Greg Noll is the most mythic of big-wave surfers. Known as “Da Bull,” he was born Greg Lawhead on the 11th of February, 1937 and changed his name after his mother Grace married Ash Noll, a chemist. They lived near the Manhattan Beach pier, where the young boy fished and worked as a bait-disher. Out on the pier, he whiffed the wisdom of the fishermen and first felt the euphoria of the “kook-box” and redwood surfboard sliders riding the swells below. That, he thought, is what I want to do with my life.
There is some controversy over who was the first to ride Waimea Bay, but it’s pretty clear who got the party started. Waimea had been kapu (forbidden) to surfers since December 22, 1943, when a couple of young surfers were caught off shore in an abruptly rising swell, and one of them (Dickie Cross) was famously killed. But on November 7, 1957, clearly at Greg Noll’s instigation, Waimea Bay was ridden for the first time by a daring dozen or so surfers. They included Pat Curren, Harry Schurch, Del Cannon, Mickey Muñoz, Greg’s good friend Mike Stange, Bob Bermell, and Noll, who promptly proclaimed that the taboo was broken. “That first day at Waimea?” Stange says, “No one would even have thought of [riding] it except for Greg.” From then on, Noll found definitive star billing in his pursuit of big waves.“
Greg Noll is a perfectionist, and his boards are much sought after; he has all the work he needs. Meanwhile, there is massive interest in just about any old surfboard. Boards that sold new for $120 in 1962 can go for five or ten thousand today. Surfboard auctions have become large-scale events and are often forums for raising money for surf-related nonprofit organizations. The collector market is on fire, and some of the most desirable commodities are old Greg Noll surfboards.
As the history of surfing becomes increasingly well-documented, the history of surfboards, as expressed in the progression of designs and materials, assumes a concomitant importance. To the educated collectors, these vehicles are sublime interpretations of the creative spirit of their times. But the art of Greg Noll has found a kind of culmination in returning to its ancient inspirations, and reinterpreting them in the light of 50 years of experience with the tools of his trade. The curves and muscles of the breaking wave are carved into these rare, handmade objects, and Noll’s continuing inspiration is to find an essential beauty in the marrying of the solid memory inherent in the wood with the swift-moving form inherent in the wave.