creation of the Quiksilver In Memory of Eddie Aikau Big Wave contest in Waimea Bay which is still being run today when the conditions are large enough to permit. The 80's pro circuit was dominated by Tom Curren and Tom Carroll while Quiksilver became the world's first publicly traded surf company in 1987.

Longboarding also regained some of its foothold in the 80's and early 90's surf scene with the first longboard world championship was held in 1986.

Tow-in surfing was also introduce as a new phase in big wave surfing by Buzzy Kerbox, Laird Hamilton, and Darrick Doener. As well as the rise of women's surfing in the early 90's. ALong with women, longboarding continued its rise as the shredders of old aged and were happy to cruise on the familiar ride of a longboard.

THe early 2000's marked a sharp change in the way boards are manufactured which we are yet to see the full far reaching effects of with the introduction of computer-programmed shaping machines and molded boards. While many surfers still prefer the craftmanship of a hand shaped boards, these new era pop-outs are becoming more popular as there prices drop and quality increases. Shapers have also recently begun to experiment with new materials such as fiberglass and pressure chambers. With all these rapid changes in board manufacturing we'll have to wait and see if this means the death of the long celebrated art of hand surfboard shaping.

To all those creating the future of our sport, keep surfing and pushing our sport to the next level.

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