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Skip Frye Surfoards team rider Richard Kenvin rips on a 6’ 10” Frye Fish, Scorpion Bay, Mexico


made them sweat, and she got the bill passed. My personal input is not nearly as intricate as Donna’s; I pick up trash at the beach. I always strive to leave it in better condition than when I arrived. Te ocean has been good to me. It’s provided me with a fantastic lifestyle. I owe it to my ocean to keep her clean. Everyone com- ing in contact with the ocean owes at least that much respect. Give that what you’d expect from others.”


Family Life Skip has two daughters, one son, five grand-


children and three great grandchildren. He still shapes surfoards (except when the surf is good), and he still hand shapes each and every board that bears his name. He continues refin-


ing and designing surfoards and fins, and on occasion, still rides a Fibre-Flex skateboard. He surfs almost every day, always has a broom and trash picker-upper in his car for cleaning the beach and never uses a surf leash. And he has never lost his enthusiasm for finding the next wave to ride.


Films, Books and Honors Troughout the years, Skip has appeared in


numerous films and books. Some of the books include Good Tings Love Water, 1994, by Chris Ahrens, and Te Glide, by Chris Bys- trom, who said in the book’s dedication: “... Skip is a gentleman of great humility. In two words he is the master glider of the modern era and this holds true no matter what size board


Skip Frye at Surfing Heritage Foundation


Te fish was shaped by Skip for James Badger in the late 1970s. It was airbrushed and glassed by a local Sunset Cliffs surfer, Jack McGee (who according to Badger is “an excellent craſtsman and skilled surfer”). It came to Surfing Heritage along with a second Frye board, that was also airbrushed and glassed by Jack, a “Skip-Jack” model. Te classic Frye wings were hand-drawn by Skip. Tis particular “model” was very limited—there being only one other that Badger knew of—which belonged to John Riddle, the “New Break Kid” (there may have been others but Badger wasn’t aware of them). Both boards were donated by James Badger in 2008 and are the only Frye boards currently in the Surfing Heritage Foundation’s collection.


he’s riding. It is an Honor to dedicate this, my first book, to Skip Frye.” Some of the surf films Skip has appeared in


include: On Safari To Stay, by Steve Cleveland and Chris Ahrens, 1991; Liquid Stage; Te Lure of Surfing, by Michael Bovee and Rob- bie Greaves, 1995; Te Seedling, by Tomas Campbell, 1999; Changes and Te Outsid- ers, 2002, by Walking on Water Foundation; Sprout, by Tomas Campbell, 2004; Glass Love, by Andrew Kidman, 2006; One Califor- nia Day, by Jason Baffa, 2008, Into Te Ether, a photo-book by Andrew Kidman, 2010, and Te Still Point, by Taki Bibelas, 2011. Skip has been humbled by the many honors


he has received over the years from the surfing community. In the early ‘60s, Skip spoke on be- half of the surfers in accepting the dedication of Tourmaline Canyon, located both in Pacific Beach and La Jolla, as a surfing park at the of- ficial City of San Diego ceremony. Over forty years later, in 2006, a surfer’s


memorial was constructed that would honor “all surfers past and present, male and female,


famous, and the unknown.” Completed and dedicated in 2008, the words on the memo- rial include the inscription “ Surf Well, Spread Aloha, Share Waves Without Judgement” and an etched photo of Skip surfing. In 1990, Skip was honored at the Action


Sports Retailer show held in San Diego as one of many Surf Pioneers. In 1991, he received the LeRoy Grannis Waterman’s Award from the Oceanside Longboard Surfing Club, and was inducted into the International Surfing Hall of Fame. In 1999, the Windansea Surf Club named Frye “Surfer of the Century”, and in 2000, he was voted first in the Master’s division in the Longboard Magazine Readers Poll. Skip was inducted into the International Surfoard Builders Hall of Fame in December 2006. “I feel it’s my duty to pass along the heritage


of our sport,” Skip says with a passion. “But there’s still a long way to go, a lot of work to be done, especially with fins.”


Visit Skip online at: SkipFryeSurf.com


Pintail: 8 ’6”


Fish: 5’ 10”


www.surfingheritage.org The Ocean Magazine • February/March 2012 19


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