Sky Dog Surfboards, Oceanside

As the Rev. Horton Heat might say, "I can't surf."

That's important, in that I've been a swimmer my whole life, and I was a pretty good body surfer in high school, but I never did learn how to surf, though I still have a couple of surf boards around the house.

My father-in-law never ceases to amaze me. He surfed with his Baldwin Park buddies back in the 60's, and a couple of years ago, when he was cleaning out his garage, he brought up a board that one of his buddies had made. It's a single fin short board, (around 5'8"), and if I remember correctly, he said that he and his buddy were driving trucks cross country in the early 70's, and his buddy decided that they needed a surfboard. His buddy shaped boards part-time, and created this one in '74 to fit under the cab of their truck, so that they could do some East Coast surfing if the opportunity arose. I don't recall if the board ever made it into the South Carolina surf or not. My father-in-law reads this blog once in a while, so I'll correct the story if he wants me to.

The way I remember hearing the story, though, is a pretty good. The board's shaper had a cool name, "Sky Dog," but I still don't surf, and starting on a short board I knew that is too small for me in the first place would be a disaster. I took it anyway, and hung it from the rafters of my garage, in case one of my kids decides to take up surfing-unlikely, but it's a good board, and I didn't want it to get beaten up outside.

The last time I saw my father-in-law, he mentioned that his old buddy had just died, and he was going to attend the service.

Then, last night, he called and left a message that he was going to come by and pick up the board. I couldn't quite get if he was going to do the paddle-out ceremony, which I don't think will go well on that short board, or he wants to bring it down to show off and possibly donate to the museum. Either way, just reading the few brief things on the internet, it seems like Skydog was a pretty good guy, and my father-in-law seemed to like him, so I'm throwing this post out in the blogosphere. If you trip over this post, and knew Skydog, (aka Dan Highland), go to the Skydog Surfboards page and add your memories.

Skydog, RIP.

8/2
My father-in-law came by and got the board yesterday. He just wanted to have it down there, and said that he hoped someone's kid would be willing to paddle it out. He said that Skydog was only about 130 lbs. or so, and that was the weight the board was designed for. He wanted to go down and prove what everyone will already know, that Skydog was such a hard core surfer that even though he was driving a truck cross-country, with little chance of actually making it in the water, he wanted to have a surfboard with him. Sounds like a good guy to me.