SOUTH AUSTRALIA’S ONLINE SUFING MUSEUM
South Australias Board Builders
John Arnold Surfboards
1 INTRODUCTION
John Arnold Surfboards South Australia
John Arnold like many of the early pioneer surfers started in lifesaving. He won numerous state titles on surf skis in the mid 50’s before latching onto the surfing craze after the 56 Olympics when US surfers introduced the malibu surfboards to Australia. He was an early member of the South Coast Surfchasers that included the likes of John Brown, Jimmy Miller, Ron Sutton, George Wortman, etc. These guys were amongst the first to surf a lot of the breaks that we take for granted around South Australia today.
The South Coast Surf Chaser
During the early 60s John started making a few surf movies, to help promote surfing in south Australia. In the next few years John set of through Asia, Japan, Hawaii and the USA making heaps of contacts along the way and when he returned to Australia He started up a surf shop of sorts in his parents shoe shop selling boards from interstate and some local shapers such as Ashley Waldeck. Then around 1965 he opened John Arnold surf shop in Gawler Place in the Centre of Adelaide. This location was convenient because there was a maze of rooms in the back of the shop where he could manufacture the boards. This is when John Arnold surfboards began.
John and Ziggy new shop boards
Within the next few years he was building surfboards, making surf movies, manufacturing wetsuits and by the late sixties had the top young surfer in the world Wayne Lynch riding for for him. Having Wayne Lynch the most exiting surfer of that time in the world on his boards created an export market and took his surfboards to the world.
During the seventies John also manufactured wetsuits under the Oneill brand and introduced Golden Breed to Australia.This was all prior to brands such as Quiksilver, Billabong and Ripcurl, making John the first major surf entrepreneur in Australia.
To run a good organisation you need good people. John had great help from Malcolm Lock who ran most of the day to day stuff. Shaper Zig (Ziggy) Kwiatkowski who shaped the boards from the mid 60s to the start of the seventies. Wayne Dale who shaped boards during the late 60s and early seventies. Wayne Dale also shaped most of Wayne Lyches board through this period.
Jack Oneil With Malcom Lock
Unfortunately by the end of the seventies this major surf enterprise had hit legal and financial problems and Golden Breed ended its operations in South Australia.
Shapers of John Arnold surfboards in South Australia
Shapers
Sig (Ziggy) Kwiatkowski
Wayne Dale
Bill Johnson
Gregg Webb
Wayne Lynch
Kym Thompson
Greg Frost
Barry Young
Ian Hendy Pooley
