SHOOTING STARS
2-14-07
By Corky Carroll
Last night I was sitting on my deck with my pals Blue Dog Metcalf and the Iguana. It was a beautiful clear night and we were watching the sky checking for satellites going by and discussing the cosmos, or at a least something that seemed to be pretty cosmic. It goes like that during some of these star gazing sessions on the deck. All of a sudden we all saw this huge bright shooting star. It went all the way across the sky. We were all stoked about that and hooting and high fiving each other.
Then the Iguana says, “Yeah, we sure have seen our share of shooting stars in the surfing world.”
Wow, ya know the dude was right. Between the three of us we have about a zillion years of surfing behind us and have seen just about everybody come and go over the past half-century. I sort of would rather the zillion years was ahead of us though. But nonetheless it is a fact that we have seen so many great surfers come and go and there have been some real “shooting stars.”
I guess this would be the same as “One hit wonders” in the music world. People that flashed upon the scene and just as quickly faded into obscurity. There were some that just got lucky for a moment and then reality set in. But there were some really talented surfers that did something great but didn’t continue and have a lasting career.
The first guy that comes to mind is Ron Sizemore from Laguna Beach. Ron won the 1961 United States Championship at the age of 16 and looked like he was on his way to super stardom. I have no idea why his surfing career didn’t become huge, he had the talent. He didn’t really fade into obscurity though; he is still around and still surfing and still good. But that was pretty much it on his surfing resume other than local stuff. I always thought he was one of the best guys around when I was growing up.
Then there was a dude named John Mason. John was from San Clemente and shocked everyone when he won the 1962 San Clemente Surf Capades. This was a major event back then. He was this completely unknown dude who happened to have the day of his life at his home break and beat the best guys in the world on that day. Other than that he had exactly no surfing career at all. I have no idea what ever happened to him either.
In 1965 a dude from the South Bay named Jim Craig won the United States Championship at Huntington Beach on a huge day. Everybody went “who is this guy?” We never really got a chance to find out. I never saw that dude again. Many people thought it was Don Craig. Don is a well-known and extremely respected California surfer and his winning the title would not have surprised anybody. But none of us had ever seen or heard of this Jim Craig guy.
Then there was the all time shooting star. Rolf Aurness. Rolf is the son of James Arness who played Marshall Dillion on the hit television series “Gunsmoke.” Rolf was the real deal. In his late teens his lanky body and amazing surfing talents merged and he skyrocketed to the top of the surfing world culminating with his winning the World Championship title held in Australia in 1970. He was the best surfer there was that year. He rode giant waves at Makaha and on the north shore the previous winter and earned the respect of everyone who saw him. He was a great guy who everyone liked and he was on the fast track to Legend status. But winning the title and spending way too much time in Hollywood and hanging out with the wrong people all seemed to slam into him at the same time and what was looking to be one of the most successful surfing careers of all time ended as abruptly as it had started only a year or two before. The shooting star basically exploded emotionally and he had serious problems that he was never able to recover from as far as surfing went. When ever people are talking about “what ever happened to so and so” Rolf is on that list. But it’s not that great an answer. He was one of my best friends. And I can honestly say that he was one of the best surfers that I ever saw in my life.
Then on the flipside of that we have dudes who have been around since time began and are still surfing and are still “involved” in one form or another. Take George Downing for instance. I love this guy. He won the Makaha International Championships a few times way back in the 1950’s and was still placing in the finals in big wave events well into the late sixties. And he remained as one of the most respected big wave riders for decades. He became the coach of the Hawaiian Surfing Team and one of the leading surfboard shapers and manufacturers on the planet. He is the guy who says, “It’s on or it’s off” for the big wave contests in Hawaii. I am not really sure how old George is, but it must be somewhere near 200 by now. He still is a huge figure in the surfing world to this day and probably one of the most respected ever.
Wheeling Robert August ~ The Wave
2-14-07
By Corky Carroll
All the time I get people asking me where do I come up with ideas for these columns. To be honest some of the time I just turn on my computer and something pops into my head. Other times I have thought of something ahead of time and have a general idea of what I am going to say and then it just comes out as I type. When I was first doing this I used to reread my stuff and add this and edit that and primp and agonize over every sentence. But as the years have gone by I have realized that sometimes you can ruin the taste of the soup by overcooking it. So now I pretty much write it and give it a once over for blatant errors and send it. I have to disable my spell-check because the dictionary and I have a huge difference of opinion.
Much of the time I get ideas from my email. People write in stuff that sparks that little flickering brain cell that holds my memories. Or they will offer up a good idea and I will run with it. And I get press releases all the time. Somebody is always sending me stuff about some new product or new this, that or the other thing that they would like to get some publicity about. Most of the time it isn’t anything that I would write about. But every now and then something catches my eye and I read it and figure it is worth writing about. Today is one of those days.
What caught my attention was an email that said something about Robert August and wheelchairs. So I’m thinkin’ yeah, Robert is getting up there. Poor dude is finally in a wheelchair. Bummer. I still remember him as the hot surfer, yet extreme socialite, in High School who wore light blue cashmere sweaters and button down Madras shirts and had all the hot babes. I always wanted to be like him except minus the sweaters. He was almost too cool for comfort. And geeze, now he is in a wheelchair??? Poor old geezer. But, I bet he has some hot grannie rolling him around and helping him put in his teeth.
But then I read the press release and to my delight it wasn’t about Robert being “in” a wheelchair at all. He is involved with the Free Wheelchair Mission and is helping with the distribution of a shipment of 550 free wheelchairs in Costa Rica. Robert is like me; he spends a lot of his time in Costa Rica and has a home down there just like I do in Mexico. We are still in quest of the “Endless Summer.” (OK, I could not resist that, sorry)
Robert, as most of you know, is a Huntington Beach local and one of the largest surfboard builders in the world. He was the star of the all time classic surf movie “Endless Summer,” released in 1964 by Bruce Brown. He has been an icon in Orange County for almost a half a decade.
Robert, son Sam August and female surf sensation Mary Osborne are scheduled to host and participate in the distribution of these mobility-giving chairs, as well as narrate a series of short form video documentaries on the event which is to be held this month in Costa Rica. These video segments are being produced by Endless Fun Productions, and will stream over Free Wheelchair Mission’s website, as well as be made available to broadcast outlets around the country and podcasts on the web.
“This project is going to reflect the connection between humanity, nature, and the human spirit,” said Free Wheelchair Mission Marketing Manager Jonathan Abramson. “I believe this project will break new ground and show people throughout the world the beauty of the people that receive our wheelchairs through the perspective of these legendary surfers.”
Free Wheelchair Mission is an Orange County based non-profit organization committed to providing the gift of mobility to the physically disabled poor in developing countries. This is a very cool thing and I am stoked to hear that Robert is taking part in it. And I am happy that my old, and I mean the term old as….well..ok…old…pal Robert is not actually in one of the chairs himself yet.
For more information, visit www.freewheelchairmission.org