Im working on a Restoration on a Cool “Design 1” Single fin- The Bottom was sanded , filled, then re Colored- Color Lap extended to the deck to the out side of the original Pin- I still have to sand re-pin and Polish, but now its presentable enough to post a few pics, and ask if some one might give me any History on the Board- Its 7’2"with has a really clean template, and tons of Rocker, with a majorly flipped up nose- Also a Vari-Set Box. A while back I saw one on ebay that mentioned a conection to Rodney Sumpter- Some one here will probably help me with info on origin, and any other skinny etc etc- The shape was to cool to let the Board lie in a horrible state of Disrepair on the swapmeet floor- Thanks all-
That board looks something circa 1969. I remember seeing their ads, they were based somewhere in NY. I recall then world champ Fred Hemmings, Rodney Sumpter and Butch Van Artsdalen being associated with them. You might find something in the archives as I remember seeing a thread about Design 1 before. By the way nice job on the resto.
Oh lordy lordy, my past returns to haunt me. Sold those for a few years, well made board and that one is in good shape. Not what I’d call super-inspired or super-innovative design or shaping but a good board in general. Very good usable board in, say, waist-head high stuff, held an edge well, a high line trim back a little from the widest point is what makes it go best, if memory still serves.
Rod Sumpter was connected with the company as a kind of team rider/sales rep of sorts, early-mid '70s, when he came through here and I met him. Nice guy, by the way. I seem to recall that they were East Coast made, Jim Phillips would know better than me. That one was right around the Reno Abillera super-scooped nose era, I think the company faded away before twin fins came out, might have gone down with the ship during the Honeycomb hollow boards thing, I think they fiddled with that some… I don’t think there’s any successor company you could look to for records, but give me a week to see if we still have anything on paper to do with the ones we sold, though 30 years ago, I dunno . If you can see the serial number, that wouldn’t hurt. They ran ads in the magazines as well, and in that era shapes were quite different every year topush boards, so that might help a lot in dating it.
Thanks for the replys on my project board of the day- There is indeed a serial # on the deck- Its #2620 also Marked 7’2" right behind the serial #. As I mentioned- The Template on the Board is really clean- Have to think it was slightly ahead of its time for a late 60s Board- I saw , and surfed lots of SantaBarbara Pintails (Yaters and Andrenis) That Had similar lines through the midsection and tail in the early to mid 70s- This Thing was mangled on the Nose and Tail, and Spotty Brown on the Bottom, but its amazing what a Pigmented Hot Coat can do-! Any idea on the shapper? Keep the info coming, and thanks again!
Oh, that’s a '70s board, no doubt about it. It was a little after the Weber Ski and the G&S Magic, call it '72-'74 or so. The rails are a bit more advanced than the first Skis and such, which were more of a rounded rail all the way while I think that gets kinda down towards the tail.
Let me get the surf shop open this weekend and remind me to look and see if we have any sales or shipment records from then, we usually put the serial number on the sales slips and of course all the boards came through with numbered cards giving length, color, add-ons and such, we sometimes hung onto those too. I have a buddy who has some serious archives of magazines of the day too, I’ll ask him what he can dig up if he’s not on the road.
In '69, Design One called me in Rhode Island and asked if any of the factory crew could come down to Long Island to work for them. Myself, the glosser, laminator and sander piled into my VW camper and went there for 2 weeks. It was the BIGGEST factory EVER. They had racks for a fork lift to move the boards around from room to room.
They were funded by Huntinton Hartford, the owner of A&P stores. Charlie Bunger had gotten the project started and was cast aside by them, it was impressive for a factory of this scale. But they over stepped their abity to manage a bunch of surfers! Everyone was getting new “team” boards, materials were streaming out the doors, all of the pitfalls of building boards. It didn’t take the management long to figure out the is no money in building surboards
Very much like Channin creating KOA for a couple of UCLA finance majors!
They had accumulated quite the roster of first string shapers at the time.Dick Catri ran the team and shaped, Rodney Sumpter also shaped, as did Dennis Choate, Mike Croteau and others I can’t remember (due to the times)
They had accumulated quite the roster of first string shapers at the time.Dick Catri ran the team and shaped, Rodney Sumpter also shaped, as did Dennis Choate, Mike Croteau and others I can't remember (due to the times)
Aloha Jim
I am sitting here with Mike Croteau and after doing a search on Swaylocks for his name we found this mention. We are having a good laugh here!
He said they flew him out to Design 1 to shape and when he got there some New Jersey accent hyper Italian guy started bossing him around and telling him he had to build his shaping room! Mike told the guy “see ya” and called Aqua Jet who had a plane ticket ready for him at the NY airport and he left town. Mike said he was about 19 or so then.
He never even shaped a single board for them! He said he thought that John Barbeau shaped most of the boards. John had driven out there to work for them from San Diego.
I had never met Mike and before his arrival, the factory carpenter was installing a set of shaping racks that were armpit high on me. Once I saw “Great White”, I realized the need for racks that tall !
Yup, Mike is a big boy! He shaped here at ProGlass and since we were just finishing up construction on some of the shaping rooms, I went ahead and added a foot or more to the width of his room just so he could fit!!
I first met Mike in about 67 or 68 at Santa Anna River Jetties. He was testing out a finless surfboard he had shaped. He was probably about 18 or 19 at the time. He was then and is still one of the most innovative designers sufing has ever had.
Great stories. I met Mike,too. Early eighties in Santa Cruz. He comes into the gym I’m working at to get in shape. Gets under the bench press with no prior training that I’m aware of and starts pressing over 300 pounds. My fricken jaw hit the floor. He’s more than just big. Powerful! Mike
