Brian Webster's photos

Surfin' safari on the east coast of England, Bilbos on the roof

I featured a couple of Brian's photos on the blog last month, including the one at the top, and he's sent me a few more. Classic shots of his old boards and hot rods, and places he surfed around the east coast and down in Cornwall -
'I thought you would like this pic of my 32 Ford 5 window Coupe this is the car the Beachboys sang about "Lil Deuce Coupe" Ive been building American Hot Rods for a lot of years. This 32 now lives in California the guy I sold it to in 1972 still owns it. The reason I sold it was to purchase a VW camper for chasing waves around the coasts of England & Wales they were super times. The pic of my 32 is from a very memorable day at East Runton & Cromer.........Cheers Bri'

The lads Newquay 1974

Perranporth 1970

Bri Webster with 10 ft Bilbo ,Sutton on Sea 1973

home made boards

There were quite a few home made /backyard boards made in the late 60s and 70s. People thought why pay £30 for a board when I can get a blank and do it myself ! Most results were interesting, some a little way out, and some complete dogs ! Even the good ones usually have something a bit out, like a wierd nose, too much thickness or strange rocker. However on the plus side, it seems that when someone went to the effort of making their own board, they really went to town with the artwork- inlays including fabric and even newspaper, lettering, full tints, glitter tints, insects and butterflies laid into the resin etc etc. So the boards often have a certain charm and visual appeal even if they are a bit crude.
This a board from my collection, a home made board from the late 60s/ early70s , 6ft 8 , its a very rounded board with 50 50 rails all the way. I love the design on the deck though, and the features like the fin. Someone has drilled a hole straight through the board for the leash - I guess thats one way of doing it. The nose is also a bit funny, unnecessarily thick and up pointing ; whereas most noses of the time were pretty flat on the deck. Its a board I enjoy having in the collection, it survives as one person's determination to get out there and do their own thing - and good on 'em.

This board is Alex's although I sold it to him a few years ago , before the blog . Its an enigma that Alex calls 'the shoe'. I'm not quite sure what's going on here, but I guess its from around 1970 with one of the most pronounced s -decks in history, helped by a nose which could really have your eye out ! It has a cool and cosmic glitter tint on the underside, and a strange fin slot which goes straight through the board, which seems to have had a patch of cloth over the fin to keep it in place. Other than this there are no fixings for the fin. Mabye the surfer had to stand on the fin to keep it in place ?!

Neil Watson has come up with some ideas about the design of 'the shoe' -
'Regarding the old home-built boards you featured, my guess is that the "S" deck would be later than 1970, and I wonder if that excessively kicked nose could result from an early method of getting some kick into a flat blank. Before pre-shaped blanks were available, one method was to glass the bottom of the board, and while the resin was going off, to apply weight or downward pressure to the nose, maybe with a stick propped against the ceiling. The result could be unpredictable!
The fin box on that board with no apparent fixing method could be explained by the way fins could be jammed into a box with newspaper, which expanded to hold the fin tight when it got wet. That was the theory anyway. We lost a lot of fins, but they were often made from a plywood offcut anyway!' . Cheers Neil

bunyip

Classic gutsy performance by Munga in Bunyip Dreaming, one of my favourite vids back in the early 90s.

British Surfer

cover by Fuzz Bleakley

In 1969 Rod Sumpter took time out from his film making to be editor ( from issue no 2 onwards) of Britain's first surf magazine, preceded only by a surf newspaper. It was called British Surfer and sought to embrace UK surf culture with its own identity, not just following trends and news from the US and Aussie mags.

The mag was nicely produced and stands as an important piece of our surf culture. Unfortunately at the time it didn't sell in large enough numbers to cover costs etc - as with most early surf mags - and it finished production after six issues. Because of this its bloody hard to find any now, so thanks to Alex for sharing the full set from his collection.

For some nice youtube footage of Rod Sumpter in the mid 60s click the link , Rod is in the no.5 vest.

Wavecraft twin keel

Another beauty from Jason's collection, an original early/mid 70s twin keeler made by Pete Mitchell for Wavecraft. You see so many modern remakes of this type of shape, its great to see an original one. Wavecraft as a maker is a bit of a mystery to me, I've seen quite a few in the south west now so they must have been produced down here, Jason thinks Truro and someone else said Wadebridge. There was a Wavecraft in the US too but apparently they didn't make many boards. If the bird is British that would clinch it, but I'm not a very adept twitcher so can't tell.
Jason took a while to get this board, but he triumphed in the end ,a board to be proud of-
' I stalked this board for a coupe of years with out success only to get a phone call out of the blue asking if i was still interested in buying it, after screaming and jumping up and down for a couple of seconds I calmly said yes!
I believe Hawiian Jimmy Blears who was world champ in 1972 (the one where someone stole and then nailed David Nuuhiwa fish to the pier) shaped at Wavecraft for a while in the early 70's and I presume his influence had something to do with the template on this board as it is miles off any other fish i have seen from around this era.'

wipeout of the week

photo by Joggly this week in Byron Bay. Two words - self inflicted !

some smooth soul for a monday morning, by Bobby Womack with J.J.Johnson

Bears holiday 1968

This is a book I had as a small kid, published in 1968, and its probably the first book I had that had surfing in. Having said that its not exactly surfing, its just stacking it into a big clump of rocks ; enough to put a small grom off for life. Papa bear was a bit of a know it all - you can tell by his bathing suit - and he spends the holiday trying to teach his son about beach safety, with predictably disasterous results.

photos

Above - Steve Daniel at Lafitenia ,France 1978.

Alex Williams has sent in some very fine photos from his amazing archive which must range from the early 70s to the present day. Here are some classy shots of some of our top surfers from the late 70s/ early 80s, at home and away. And almost all of them are on Ocean Magics, one of my and Alex's favourite makes. If anyone wants to contact Alex about his photos his email is alexcam@eclipse.co.uk .

Steve Daniel, Brittany France, 1984

Nigel Semmens , Brittany, 1984

Lafitenia 1978

Steve Daniel , Watergate 1982

France trip 1978, Paul Bassford, N S, Clive Rhodell and Lenny Ingram.

Jamie Owen, Fistral 1984

N S at Ocean Magic, mid 80s

Many Returns twinnie

Here's a nice late 70s twin fin sent in by Jason, made in Bideford ,North Devon by Brian Adams for Many Returns. As you noticed it has a logo just a wee bit similar to a famous Australian's logo of the time, the superman himself MR. Still it looks a really nice board and one of those useable classics which are great fun to surf. Nice clear fins too.
Jason says- 'Thought I'd send you pics of one of my favourite non-Bilbo boards, it's a rare Many Returns twinnie with a bit of a special logo.
Shaped in Bideford (North Devon)by 'Many Returns' before they moved to Englands 'premier' surf town. They shamelessley nicked Mark Richard's 'MR' superman logo and changed it to Many Returns. I love the simplicity of the telephone number '5971'. She's a great rider too !'

The real MR logo

mr2

From Surf Scene, 1980

surfers path

Readers of Surfers Path will see that the jan/feb issue has a piece on seven artists who surf, of which I am happy to be one. Good words thanks to Mike Newman about the old boards, my art and the blog, where they've been unearthed and how they help to inspire me as an artist. I never knew I was Welsh though Mike. A few more photos of the old boards would have been great in a mag full of shortboards but I guess space is tight and mabye not everyone wants to see old relics, crazy as it might sound to us.