Archaeology of the Surfboard Fin
The Society of American Archaeology defines its discipline as “the study of the ancient and recent human past through material remains”. Archaeological records generally focus on artifacts, architecture, sites, and cultural landscapes from hundreds to thousands to millions of years ago. So when diving into the archaeology of the surfboard fin, it’s important to note that we’re somewhat constrained by the passage of time, or lack thereof.
Although surfboards have been around for hundreds of years to the credit of ancient Hawaiians, the surfboard fin did not come into existence until the early 1900s. Before then, Hawaiian kings, queens, and ali’i had been “sliding ass” all over Oahu’s south shore amidst summertime swell. It may be theorized that the easily ridable Hawaiian Olo (16-20 feet in length) was designed to avoid royal embarrassment, as long as it pointed straight.
Who first conceived of the surfboard fin as we know it? What did the evolution look like before Australia’s Simon Anderson forever altered surfing’s style and grace in 19881 when he thrust the tri-fin upon us? Let’s review.
Historical Analysis of the Surfboard Fin as it Evolved in (and from) the Hawaiian Islands
Wisconsin Introduces the First Fin
Like the surfboard, the surfboard fin was born in Hawaii, but not by the hands of a Hawaiian. Instead, a man from Wisconsin named Tom Blake was the first to affix a skeg to the bottom of a board, although Duke Kahanamoku was an inspiration for Blake and therefore indirectly instrumental in the advancement of surfboard design:
“At age eighteen, Blake spotted Duke Kahanamoku in a Detroit movie theater lobby—the famous swimmer was on his way home from Belgium, where he’d just won another Olympic gold medal—and he walked over for a handshake. Afterward, Blake would view this moment as a first step on his beach-bound road to redemption. A few months later, in 1921, after a single day’s work on a Texas cattle ranch, he caught one more train to Southern California […] He tried acting and picked up a few bit roles—Blake had leading-man looks, with his tousled hair and bulletproof jaw, but no real talent—then took a Santa Monica lifeguarding job and began to surf. In 1924, still a novice wave-rider but consumed by the sport, he caught a steamer for Hawaii.” (Encyclopedia of Surfing)
In his adopted home of Waikiki Beach, Blake would quickly become responsible for a number of surf craft innovations. The one he was best known for, was the Okohola. Blake’s Okohola was essentially a hollow version of the olo board ridden by ancient Hawaiian royalty. The board was initially referred to as a cigar box, but quickly became known as a kook-box to infer that it allowed a surfer of lesser skill to cheat and catch waves with unearned ease. Say what you will, the Okohola represented an important development in surfboard design, but it was Blake’s tinkering with the skeg concept that may have mattered most.
Recognizing that something had to change in surfboard design to make them do more than follow a singular line on a wave (and keep from spinning out in critical sections) Blake installed a skeg on one of his 14-foot boards in 1935. It worked for boats and airships, so why not wave riding craft? Blake’s (and the world’s) first designated surfboard fin was about 4-inches deep and 6-inches long, and allowed him to ride waves like he never had before:
“I took it out and caught a pretty good wave on it, a six-foot wave, maybe, and it was remarkable the control you had over the board with this little skeg on it. It didn’t spin it, it steered easy, because the tail held steady when you put the pressure on the front, and it turned any way you wanted it, and I knew right from that moment it was a success.” (The Surfboard | Art Style Stoke | Ben Marcus)
Hot Curl, Interrupted
One may assume that the surfboard fin concept would have swept the nation with Blake’s successful test runs, but the takeoff was slow. A subtle skeg was adopted by Pacific Systems Homes balsa-and-redwood surfboards in the late 1930’s, but otherwise the progress was quiet. Why? Running concurrent with Tom Blake’s innovation, was the introduction of the Hot Curl.
South shore surfer John Kelly, in an attempt to solve the same problem that Blake toiled with, opted to trim opposing sides from the tail of his 10-11 foot long solid wood board so that it formed a vee-shape upon head-on inspection. Kelly created a fin without creating a fin, and consequently may have interrupted the trajectory of Blake’s baby.
“What happened was directional stability and speed and a whole new world of waves and surfing that opened up by shrinking the width of the tail and creating a vee that bit into the wave. That narrowed down tail was the hot curl.” (The Surfboard | Art Style Stoke | Ben Marcus)
Aircraft Engineer Brings Fins Back, and Doubles-Down
Tom Blake was partly inspired by the fixed keel design found on the underbelly of airships in creating the first surfboard fin. It is therefore serendipitous that the man who would revive the concept was a surfer from Southern California with a background in aircraft engineering. His name, was Bob Simmons.
Simmons made a number of contributions to surfboard design through the late 1940s and early 1950s.. He experimented with different materials, including balsa, plywood, and foam in addition to game-changing fiberglass. Fiberglass was developed as a replacement for the molded plywood used in aircraft radomes during World War II, which caught the imagination of the Californian. Simmons penchant for cross pollination between military applications and surfboard design also borrowed from a 1947 MIT study in Hawaii on planing hulls of military boats. This propelled his foray into fins. Simmons doubled down on Tom Blake’s invention by being the first to glass-in identical skegs to each side of the tail bottom, effectively creating what we refer to today as a twin fin.
We can only speculate over how much further Simmons could have advanced surfboard craft and fin design. Unfortunately, he died at the age 35 in 1954, when he was struck by his own board while surfing in La Jolla, California. Regardless, Simmons solidified his legacy as the man who most quickly advanced the evolution of the surfboard fin.
Single Minded Through Shortboard Revolution
While Simmons made skegs a staple in surfboards, he wasn’t the only one experimenting with fiberglass and fins. A master-craftsman in surfboard design by the name of Joe Quigg from Santa Monica CA worked along side Simmons in the late 40s and early 50s prior to Simmons untimely demise. In addition to building some of the first polyurethane foam-core boards, Quigg was responsible for designing the first fiberglass single fin and the raked (back-leaning) single fin. When Quigg opened a surf shop in Honolulu in 1953, single fin boards reigned supreme, and his design advances became the standard for more than two decades. A single glassed-in fin graced the bottoms of every Velzy, Bing, Hobie, Noll, and Yater (etc.) on the market, from the island to the mainland and beyond.
Rounded D-fin on a Hobie Phil Edwards model used to ride Pipeline for the first (documented) time
Restoration-ready (right) fiberglass D-fin at Country Surfboards in Haleiwa
The single-fin longboard held it’s ground through the 1950s and early to mid 1960s. There were variations on the design and shape of the single-fin, such as the D-fin, rounded D-fin, reverse D-fin, square-fin, dorsal fin, fathead, hatchet, and straightback, along with more experimental designs such as the butterfly, tunnel, flow-through, and tiger tail fin. Among all of the attempts to make the single fin design more accommodating to a given rider, none were quite as impactful as the contribution made by Hawaiian George Downing. Downing had a massive influence on the evolution of the surfboard fin by inventing the fin box in the early 1950s. The fin box allowed the skeg to be placed deeper into the board and repositioned as needed prior to glassing.
Vintage D-fins and Velzy’s experimental butterfly fin
Something Fishy
Single fins reigned supreme until the 70s. That being said, fins became leaner and pointier in the late 60s with a shortboard revolution that was led by George Greenough, Bob McTavish, and Hawaii’s Dick Brewer. However, rumblings of a double-fin resurgence (since Simmons) came about in 1967. San Diego surfer, Steve Lis, who had a penchant for riding Hawaiian piapo boards from the knee, invented a surfboard known as a fish. The Steve Lis fish was a split-tailed board with enough width to support two low-profile fins. His innovation permitted a revolutionary style of wave-riding that promised a surfer superior carving, tube-riding, and lip smacking ability.
The Lis fish caught the attention of the professional surfing world. On one fateful day in 1976, a pro surfer from Hawaii by the name of Reno Abellira transported one of Lis’ double-finned innovations to Australia and showed it to an emerging Australian pro Mark Richards. This event would give birth to a short-lived but important dominance of the twin-fin on the grand stage of competitive surfing.
Bonzer, Briefly
An original Bonzer on display at Café Haleiwa, Oahu, HI
Before we expand on Mark Richards’ adoption and advancement of the twin-fin in the late 70s, we must briefly discuss the Bonzer. The Bonzer was a three-fin surfboard that was invented by Malcolm and Duncan Campbell of Oxnard, California, in 1972. The two side fins had an even lower profile than those found on Lis’ twin-fin, while the center fin box fit more of a standard sized fin that the surf world was seeing in the 1970s. Ultimately, Bonzer fins were looked at as more of an oddity, and never really took off. Renowned surfboard shaper Bing Copeland did work with the Campbell brothers to make the “”Bing Bonzer” model (shaped by Mike Eaton) but it was a relatively short-lived endeavor. Despite the brevity of the Bonzer “era”, make no bones about it – the Campbell brothers’ gave birth to the three-fin set-up, even though Simon Anderson is credited as being the father.
Wounded Seagull Twin
As alluded to in our discussion about Steve Lis’ fish, the twin-fin was adopted by Australian world tour pro Mark Richards after being introduced to it by Hawaii’s Reno Abellira. However, another Hawaiian (and master-shaper) Dick Brewer, provided Richards with guidance in designing a competition board that featured a pair of six-inch-high fins. This new twin-fin design would be the catalyst that earned Mark Richards four consecutive world titles.
End of an Era
Mark Richards’ twin-fin world title reign came to an end at the same time as the three-fin set-up joined the realm of professional surfing. It was introduced by professional surfer and shaper Simon Anderson in 1981, before it went global in 1982. Anderson dubbed his tri-fin board the thruster. It featured three equal shaped and sized fins, and instantly improved an elite surfer’s ability to hold a line, turn, and generate speed.
For all of the improvements the modern thruster and its ubiquitous fins offered for performance, it stripped away from style and grace. To date, designers tinker away in their SoCal studios, leveraging Computer Aided Design (CAD) to mass produce thruster fins to meet mass demand for thruster boards as consumers imagine themselves being able to surf at a professional level that most can never aspire to. In reality, nearly everyone who isn’t vying for a spot on the World Surf League (WSL) Championship Tour (CT) should stop counting orthodox fins in their quiver of skegs. Unfortunately, most won’t. And thus, our analysis of the evolution of the surfboard fin ends here. Luddite reasoning perhaps, but we’ll leave it to the Class of 2124 to revisit this story in a century or so.
Call it a Comeback?
We certainly won’t see a sweeping single-fin resurgence any time soon, but we are witnessing a “ride everything” revolution. As board design accommodates the nuanced preferences of the most diverse wave-riding population that the world has ever seen, we’re seeing surfboard fin history repeat itself. For instance, single fins are being affixed not just to restore or build replicas of iconic boards, they are being glassed onto new longboard creations as a call for style supersedes performance. Modern big wave gun shapers also honor predecessors like Brewer with glass-on jobs that hold the line at the likes of Waimea Bay.
Moreover, there is an appreciation for fins as much as there is for surfboards of a bygone era. We’re not being hyperbolic in our use of the word “archaeological”, as relics are being dug from Hawaiian reef and displayed on mantles all over the islands and mainland. Salvaged fins are even repurposed and sold as art by the world’s most renowned body surfer and retired Oahu lifeguard, Mark Cunningham, among others.
From the Mark Cunningham collection
Be sure to stop by Surf Museum Hawaii to view our permanent exhibit that details the evolution and history of the surfboard fin.
