surfboard in Pearl Harbor
Mike Sullivan
indifferent to it, I'm enough of a student of the history of
WWII and an experienced old Hollywood hand to know that this
movie would piss me off at some level. They should have left
it with Tora Tora Tora.
Still, I thought it would be a good opportunity to discuss history
with the kids, which it was.
Wishing to avoid discussion of the movie in general, I was
interested in the small part where the Navy flier is building the
surfboard. He had a laminated board and he was 'inventing'
a tailfin.
In 1941.
I assumed that this was as ahistorical as other gimmicks used in the
film, but I realized I couldn't exactly quote when laminated balsa
boards started appearing, and who started sticking skegs on, and
when.
Surfing historians? Malcom?
Mike
Foon
> I was
>interested in the small part where the Navy flier is building the
>surfboard. He had a laminated board and he was 'inventing'
>a tailfin.
>
>In 1941.
>
>I assumed that this was as ahistorical as other gimmicks used in the
My Father-in-law saw it and loved it. It was the first movie he's sat through
without fallin asleep in years. He was there and punched a dozen holes in the
movie but claims the thing that was most unauthentic is that the Japanese plans
never flew as low as depicted in the movie. The attack lasted almost two hours
and the only time he ever really saw a plane (because there was just so much
smoke) was when one got shot down. The surfin part? He said he saw someone
riding a big giant board at Waikiki one day. No fins on the board either.
-Foon (Enjoyed a war movie called "Dawn Patrol" as a kid.Now I know why?)
John4Surf
Seems I heard somewhere Tom Blake introduced the small fin on his hollow boards
in mid-1940's (after the war).
eric burch
regularly until after WWII.
---
Mike Sullivan <Su...@forsythe.stanford.edu> wrote in message
news:9g307a$o6s$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU...
Grey Wolf
says...
> I was
> interested in the small part where the Navy flier is building the
> surfboard. He had a laminated board and he was 'inventing'
> a tailfin.
>
> In 1941.
>
> I assumed that this was as ahistorical as other gimmicks used in the
> film, but I realized I couldn't exactly quote when laminated balsa
> boards started appearing, and who started sticking skegs on, and
> when.
Ask, and you shall receive. One question, don't you have a web browser?
The first fins:
==============
In 1937, some of the pacifists in the general vicinity of Pearl Harbor
(Brown & Kelly and others) started carving their boards' thick tails
into crude fins.
http://www.legendarysurfers.com/surf/legends/woody.shtml#hot_curls
The early lightweight boards:
============================
Skegs were not widely until after the war. While Bob Simmons set the
stage for its development, it was really his assistants and proteges Joe
Quigg, Matt Kivlin, Tommy Zahn and Dave Rochlen that came up with the
original Malibu Board.
http://www.legendarysurfers.com/surf/legends/ls16.shtml
1st fiberglass fin:
==================
Also during the summer of 1947, Joe Quigg shaped two other boards that
were revolutionary in design.
One was a 100% foiled down wide pintail with the first fiberglass fin.
It featured carved-in rail rocker, low sharp rails, flowing rocker end
to end and a 100% breakaway tail.
http://www.legendarysurfers.com/surf/legends/ls16.shtml#1st quigg
pintail & fiberglass skeg
Malcom's site, http://www.legendarysurfers.com is one of those places
where I could hang out for hours, or just pop in for quick info, like
now.
--
Grey " " Wolf
Finding depth at low tide.
The original sig line is back by popular demand!
tower7
http://www.legendarysurfers.com/
"eric burch" <surf...@hot-curl-mail.com> wrote in message
news:tia9ajq...@corp.supernews.com...
Timothy B. Maddux
Mike Sullivan <Su...@forsythe.stanford.edu> wrote:
>Wishing to avoid discussion of the movie in general, I was
>interested in the small part where the Navy flier is building the
>surfboard. He had a laminated board and he was 'inventing'
>a tailfin.
>
>In 1941.
That lags Tom Blake's skeg by 6 years, but they got the
location correct (he tested it at Waikiki):
http://www.legendarysurfers.com/surf/legends/ls07_blake.shtml#skeg_1935
OOP also notes elsewhere on the site that the first fiberglass
board was a hollow 2-piece affair of just fiberglass built by
Pete Peterson, 10 years later. Then there was Simmons' sandwiched
boards, which the Surftech boards really echo. I don't know about
balsa specifically, but I'm sure it's somewhere on Malcome's site.
Have no intentions of seeing "Pearl Harbor" but it sounds like
they did okay with this gaffe, certainly better than the "Thin
Red Line" scene in the film's opening in which a shortboard is
in the foreground...
--
.-``'. Tim Maddux, Ocean Engineering Lab, UCSB
.` .`~ http://www.me.ucsb.edu/~tbmaddux/
_.-' '._ "From the essence of pure stoke springs all creation."
Grey Wolf
KEEPYOURgrey...@snotmail.com says...
> Skegs were not widely until after the war.
Malcolm: that line has a typo.
Michael Sullivan
>
> In article <9g307a$o6s$1...@nntp.Stanford.EDU>, Su...@forsythe.stanford.edu
> says...
>
> > I was
> > interested in the small part where the Navy flier is building the
> > surfboard. He had a laminated board and he was 'inventing'
> > a tailfin.
> >
> > In 1941.
> >
> > I assumed that this was as ahistorical as other gimmicks used in the
> > film, but I realized I couldn't exactly quote when laminated balsa
> > boards started appearing, and who started sticking skegs on, and
> > when.
>
> Ask, and you shall receive. One question, don't you have a web browser?
you guys wouldn't get a chance to show off.
Mike
Lemmings!
Experts" that need help with search engines...
"Michael Sullivan" <gc....@forsythe.stanford.edu> wrote