I remember my first surfing experiences back in the mid-50s as a beach gremlin at the foot of Bayshore Drive in Long Beach. One of my uncles was among those who surfed the gentle waves in that area during the early days. Every now and then someone would loose their board and the kids on the beach would try to retrieve it. Sometimes they would get a push in ride from whoever lost their boards. These early memories were the beginnings of the spark.

By the late 50s to very early 60s, Chuck Linnen, a lifeguard in the bay area of Bayshore, became our local surf king. He was the one to we kids looked up to, great volleyball player, great surfer, and popular with the girls. We all wanted to become surfers and be like him. More sparks to start the flame.

Group at the Cliff's about 1963, Bruce on the right. photo courtesty of Bruce Gabrielson

I first started surfing across the inlet at Ray Bay by the Power Plant in Seal Beach in 1960. Chuck surfed there so of course I tried my best whenever he was around. Finally, one day I had enough courage to paddle into the middle of the channel where the “big” names were surfing. Wouldn’t you know it, I caught my first good wave and surfed right past Chuck. I could hear him hooting all the way and when I was paddling back out, he came over to me and said I had rode a great wave. Chuck became my friend and helped my spark turned into a small flame. He has been my friend through college and later years and is still my close friend today.

Around 1964 I met Dewey Webber through my wrestling activities. He was widely recognized as a famous surfer and knowing him really made me want to get better. Dewey subsequently got me my first new board, a Webber noserider. By then I was in college, feeling competent of my surfing skills, and had even entered some bigger contests. My surf partners were John Geyer from Newport Beach, a member of the Surfboards Hawaii Surf Team, and Raul Duarte from Huntington Beach. One thing led to another and John was able to get me onto the Surfboards Hawaii Team in 1966.

In the spring of 1967, Gary Wurster and I started surfing for Soul Surfboards in Huntington Beach. I had a WSA and USSA ranking by then, was known as the Huntington Beach “Snake” (another story), and was serious into board designs and what the various designs could do. Dale Velzy was the shaper for Soul, and I spent a great deal of time working with him in his stall on new board designs.

The industry was just going into the short board era, so we were both experimenting a lot. He came up with something and I tried it out. I was trying to figure out how to get a flexible turning board and a nose design that didn’t grab and spent a long evening working with Dale on the design. It was glassed in a couple of days and when it didn’t work, I came back to Dale to get something changed for a new design. I remember the evening well. First he asked me to go get a bottle of Peach Brandy. When I came back, he handed me his planer, sat down on a chair in the stall, and opened the bottle. Then, after slowly taking a drink he paused and said it was time for me to get serious and shape my own board.

That was the beginning of the fire. My Surf Gooroo was sitting there, helping me shape, checking everything out as I went, and telling me stories about his surfing adventures. I’m sure he was also imparting to me both wisdom and his particular brand of surf culture. Obviously, I listened and learned.

Dale left Soul several months later and Steve Boehne became the new shaper. I moved on about a month later. It wasn’t that Steve didn’t shape good boards, he did, but without Dale it just wasn’t the same. Another friend of mine, Steve Walden, was opening his own shop just up the street. My surf partner Charley Ray and I liked Steve and decided to surf for him as his first team riders. I still wanted to shape, but no money for equipment and no place to work had pretty much shut down my fires for awhile.

I surfed for Steve about two months. Then one evening I got a call from Dale to come over for a visit. He was meeting with Dale Rogers of Rogers Foam and they had been talking about me. When I got there, Dale told me he had some things to give me. He opened my van and started loading racks, his shaping stand, florescent lights, sanding blocks, templates, and various other things. Among his templates was a nose template, tail template, gun template, two longboard templates, and a mini-longboard template, all made out of unfinished plywood. When I asked him about those, he said they were his early day templates and that he wouldn’t need them anymore. He also said that I might want to use them someday if I ever shaped a balsa or one of his longboard designs. Except for those I’ve donated to various museums, I still have most of these templates today.

Finally he brought out his planer. As he and gave it to me he also gave me one of his serious “go forth and prosper” speeches. I wasn’t really sure if he was blessing me or just saying to have fun and make some money. I was stunned to say the least. My shaping mentor had just put me into the surfboard business in a big way. I raced back to tell Charley that we needed to get a place to make boards and that our break had come.

Nearly everyone in Huntington was impressed with my good fortune. Years later Dale told me that he planned to retire from shaping and that Rogers suggested he give his shaping equipment to someone just getting started and needing a break. I was high on their list, and, being Dale’s most recent protégé, both thought I should inherit the trove. My spark had turned into a full-fledged bonfire.

Our first boards were built at a warehouse in Costa Mesa, then about a month later under an awning behind my house off Garfield and Beach Blvd. in Huntington Beach. The only lasted a short time also as my parents had purchased a new house on he corner of Garfield and Delware and were getting ready move. By the time Wave Trek was into full production, we had moved to a new building behind their new home. An interesting story about the Wave Trek factory behind my parent’s place on the corner of Garfield and Delaware is worth telling. The little red four room building is actually the oldest building still standing in Huntington. It was built by an original settler, a Mexican farmer, in the early 1890s. It’s siding is rough-cut boards from the saw mill in Santa Anna that existed during that time period.

My parent's house was built on a ¼ acre parcel of land next door to the grand children of the farmer in the early 1940s. The Wave Trek building was partially on both house plots, so my father pulled completely onto our place with a tractor rather then having it torn down. It sat there for a long time with no electricity and running water until I finally came up with the idea for my new shop.

We had just an electric extension cord and a hose at first, but finally got the place fully wired and water pipes installed as our business expanded. The smallest room just happened to be the right size to shape boards, so this became my shaping stall. Several years later, John “Whitney” Guild came to work for us and we moved the shaping room to a larger room. Whitney stayed in the small room.