surfresearch

pods for primates : a catalogue of surfboards in australia since 1900

surfresearch.com.au
museums : slsa museum, bondi

Surf Life Saving Australia Museum, Bondi, NSW.

1 Notts Avenue Bondi Beach NSW 2026
Phone : 61 2 91307370
Contact : Dayna Hogdetts (National Development Manager)
danya@slsa.asn.au
Location : South end of Bondi Beach above the Icebergs Club Second Floor
Web : www.slsa.asn.au

A small, well presented, collection of SLSA items in a great location.
Some historical data is open to discussion, the highlight for boardriders is a 1917
solid wood board facing the entrance, see below.

Items of Interest

Oswald 'Ozzie' Downing's 1917 Surf Shooting Board
8 ft 5 inch Solid wood finless Alaia
A copy of Duke Kahanamoku's board, the board was gifted to Snowy McAlister.
Ozzie Downing wasa an architecture student and prepared blueprints of the design.
Snowy McAlister donated the board to the SLSA in 1974
Catalogue #175, click image right.

Model reel and line
With a fixed metal plate reading ...
"Designed jointly by George Henry Williams RLSS and Major Bond (a Royal Australian Medical Corps officer and instructor)..Presented by the family of George Henry Williams"
Note that this is not one of the commonly known attributions of this design. See History - Before Duke.
RLSS - Royal Life Saving Society, introduced to Australia in 1894
Major Bond was a Royal Australian Medical Corps officer and instructor, who formed Life Saving Brigades at Bronte and Bondi in the late 1890's.

Early model rescue tube, circa 1960.
Rubber adaptation of Walter V. H Biddell's Torpedo Buoy.

Timber and metal reel with lines and canvas belt, circa 1940.
Restored from the Coolangatta Club.
Image right

Surf Carnival Program Manly 6- 8 December 1919
Memorial carnival for Lt. Cecil Healy, killed in World War I .

The Australian Surf Life Saving Handbook Eigth Edition (Revised 1929)
JNO, Evans and Son Printing Coy., 486-488 Kent Street Sydney, New South Wales
Possibly contains Solid Wood Board Plans, as in the tenth edition of 1938, page 182

Australian and International Surf Carnivals Program, Torquay, 1956
The carnival was in conjunction with the Melbourne Olympic Games and was the first public demonstration of fibreglassed Malibu surfboards in Australia..

Additional Notes to the Australian Championships Progam, 1966
The first carnival to feature the Iron Man event and the use of the Malibu board in competition.

Models of surfboats, reels and a surfski.
By the Maritime Model Museum. 02 9262 1457

Photographs and specifications Monday 25th November 2002. (Sydney was 38 degrees)

Surf Life Saving Australia Museum, Bondi, NSW.
Image from Surf Life Saving Australia Annual Report 2002, page 6.

Last Updated 2002.12.08