Sunday, January 22, 2023

California Surf Museum Shares the Stoke!

 

A Wave of Treasures to Enjoy


 Written by SurfWriter Girls Sunny Magdaug and Patti Kishel 

In Oceanside, California, just steps from the beach and municipal fishing pier, there is a surfing treasure waiting to be explored – the California Surf Museum. 

 


Filled with surf paintings, photographs, classic boards, mementoes, and displays, it is a welcoming beacon of surf lore in a beach-loving town.


 

Navigating the well-designed, inviting space, SurfWriter Girls Sunny Magdaug and Patti Kishel kept making new discoveries. And with two, classic rattan chairs placed in front of a giant wave backdrop, we were ready to kick back and soak it all in.


From the larger-than-life image of renowned board-shaper Donald Takayama shaping one of the boards surfers have dubbed as "magical," we were drawn into this special place. With his six decades of board shaping prowess, Takayama is the perfect one to put front-and-center by the museum's entry.



 

Nearby we saw an exhibit of a totally different kind of board – an homage to Tom Morey, the creator of the Boogie Board, that soft, flexible piece of colorful foam that has given fun and enjoyment to so many.



Walking through the Timeline of Surfboards display took us on a journey through time that makes you want to grab each board and take it to the ocean.



While much has been said about the Zen of surfing, there's a science to it. The bright, yellow buoy in the museum's Wave Science display shows how buoys operated by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography’s Coastal Data Information Program monitor ocean temperature and wave direction to predict swells, letting people know when "Surf's up!"

 


SurfWriter Girls were lucky to run into Jane Schmauss, the museum's historian, and find out how the museum got started and has grown since it was founded by a handful of surfers in 1986.

 


Schmauss said it took dedication from surfers and the community. She donated a corner of her restaurant in Encinitas, George's Restaurant, for the museum's first location. Later it moved to other SoCal spaces until finally landing at its current spot. 

 



Since those first surfers got together to talk about preserving surf history their vision has grown into a premiere surfing museum that has hosted more than 650,000 visitors from around the world and holds an annual gala to celebrate surfing. 

 


SurfWriter Girls found out about the surf museum from Tom Gibbons, a member of the board of directors and its history/social sciences consultant, when he invited us to the museum's 14th Annual Gala in Carlsbad.

 


The festive gala in November honored leaders in the surfing community and presented three Silver Surfer Awards to pioneer surfboard shaper Bing Copeland, Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard and Kathy Zuckerman (AKA "Gidget").


Located at 312 Pier View Way in Oceanside, the California Surf Museum is right in the middle of all the action for a day of surfing, fishing, or sight-seeing. 

 


SurfWriter Girls

Surf’n Beach Scene Magazine

Sunny Magdaug and Patti Kishel hold the exclusive rights to this copyrighted material. Publications wishing to reprint it may contact them at surfwriter.girls@gmail.com Individuals and non-profit groups are welcome to post it on social media sites as long as credit is given.

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