DESIGN PRODUCTION - WEB - HISTORY RESEARCH

The research below was taken from my Summer brief.

HISTORY - THE EVOLUTION OF SKATEBOARDING

All information has been taken from a book called 'Dysfunctional' by Aaron Rose.  I noted down the most relevant points made on each page, highlighting points of interest and importance.

• 3000BC - Peruvian ruins which date back over 5000 years feature carvings of men riding waves while standing on 'Caballitos', which are small boats made from bundles of bound up reeds.
• The aforementioned graphic portrays the oldest known surviving reference to surfing.
• 525BC - It is believed that the Kanaka Maoli (the ancestors of the Hawaiians) brought the activity of surfing with them when they arrived in Archipelago over 2500 years ago.
• 1863 - The first practical four wheeled roller skate is invented by James Plimpton of the USA.
• 1907 - Railroad tycoon Henry Huntington imports Hawaiian beach boy George Freeth to California to demonstrate the sport of surfing. Thousands flocked to witness Freeth's aquatic antics.   
• 1918 - 48 - Someone broke the apple box off the front of his apple box skate scooter and started a new trend.

• 1926 - Thomas Edward Blake studies and measures the few remaining boards in the Honolulu Hawaii museum. Blake eventually recreated a 16' surfboard that apparently used to belong to legendary rider Chief Paki.
• 1932 - Los Angeles surfing enthusiast Meyers Butte produces the first commercial surfboards.
• 1939 - The streamlined all steel, three wheel scooter skate debutes in Chicago toy stores. Due to poor design most of the scooters ended up in the rubbish pile.
• 1941 - Santa Monica life guard Tom Blake releases a new hollow box board through the Los Angeles Ladder Company, the board was the first on the market  to have a tail-fin.
• 1952 - Dale 'The Hawk' Velzy, a Dutch woodworker, commissioned the creation of a round laminate logo to be fiber glassed on top of his boards. Echos of Dale's graphic style are visible in surf and skate graphics for the next four decades. 

Velzy's Graphic.

Link

• 1958 - The first skateboards start to appear, the general consensus was that they could be used to cursing out the oceans flat spells. Newspapers printed stories on the vast number of school children making skateboards in their wood working classes.
• 1961 - Derrick 'Skipperboy' Engblom makes custom skateboards for profit in his Santa Monica garage. In later years Engblom served as the Makaha team manager and founded legendary skate companys 'Zephyr' and 'Santa Monica Airlines'.
• 1962 - legions of urban types adopt the skateboard into everyday life. Since commercial boards are unavailable skaters use anything they can get their hands to use for a deck.
• 1963 - Surfboard company skate brands were the first to use skate graphics. Since the skateboard was born out of surfing the boards design remained beach orientated.Soon multi-laminate hardwoods prevailed labeled with the logos of their builder.
• 1963 - Larry Stevenson, publisher of 'Surf Guide' magazine actively sells Makaha Skateboards, the leading brand of a new industry. Stevenson also patents the kicktail at the end of the decade and spends the next 20 years trying to collect royalties for it.

• 1964 - Various celebrities are seen riding skateboards in an attempt to maintain their youthful images.
• Dean Torrance records skateboard sounds and uses them in the international hit song 'Sidewalk Surfing'. This is the first exposure of skateboard influenced music.
• The first issue of 'Skateboarder' appears. The magazine focuses on slalom and freestyle skateboarding.
• Triumph records release the LP 'The Challengers Go Sidewalk Surfing'. The advertising campaign in skateboarder consists of hand drawn adds by Rick Griffin.
• 1965 - With jumps in technology the 27' Hobie Vita Pact Competition model is sold at Macy's in New York City. The molded fiberglass unit had a herring bone textured deck, integral reinforcement beams and a simulated adhesive vinyl mock wood stringer. 
• The international skateboard Championships are held at the 10,000 seater La Palma Stadium in California. It is covered by three TV networks.
• San Diego skater Pat McGee is on the cover of 'Life' magazine.
• The Eiffel tower is declared off limits to skateboarders. 
• Skateboarder magazine ceases publication due to lack of interest.
• With skateboarding officially a thing of the past skaters focus on skating different terrain. The trend towards short boards in surfing is echoed in the skateboard world.
• New moves are created such as; side slips, controlled drifts and 180-plus cutbacks.

• 1969 - Skateboarding progresses into a total underground phase. Backyard pool sessions begin to gain popularity. 
• Representational expression drifts into the acid-splashed psychedelic variety. Artist Rick Griffin gains a global following. Jimmy Phillips emerges as an original talent.
•  In the Summer of '69 the first dogtown boards were painted.
• The motif found popularity with up an coming artists in the surf skate hood. Kevin Ancell, Wes Humpston, and the Kaiser brothers expanded and extended the glyph over the succeeding decades
• 1972 - Leucadian surfer Frank Nasworthy takes note of the urethane roller rink wheels and adapts them for skateboarding.
• 1973 - Nasworthy is in business and delivers his urethane wheels to all surf shops intelligent enough to recognize a good deal.
• 1974 - The press and general public are calling skateboarding the latest fad. The law calls it illegal, and the skaters call it a renaissance.
• 1975 -  'Skateboarder' magazine resumes publication. 
• The Bahne Cadillac Contest is held in Del Mar and brings together a vast range of skaters with varying styles, among them are the Z-Boys.

Rick griffin was a regular contributor to the skateboard industry.

• 1976 - Sublimated four-colour photographic half-toned images are released. The fiberglass matrix 'Surfer' magazine cover montage is a good example of this style.
• The application of silk-screened pressure-sensitive vinyl decals creates a visual atmosphere similar to the billboards of NASCAR.
• Pool riding is now an established sport within itself.
• Guy Grundy sets a speed of 50.3mph for the Guinness book of world records.
• Sam Puccio wins the Signal Hill Speed Trials by going 54mph.
• Skate parks can now be found nationwide.
• Vans designs the worlds first skateboard shoe.
• 'Skateboarder' magazine goes monthly.
• 1978 - Dave Hackett, the Albas, Dennis Martinez form the nucleus of the New Wave.
• The sport reaches a new derangement as 'artist' Leroy Nieman rips off a Paul Hoffman taken by Warren Bolster and turns it into a plastic coated serving mat for burger king. 

• 1978 - Steve rocco pulls off handplants on street curbs, but fails to gain much recognition due to his social stature. Rocco goes on to form SMA Rocco Division, which beget 'Blind' which in turn became 'World Industries'. These upstart companies thrived and helped shape the direction of the sport.
• 1979 - The mainstream media wrote skateboarding off, allowing the movement to get back to business. A collection of skate brands poped up into the void created.
• Floridian amateur skater Alan Gelfand gains the attention of the skate world with his ollie pops and no-handed aerials.
• Duane Peters upsets the expectations of the media fed skate world  by proving anyone can win a professional competition. The days of 'one star' dominated competitions seems to be over.
• Jay adams, an original member of the z-boys skateboarding team and 'original seed' of the sport gives his final interview and 'quits skating officially'.

Jay Adams circa 1975

Link

• 1980 - Surfing, one an influence of skateboarding, is now copying. Concrete-created moves are now the 'big' hits in professional surfing.
• After declining sales 'Skateboarder' magazine becomes 'Active now' in an attempt to attract a larger audience. Offended skateboard manufacturers call a meeting with their publishers due to Action Now's ignorance towards skateboarding.
• Fausto Vitello angrily leaves the meeting vowing to fund his own skateboarding magazine  'Thrasher' magazine is a reality one month later. 
• 1982 - Offended skateboard manufacturers Peggy Cozens and Larry Balma start 'Transworld Skateboarding' magazine in protest over an independent Trucks ad, featured in 'Thrasher', which showed a naked under-age model.

• 1983 - Funded with proceeds for appearing as a high jumping, skateboarding Ronald McDonald in a TV advert, Jim O'Mahonney founds a skate/sure museum in Santa Barbara California.
• 1984 - Neil Blender bursts onto the scene entering contests and riding for Christ-centered corporation G&S. Starts doing graphics for skateboard company 'Alien Workshop'
• Brand new t-shirts are rigorously cut and marked with ink pens, indicating that the staid control of corporate graphics is obsolete. 

• 1989 - Mike Folmer, a former professional skateboarder, curates an exhibit of historic skateboards, skate related artwork and media at the Santa Ana Museum. 
• 1990 - The first full colour, full length, silk-screened boards are released by 'Think'. The Mike Santarossa model depicted a treatment of 'Dali's Wife' by Amanda Haggerty. 
• Mark Gonzales and Steve Rocco, two of the principle partners in Blind Industries, produce a photographic sublimation of macaroni cheese on their newest Gonz model. 
• A Danny Way shotgun and shells pictorial board was released a short time after by another Rocco related company.
• 1993 - Keith Cochrane of Think sponsors Danny Boy O'Connor of the group House of Pain. The musicians signature model is graphically your basic barb and shamrocks presentation. The model is banned in Britain because of its obvious references to the IRA.
• 1994 -  The Consumer Product Safety Commission Report is released, stating skateboarding is 20x safer that football injury wise.
• 1995 - Thrasher celebrates 15 years of publication and is one of the longest running skateboard magazines.
• 1996 - The much ballyhooed 'Speak' Magazine debuts, created by David Carson and Neil Feineman. 

The Gonz, Macaroni Cheese deck.

Link

• 1996 - Speaking to LA radio station 97.1 Quentin Tarantino quotes the films of Tony Alva as a profound influence on his career. 
• Following a two year long process the public skatepark at Temecula California opens. Designed by Kevin Thatcher the concourse is the most extreme public terrain offering ever.
• California Assemblyman Bill Morrow attempts to pass bill AB2357, declaring skateboarding as a hazardous recreational activity.
• NBC sports analyist Dick Enberg covers Tony Hawk and nine other skaters' demonstrations during the closing ceremonies of the Atlanta Winter Olympic Games. 
• The broadcast marks the peak of skating's exposure to the world.
• 1997 - A 1963 Makaha Phil model in seven point original condition is offered for sale at $375 in the San Onofre Surf Shop during the grand summer sale. 

• 1997 - A pen and ink drawing by Rick Griffin originally executed for 'Skateboarder' magazine sells at auction for thousands.
• The ESPN Extreme Games are held at Mariner's Point in San Diego, California.
• Chris senn, defending world and Extreme Games champion was quoted saying "...it is pointless to try to judge skateboarding because it cannot be done."
• The influence of skateboarding upon surfing was made more obvious as repeat champion Tudor and US Open competitor World Champion Kelly Slater each have pro skate models as well as their signature surfboards.
• DC shoes arranges a secret stunt session for the worlds highest air. Transworld skateboarding magazine were onsite to record the events. Despite tight security Dan Stuart sneaked on set and got images of the whole event, selling the images to Thrasher magazine who managed to release them before Transworld. 
• Danny Way bomb dropped from the helicopter and sticks some huge airs. 

• 1998 - The integration of skate imagery into mainstream cooperate society is prevalent  the Venture flying 'V' logo has been turned out by Kawasaki and the 'Have You Seen Him Animal Chin' campaign has been co-opted by Nissan. 
• California Governor Pete Wilson signs the Assembly Bill into law, officially declaring skateboarding to be a hazardous activity. 
• In an Alan Seymour Pacific Coast Collectible Audition, Dale Smith sells the same Hobie 36" mahogany laminate for $1100. Scores of surf collectors shift their focus towards the sidewalk.