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Often someone sends an e-mail saying they have an interesting old photo they would like to share.
It has taken me too long to figure out how to work with this idea.
Now that Photos from the Vault is solidly established I would like to publish your images as often as once a week in addition to the usual number of newspaper based postings. It will all depend on the flow of submissions.
Paso Robles blogger Dave Skinner sent me a link a few months back to family photos he had posted from Avila Beach in the 1930′s.
These photos are special to Dave, in part, because he knows the family story behind them. I think readers will enjoy them as I did because they have a strong sense of place.
If you have a photo you think other readers would be interested in attach the photo to an e-mail with a few sentences we can use as the caption. By sending me the image you give The Tribune/Photos from the Vault permission to publish the image but you would retain ownership of the image.
Contact me at: dmiddlecamp[at]thetribunenews.com
(Replace [at] with the usual symbol, trying to make it hard on the spambots.)
My guess on the time of the surf photo, based on the image of Grumpy on the surf board, would be after the general release of the cartoon movie Snow White. The Internet Movie Database has the premier in December 1937 and general release in February 1938. Fellow photographer and surfer Joe Johnston showed me the link to surfboards in the old Hawiian Alaia style.
Now the challenge has been made, who out there has the oldest Central Coast Surfing photo? The clock now stands at 1938.
Here is an excerpt from Wordy Dave’s blog and a link to the full post with more text and photos.
My father, Don Skinner, grew up off of South Broad Street in San Luis Obispo. Born in 1921 to a hard-working Union Oil man from Templeton and a doting mother from Tennessee, he and his younger sister, Margaret, would become part of the greatest generation of kids who experienced relative innocence before the horrors of WWII re-defined their view of the world.
Avila Beach in the 30′s offered a great getaway from the somewhat bustling burg of SLO. Picnics, swimming, trying to get a suntan and people-watching were the main fare. Take your best friend and just have fun — all encouraged, financed and supervised by your parents.
I need your help in identifying the homemade board stuck in the sand behind my dad. The year is probably 1938.
Gary Lynch has told me this much about it: “It is a very common design/shape seen on the beaches of So Cal starting approximately after the turn of the last century (1900). It is a take off of early Hawaiian shapes and used in abundant numbers both in private ownership and rental concessions at many of the most visited beaches in So Cal and other areas of the USA.” Gary lives in Templeton and is the author of Tom Blake: The Uncommon Journey of a Pioneer Waterman.
Tom Wegener Surfboards website labels this board style as a Hawaiian Alaia. Yes, it is still used on the waves!