Rotten Apple Media has an archive of California Cheap Skates mail order catalogs that range from 1991 to 2001. The CCS branding that they switched to made me forget that these guys used to call themselves California Cheap Skates. Aside form being an trip through nostalgia, it’s also interesting from a historic point of view, at least if you are one of the geeks frequenting Skate and Annoy. You can trace the de-evolution of skateboard shapes and graphics. In 1991 most of the boards offered had a distinguishable nose and tail, but the shapes in general had already become homogenized. In 1992 you can see the appearance of the the popsicle stick as we know it, as well as the trend towards copyright infringement in art direction. By 1993 there are no longer any shaped boards available, and the general number of companies starts to increase dramatically so the board pictures get smaller and smaller. It’s not until 1997 that a few alternative shapes start to turn up again, mostly in the form of longboards. Those earlier years are also interesting if you look at the offerings from some of the giant names in skateboarding, especially when you put them…

I ribbed them about the lack of photos we got from the grand opening of the new Dunedin Florida park, and David Adams replied that they are too busy skating to take pictures. Fair enough. He did, however, take the time to scan and send in this 1979 postcard of the now defunct Clearwater Florida skatepark, which he said was the last park of it’s kind (until Dunedin) in the west central Florida area. (Did you know there’s cement parks in North Port and Sarasota?) The caption reads “GBM in full take off mode! Awwwk Awwwwkk!!” David also mentions that Ed Womble, George McClellan and himself were on the Clearwater Skatepark team back then, and are still skating today. If you take a look at this postcard, your first reaction might be “Yuck!”, but man, wouldn’t it be fun to go back in time and skate one of these sprawling concrete landscapes? I wouldn’t want all my parks to be like this, but you make your own fun, and I see fun written all over the place. If you’re in the mood for something newer, Chuck Dyer has some shots from opening day of Dunedin.

In honor of EA’s Skate and Tony Hawk’s Proving Ground, which the Interweb™! can’t seem to shut up about. I’m going to bring you seven days of bad skateboarding video games. Day One: Cheap Skate for the Commodore 64, from 1988. Look out! That guy has to dodge meteors! Talk about skate harassment. Giant skateboard with Speed Racer mountain climbing wheels? Check! Button down shirt with smart sweater over the top? Check! (Sorry, this is a U.K. game, so I think “sweater” should read “jumper”)

The Old Man Army crew decided to take off for a weekend to go down to San Diego to see what all of the hoopla was about at the ASR show. They wanted to meet in person a few of the people in the industry that they have dealings with. The only other thing on their agenda was to get a couple of pictures of the kooky skateboard gadgets for the Skate and Annoy. Check out: 2007 ASR with OMA

I thought we would get a lot more pictures from the Dunedin Florida skatepark opening, but so far all I have is a few from local Ed Womble, which includes a shot of Monty Nolder. You guys must have a poser’s scene down there, you don’t deserve a good skatepark! Haw haw! I kid! Check out the pictures after the jump.

I remember the first time I saw an ad for Bacon, it was a full page in Concussion I think. I did find their first graphic amusing. It was just the name spelled out in strips of bacon. However, my first reaction was “Here’s another upstart company with a stupid name that is going to blow through all their money in two years and then go out of business.” Boy was I wrong. Bacon is going strong, and getting stronger, and now I have to live and skate in the same town as that dick Colin who owns the company. Sometimes I even have to suffer the indignity of skating the same spots with him. Apparently, Oregon is some sort of hot spot for skateboarding right now, so he up and moved his company here. They are working on a new video (way to make sure you get your money’s worth from that flame stock footage!) and it looks like it going to be a killer. It’s great seeing some familiar faces destroying some familiar spots in ways you’ve never seen before. Check out the trailer on the Bacon site. You and your speed metal music can go suck an…

It’s amazing how unsophisticated skateboard graphics were in the early 80’s when companies first started to explore designs that were more than just a small logo on the bottom. Believe it or not, some people are going to be pissed off that I posted this picture of a rare old Neil Blender deck that is currently up for auction on eBay. They will say that we are somehow affecting the outcome of the final price, blah blah blah. I’m just using it as an excuse to embed a few Neil Blender videos from YouTube. Notice there is no link to the auction. I don’t want to encourage any (more) of the “Hey, check out my auction!” emails that we already get. After you are done watching these videos, head on over to Neil’s official web site The Heated Wheel.

Sean Cliver has a short interview over at Cool Hunting that is focused on his book Disposable. At the time he gave the interview he had no idea where and when it would show up. I’ve never really trolled Cool Hunting, but it seems like a site for people suffering from really short attention spans, the really lazy or terminally bored. It’s compilation of completely unrelated things that someone has determined “cool.” Disposable has been re-re-released on Ginko Press with minor cosmetic changes and factual corrections making it different from the last version published by Concrete Wave Editions. But of course, if you are a collector, you’ll need to get this one too. Cliver is working on a follow up to Disposable that he hopes will be released in Spring of 2008. Yes, much to my wife’s good humor, for the past 10 months I’ve been working on another follow-up book of sorts. This one will be more “collector” based, and my main intent is to showcase a big gallery of deck images from the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and just a smattering of the 00s. I’ve pillaged/shot a number of heretofore unseen collections and archives, so I promise lots…

This Titan missile silo complex located one and a half hours west of Spokane Washington is for sale. $1.5 million dollars gets you 57 acres, three missile silos, thirteen other underground buildings and the most expensive street skating spot you can find. At least you won’t go to prison for barging it. Looks like a great spot for a photo shoot. [Source: Gizmodo]