This was the beginning for skateboarding when all across California surfers started to take to surfing the streets with the idea of replacing the waves with wheels. It is unclear how the first board was actually created, but instead, it seems that a few different people came up with similar idea at roughly the same time as each other. There are a small handful of people that have laid claim to inventing skateboarding first, but none of this can be proved, and this leaves skateboarding a mysterious creation with no solid roots.
The very first skateboarders started out using wooden boxes or boards that had roller skate wheels fixed to the bottom. As you could imagine, There were a lot of people who got hurt in the early years of skateboarding. this was because it was a sport newly discovered, so anything went. As time went on the boxes turned into planks, and eventually companies began to produce decks of pressed layers of wood that were very similar to the skateboard decks of you can buy today. In this era skateboarding was an after lesuire for surfers who wanted more action whilst they were away from the shores.
1963
In this year skateboarding reached it's peak of popularity and various companies including but not limited to Makaha and Hobie, started putting together skateboarding competitions. At this time, skateboarding was either a downhill event or freestyle. Three men Danny Berer, Woody Woodward and Torger Johnson were some of the best known skateboarders around at this time, but the techniques and maneuvers they did back in them days were nearly entirely different to what skateboarding looks like today. The style of skateboarding that they used, called "freestyle", is more like doing things such as dancing ballet or perhaps performing ice skating with a skateboard.
1965
In this year the massive popularity that was only two years ago, suddenly grinded to a halt. Most people thought that skateboarding was a phase that had just died out, as the hoola hoop did. Skateboard companies collapsed and people who wanted to skate had to resort to making their own skateboards again entirely from scratch.
Despite this though people still skated, even though the parts were extremely hard to find and the boards were home made. Some skaters were even using clay wheels for their boards, which resulted in them being highly dangerous and very hard to control.
1972
This was the year when Frank Nasworthy came up with the invention of the urethane wheels, were roughly the same as skaters use today. He then started a company called Cadillac Wheels, and in relation to this it sparked a new interest in skateboarding among surfers and similar people.
1975
This is when skateboarding evolved towards the very sport that we see today. A freestyle contest took place at the Ocean Festival involving the Zephyr team who showed the world what skateboarding could be with a bit of dedication and hard work. They rode their boards like no one had ever seen and skateboarding moved from being just a hobby to something serious, rewarding and highly exciting. The Zephyr team consisted of many members, the most notable being Tony Alva, Stacy Peralta and Jay Adams .
All the skaters who wanted to be like the Zephyr team including themselves, also made skateboarding even more exciting to the public eye and started an anti-establishment sentiment that is still present in skateboarding world to theis very day.
1978
A few years into the surging popularity of this new type of low style skateboarding, Alan Gelfand, who was nicknamed 'Ollie', came up with a maneuver that gave the world of skateboarding another jump in evolution. this involved slamming the back foot down on to tail end of his skateboard and then proceeding to jump up into the air and as a direct result of this lifting himself along with the skate board up into the air. This was the birth of the 'Ollie' a trick that completely changed the face of modern skateboarding. This paved the way for most tricks today which are based in performing an ollie. As you may well know already the trick still bears his name, and Alan Gelfand was added to the skateboard hall of fame another 24 years later in 2002.
70's
During these years skateboarding's popularity took it's second hard tumble. there were public skate parks that had been being built, but with the danger of skateboarding being a prime factor, insurance rates went totally out of control for the sport. This then had an effect on the number of people coming to use skateparks which forced most to close.
Despite this again there were skaters who kept on skating.
80's
By this time skateboarders were started to build their own ramps at home and to they were using whatever else they could find. Skateboarding began to take a more underground face, with skaterboarders continuing to ride, but to using every object in thier path to create thier skatepark.
During this time smaller skateboard companies that were founded by skateboarders themselves started opening all around. This then meant that each company could be creative and do whatever they wanted in terms of creating new styles and shapes of boards.
This was also the era of the VCR and this resulted in the opening up of the skateboarding world to anyone wherever they were. Two people, George Powell and Stacey Peralta, formed a young team of talented skateboarders, called the Bones Brigade. Stacey's talent was for filming and in 1984 she shot the first of a long series of skateboard videos, that were of a style never seen before. The team included Tony Hawk, Steve Caballero, Mike McGill, Lance Mountain, Stacy Peralta, and Kevin Staab, amongst other soon to be famous skaterboarders.
Unfortunately, when the 80's reached to a close, skateboarding started to once again dive in popularity. Every fall in the popularity of skateboarding has been more severe then the last. This in return had a huge impact on professional skaters who like Tony Hawk had a very difficult time making it through the late 80's and early 90's. Due to this Tony Hawk went through a tremendous amount of stress and even lost his first wife as a direct result.
Early 90's
It is then in the early 90's that skateboarding's popularity started to increase once again, this time with a more determined and dangerous attitude. It was also the time when Mike Vallely and Natas Kaupas came onto the skateboarding scene and pushed street style even further. this was at the same time and parallel to the more angry punk music.
Late 90's
In 1995 in Rhode Island, ESPN held their first Extreme Games. This first X Games was a large success and it enabled skateboarding to be more attached to the mainstream. It also meant that it was closer to being accepted by the majority of the general population as a whole.
In 1997 "Extreme Sports" were classified as a result of the first Winter X Games being held. on the other hand there were a lot of skateboarders who do not like the way skateboarding had moved from underground to mainstream. Despite this, the X Games did result in the revitalisation of vert skateboarding's popularity. The X Games and similar competitions, have continued to keep vert skateboarding's popularity alive. It has also lead to Vert skateboarding has becoming a much loved spectator sport.
2000 Onwards
In recent times the media and general commercialization of the sport, such as the introduction of products such as skateboarding video games, children's skateboards, etc, have all pulled skateboarding more into the mainstream. One benefit of this is skaters are more widely accepted and the common misconception that all skaters are related to criminal activity has slowly faded. Another point is that with more money being put into skateboarding, there are many more skateparks and better quality skateboards that have been produced.
On the other hand, there is a group of skaters who who strongly disagree with the way skateboarding has been made more mainstream and yearn to go back to underground days.
Due to it's history and the way it is, skateboarding is an individual's sport and there is no definitively right or wrong way to go about skateboarding. However, if skateboarding is classed as an official sport, then this means many skaterboarders are scared that this freedom of choice and opinion will soon die out. This is reflected in the current debate concerning skateboarding becoming an Olympic sport.
Despite this, with the sport having such an action packed short history, it is easy to see that no one knows where skateboarding will stand and how it will evolve from here on out. Skateboarding still has not stopped changing and skaters are constantly creating new stylized tricks and techniques. Skateboards are also continuing to evolve, as skate companies try to make them more durable, resistant and improve the performance of them overall.
So who knows where skateboarding will be in 10, 15 or 20 years time?
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