I had recollections of this board. I had seen pictures, but never in detail. It’s the kind of skateboard that lives in back of your subconscious. You know it exits, but what the hell it s called? It bubbled up to my attention again while searching for pictures of the boards featured in the Department Store Catalog gallery. It was titled simply “Adjustable 24″ Skateboard suitable for bare feet or shoes.” Trying to pull the name of this thing out of thin air proved near impossible, but eventually the right combination of search words led to an auction of the Tuk n Roller. The images had been removed, but the seller hamitup, graciously responded to my enquiry and sent pictures.
I’ve never seen one of these things in the real world, and my fuzzy recollection of pictures or ads made me think it was from the 70’s. I also recall someone making a similar board to this in the 00’s. It appears in a Spring/Summer catalog from 1966, so it could have been made in 1965, if not earlier.
These photos are from a past auction that was unsuccessful. The asking price was a cool $13k, which might see extreme (it does) but there’s currently a single gold version with a price tag of $7,779. Who has the money buy these things? Not me, not even SKHoF. The seller said this collection was being handled for a 3rd party, and they couldn’t give me any further information about it. It will likely turn up again.
Let the glitter disco vinyl padded skateboard parade begin!
These trucks have the largest baseplates in existence. What exactly is going on there with that groove down the middle? I’d love to see multiple close up views of these. (Update: They are adjustable. See the ad)
This delaminated green board demystifies the construction of the Tuk n Roller. It looks like there was very little padding at all. It also appears that this is not one of the pristine boards from the auction, unless it was refurbed. That does look like generic vinyl molding along the rails.
Back to the glamour shots…
Western Skate Company
For sale at Western Skate Company This version is apparently known as “Go Granny Gold.”
Here’s a couple more from random, dead auctions.
So that’s the Tuk n Roller board. Pretty groovy. I can imagine some barefoot kid with cuffed jeans and a Pendleton shirt under a windbreaker, rolling down the sidewalk on one of these, eventually eating shit because the clay wheels catch a pebble! I’m going to see if I can find that early 00’s take on this. Hopefully I’m not conflating it with the carpet boards that were ubiquitous for a while. I think they might have been a product aimed at little kids.
SUCCESS!
A reddit user pointed me to the “Tuck n Rolla” tribute board board that Santa Cruz released in 2010, which led me to a a post by an old friend of the site Sa Ka Roulé. And there it was, an old ad for the Tuk n Roller! I headed over to my pile of Skateboarder Magazine reprints and scanned this one from Volume 1 #3, from August, 1965. Did I say reprints??? Yes I did. You can (and should) buy these, reasonably priced repros from Crop Mark, the same publisher of GSDs Best of Skate Fate!
The Tributes.
Where else but Skate and Annoy? Check out the Inside Skate, circa 2006. They even called it a “Tuck n’ Roll.” It’s unclear how many, if any of these were actually sold. It has the feel of an art project. There’s also a very expensive padded longboard used as set dressing in Nordstrom, circa 2008.
Santa Cruz “Tuck N Rolla”
Released in 2010.
This image from Kevin Shaw
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