That’s right, we’ve got a 20+ year old beef and we’re calling out Jeff Kendall. Sure, he’s probably got a life and has moved on, but we haven’t, obviously. I would say we’re tryng to embarass him with these old pictures, but there isn’t really anything embarrassing about them, considering he was 14 years old when these were taken by friend Bob Pribble Swamp:
Kendall is 14 years old in those pictures. The year is 1981 and he’s riding my old Losi Variflex deck on some ACS trucks and Kanoa Rollout wheels. Why do I remember all this useless information? The Roxbury Ramp was located at Chip Jones house in Indianapolis, IN.
Check them out after the jump.
Click to enlarge.
33 comments
S Hughes
First time I met Sean was when I was a 13 yr old grommet. We had a 1/4 pipe out front, it was maybe 1985. Sean rolls up seeing it and wants to ride. He was a full grown man with a leather biker jacket to us. We thought he was so cool. To me he seemed like he should ride for ALVA or something. LOL. Lots of kids younger who skated around Broad Ripple always looked up to him even back then.
Schick
haha my dad steve schick helped build that! he tells us stories about it and all of his friends from when he was a kid. have a picture of it hanging in my room, stoked to see it here!
Craig Hagadone
Hi everybody It’s Craig Hagadone, from back in the day, I just heard Sean and it breaks my heart.I lost track of him, I went back in 2007 looking to find Sean ,but no one could help me. I would like to say Hi to Shannon, and his folks. Who treated me like family. I live in Malibu now, I have a nice life, I was just thinking of Sean and Googled him to find this all out.
I miss all the summers skating and getting drunk. The 80’s were the shit.
what’s up Jeff Kendall? How’s the family, have a son who is Three. If anyone ever wants to talk or just catch up, call me 1-310-924-0153
chuck janke
1981 I wasnt even born yet but my dad was im jeffs second cusin my whole life i heard how great of a skater he was and looked up to him ever since with the one pic i got from unc sunny and my favorite poster of jeff .I still represent in 08 when i cruise my black ford around indy with my jeff kendall stickr thats probably older than me.
Chantel
Shannon,
I just heard about Sean…Im just sick with the news of his death. Found out at a skate park..go figure. I saw your blog on the myspace about why now…I wonder that myself. It just made me remember so many troubled nights at your house as well as some fun childhood memeories..watching him skate over at jeff’s and by the ROCK, playing frisbee, stealing his clove cigs, Sunkist and the best 8 track collection I ever saw.haha God bless you and your family.
Shannon West
I want people to keep talking about Sean. Can some of you guys do that for me?
mark plumlee/quigley
sean and i shared alot in common, we were both skaters, punks, carpenters, addicts, alcoholics, but more than anything we both just wanted to have some fun. i mean fuck, it was the eighties. sean was the quintessential skate punk, icon, enigma, hero. i first met sean at fathers day mondo along with eric lee, jeff kendall and the rest of the east side skate crew that i had no idea existed and they had a ramp. a fucking big ramp, “love ramp” was its name, so it was ripple meets lawrence, if i remember correct it was stern and jeremy and myself piled in colliers honda but before we could get on the road it was a quick trip through broad ripple and who do we find? jesse manduley(R.I.P.), of course jesse wants to skate love ramp and of course we want jesse to come. so off we go, when we get there we are blown away. kendall is ripping of course, smithverts, ho ho plants, etc. but seeing sean skate was something different, sean could skate, sean could skate anything. he would rock and roll slide the length of the ramp(28′) while tipping up a longneck. drop in from the tombstone and blast backside airs over the channel. sean skated with such authority and power, commitment. i think my favorite was watching sean do hang ten nose wheelies as fast as he could, clear across the vogue parking lot, big carving turns getting smaller and smaller until he was just spinning 360’s on the nose. sean was awesome, he had a huge heart and looked out for all of us kids, he inspired me on many levels not just skating. when we were moshing, sean was one of the big guys i would try and find when claiming a stage dive. sean was always punk, and true to what he believed. i will miss sean very much,i have been procrastinating writing this since wednesday because it’s been tough to face that sean is gone. he was the familiar face i seemed to always find in what once was broadripple, i will miss sean, i already miss him. the world was a better place before sean died.
R.I.P. SWEST
Raegan
I have so many good memories of our Dear Friend Sean. Alot of you on here, are also in those memories. I pray he is at rest, and skating that huge ass skate park in the sky. Shannon- I am very sorry for your loss! Alot of us looked up to Sean. He will be greatly missed! He will always be remembered.
A true LEGEND as far as I am concerned!
Raegan
drickd
Shannon,
This is Rick Daugherty. I am very sorry to hear about Sean. Even though I wasn’t coordinated enough and to big to really skate I always thought your bro was the coolest. Back in the day getting off the bus at the corner by your house and there was Sean skating in the street or riding wheelies. It was always a blast going over to Kendalls with my little bro to watch them all skate and Sean always giving the young dudes advice. ELee gave me your email I’ll send you a note. My prayers are with your family. Look for drickd69@yahoo.com.
matts1w
Shannon-
I am so sorry. I thought you might like to see more discussion of Sean on this website: musicalfamilytree.net
Actual links are here: http://www.musicalfamilytree.net/profiles/blog/show?id=2000984%3ABlogPost%3A31459
and here:
http://www.musicalfamilytree.net/photo/photo/show?id=2000984%3APhoto%3A30924
When you find time email me at schaf_matt (at) yahoo (dot) com. I would love to get caught up.
Matt S.
Shannon West
Hi. I’m Sean’s sister. (the one who used to hang out and watch you guys skate all the time, and smoke a clove or two). We will be burying Sean Tuesday. I still can’t elieve he is gone. It is good to hear that he touched so many lives, despite his own being so unmanagable. He would have loved to know that you guys still thought about him.~ Swestra
Swamp
Swest was hardcore…built more ramps than most people have skated their entire lives…favorite Swest memory: Acid Dropped Roxbury…made it…went for it again, fully slammed straight to bottom and bounced a foot in the air…got up and started skating again (all of which was caught on the only video footage of Roxbury, which Swest promptly took to a party and lost). – Chip
PRBL
it was really sad to hear the news about Swest…he was the most hardcore skater and punkest dude out of all of us back in the day…he was always down to ride and always down to have some fun…I would love to hear from some of you guys I lost touch with and those who knew Swest…e-mail me at prble (at) yahoo (dot) com
matts1w
Although I hoped to never hear this, I have to say that many people always feared this would happen. Anyone who knew Sean West through the years remembers two people. He had a very dark, troubled side that, quite frankly, was very scary and self destructive. Nonetheless, I will always choose to remember the side of Sean that made him so popular and carefree. He had great charisma and a huge heart that I loved.
Sean and I shared a house in 1988-1989. At that time he was clean and trying to put some pieces of his life together. I ended up heading to Bloomington, Indiana, and Sean soon dropped back off the deep end
Kilwag
Sorry to hear that for those of you that knew him. There’s at least one picture of him in Convert #7
Kilwag
I’ll send him a note. I can’t give out emails without permission.
Elee
Sean “Swest” West was the “old guy” back in the day in Indianapolis. He skated Roxbury and was neighbors with Kendal. I have no way of getting in touch Bob Pribble or Chip and came across this post and thought they might see it. I am sure Bob would like to know that he passed away, if you know how to contact Pribble. Thanks !
Kilwag
Sorry, I don’t know who he is, is he related to this post?
Elee
Sean West died a few days ago. Thought you guys might like to know. Very sad Sean sold me my first board. He had been hangin around my sister and Steve Pratt recently. I just found out today.
PunkinHead
pribble is one sexy dude. is see him skating all the time and i’d love to f@!k him. then he could hold me in his big strong arms and tell e stories about the old days.
Swamp
I can’t remember if we opened that show, but afterwords Negative Element came to my house and the bass player showed us his talent of lighting farts on the flat-bottom of our ramp. My dad was pretty psyched when he woke up the next morning and found Negative Element sprawled all over the house and eating pancakes. Those guys were great, both as a band and as people.
hector martinez
legend
brad
Bob- your right about all of those facts- only I joined that band after that 7″ and gig in Indy. That 7″ has been going off pretty high on ebay lately, I’ve got like 4 of ’em sitting around from the old days. We used to skate in Springfield, Ill. a lot in ’83 at Bruce’s ramp, but I don’t think you made it over there.
PRBL
Brad, I could swear that your band Negative Element played in Indianapolis in ’82 or ’83, perhaps with Swamp’s, Kendall’s and my band Poison Center, and that we all raged at Swamp’s house after the show and rode the Roxbury Ramp the next day. You guys had a record out called Yes We Have Bananas or something like that, right? (I still got that vinyl in my collection.) Help me out here. Too bad Swamp is away the weekend or he could straighen me out…Livmo, go check out the back cover of the Jan. ’84 Thrasher
brad
Bob- I was in Peoria Illinois, I joined a hardcore band with the Stepe brothers (Negative Element), and started skating in ’83. We were devastated not to make onto the Master Tape comp. out of Indiana. So didn’t skate with you but knew of you a little bit. I lived in Indy in 2001 for about a minute before heading to Portland.
Livmo
I thought the Flagship ad was Chris Black at Del Mar… diff ad?
PRBL
Good fashion call, Livmo, never thought about it like that…as a proud member of Team Beer Gut and so as to not scare the street flippers at the local park, I’m back to wearing the full shirt; Swamp took those pics, for sure, and he was either too lazy for too into little boy butt to to snap that one from the other side of the ramp; Brad, did we ride together back in Indian-no-place…that ditch was called the Dump and located just off of Arlington Ave., near 56th St.
Livmo
Shirt fads in the 80’s; Went from full shirts, to half-shirts, to no shirt and tying them around your waist, and finally to wearing just the sleeve on your head.
brad
We used to stare at Pribble’s Sims Flagship add on the back page of Thrasher- wasn’t it a backside boneless in some ditch?
Kilwag
I got them from Pribble, just assumed he took them. Should the copyright read “Swamp?”
I’m rocking the Half shirt right now. it’s Casual Friday!
bk
Wow! Anyone else remember the “half shirt” phase of the 80s?
Swamp
Nope, the ramp was next to a tennis court (is that suburban enough?), and yes, we would go see the Zero Boys after ripping all day…If Pribble told you he took these pics he’s a liar…I took them!
brad
…is that ramp next a golf course (seriously I want to know, I used to live there)? Did you go see the Zero Boys after ripping all day?