This photo of me at Sandon Point was taken by Jack Eden in 1965 at that time I was riding a 10ft 2" Graham King old style mal this photo & a couple of others were included in the Surfabout surf magazine article featuring Bobby Brown.
This Photo was taken about 6 months to a year later also at Sandon point this was the first Bill Collins surfboard ever made ,a copy of a Bobby Brown stringer-less it was 8ft 6" long about 23" wide deep "V" tail dunny seat concave under the nose one of the best surfboards I have ever ridden
Glassing one of the few boards made in the Bald Hill Stanwell Park factory
Only a few weeks ago during a visit from my old school mate Bill Trestrail I was able to make contact with another old school mate Trevor Stephens who still lives in the same house in Stanwell Park Trevor has a lot of old photos of some of my old boards ,cars & old mates & stuff just like this one of the old service station on to of bald hill which is where the first Bill Collins surfboards were made as you all remember the service station was pulled down so ending the business partnership as Bill was an interstate truck driver at the time making a lot more money than building surfboards,if I had any sense I should have stayed working in the coal mines ,instead I found another factory in Thirroul shown in the next photo .
In this photo you will see the factory at the bottom of Kennedys hill between Thirroul & Austinmere & from left to right brothers Mark & Danny Maher, me looking trim & slim back in those days & in front Trevor Stephens . You can also see one of the two first Collins surfboards that were made in the old service station above,this is the board that is shown in the photo of me at Sandon Point above . My Mate Bill had a board exactly the same in mint condition & sold it for $30 a few years ago you wont believe how pissed off I was when I found out ,so was he when he realised it was worth around $1000 today
I am sure a lot of you looking at these photos will remember just how good these boards went hope you also remember the great surf & times we had back then if only we could turn back time
These photos were posted on Ebay the board eventually sold for an incredible $750 perhaps the buyer was the original owner who wanted to relive those good times .
My first car a 1937 Vauxall in this picture on the windscreen Graham Coleman on the mudguard my sister Lesley, sitting on the board me next to me George Blackwell also on the roof Darryl McCullough & with his head in the window my brother Barry.
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This is a picture of me at Stanwell Park with my Gordon woods 9' 6" mal & of course my much loved 1962 EK panel van wish I still had them both
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You are not going to believe where this photo was taken ,here we are my brother Barry in the photo the guy who owned the car Roy ( Rocky) Hardacher & myself free camping at Wategoes beach Byron bay in 1961 the car I think was a Morris Major please correct me if I am wrong this was our first surf safari ever away from Stanwell Park , what a pity we never had the foresight or the money we could have bought the whole beach for a few thousand pounds
All rite just for you Rob these two photos of me were taken by my partner Maureen last year about May this perfect left worked for 3 days the next surf I had was October a bloody long time between surfs due to the constant southerly and almost continuous rain what a shit year weather wise 2011 was
Back in the early sixties surf life saving clubs, due to the board riding craze that took over the world, had great difficulties in stopping surfboard riders from surfing between the flags, the solution was to make all board riders register their boards by paying a fee to the local council unless you had your board registered you could be fined . The surf clubs then had the authority to confiscate boards from those caught riding between the flags ,not sure if it was too hard to police or whether after getting your board confiscated we all woke up & got the message & stuck to the rules but pretty soon surfboard registration was cancelled . The photo above is a make up of the original & stuck on a tile to use as a place mat ,the photo below is an original on an old balsa board that is in my shed , you can see that it was in force from 1964-1965 in the Sutherland Shire & the registration number is 8 very rare indeed