If I didn’t know better I’d think this was a gag from GVK. The ad copy is absurd. “The ol’ Mersedes Bends Skatboard Factory?” Seriously? Even if “skateboard” wasn’t misspelled, that would still be a bit much. Twenty dollars will buy you the hottest skateboard you’ve ever seen. Star wheels designed by freestyle champ Ed Nadalin normally sell for $79.95 each (yes, each) but through this ad you can get a complete set for only $12. That’s an amazing 97% discount! Pre-designed configural CAMBER-FLEX? They make a big deal about including sealed bearings, so you know it must be 1976, and it is. Volume 3, Number 1, which is the October 1976 issue of Skateboarder Magazine. My best friend in grade school nada plastic board with a Mercedes logo relief on top, but no name visible anywhere. It always impressed me as a kid. We all called it the Mercedes Benz board. I’m surprised Skateboarder agreed to print this advertisement, it would be the same thing as Thrasher running an ad for Nash…. Oh wait, they actually did that all the time.

It may actually take decades to respond to reader mail, a Jim Gray can attest. I recently found an envelope from the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, mailed to Skate and Annoy sometime in 1988, only to be fully examined in an entirely different millennium. Do I regret not reading this letter from Darko Kolesar, AKA “Gricko” from Zehun, Yogoslavia? Do I lament the lost opportunity to create a cross-cultured, transcontinental friendship, let alone the chance to establish an outpost behind the Iron Curtain? Would I have loved to have a copy of the Yugoslavian skate zine Body & Soul in my collection? Do I wonder what Yugoslavian skate rock sounded like in the 80’s? Do fell like a dick? Yes. UPDATE: A response from Gricko! Thanks to everyone who helped track him down. Read the Darko chronicle appended to the post!

SFGate has posted some pictures in a feature called Four decades of skateboarding in San Francisco. It’s part of their Let’s Go to the Morgue! series where they dig up old photographs from the San Francisco Chronicle. Better versions of the picture, along with a little commentary are on the SFGate blog. The earliest photo dates back to 1964, and the last one is from 1994.

A Flex-trol skateboard, apparently the first one on the Interwebs, as I couldn’t find a single image of one anywhere. I’m guessing the name is combination of “flex” and “control.” Yeah I know, wild guess. This skateboard is fitted with a tension and torque control bar. The trucks are held at a fixed distance by the bar and as result: Has a sharp turning radius. It takes less lean to do a turn. Fewer skid-outs. The control bar tends to keep all 4 wheels on the ground during maneuvers. Board flex is controlled. As the flex increases, the board stiffens. This eliminates any “mushy” feel. Manufactured by the good folks at A.E. & Co out of Tarzana, Ca. I’m tempted to look it up and see if that patent ever got awarded. List of possible subtitles for this post: It takes less lean to do a turn. Fewer skid-outs As the flex increases, the board stiffens? Danimal picked this up recently at a Good Will!

Original vintage no skateboarding poster on sale at Antikbar. Published by the British Railways Board in 1978, it will set you back £325.00 or about $560. Pretty cool, but not that’s a steep price. There must be a British Railways Board collector’s scene.

I love the packaging from 70’s era skateboard parts. These parts are shrink-wrapped on a display card for hanging up on pegboard hooks, as if you could go to your local grocery or toy store and pick up a few items for your skateboard. Check out some goods from GT, aka Grentec Leisure Products.

The first half of the 1960s were the hey-days for Surf Music with a high percentage of bands being from California. Many of those bands also wrote songs about Skateboarding or what then was known as “Sidewalk Surfing” (I counted about 30 releases so far from that era, including bands from other genres). But there were also bands from such “exotic” places like Texas.

The news about the new skatepark design meeting in Tampa got me thinking about the Bro Bowl. Ages ago I posted about a Bro Bowl documentary that was in progress, so I decided to see if anything ever came from it. They finished it, and it’s available for viewing in it’s entirety. The opening sequence starts off a bit rough, but once you get past that, it’s pretty good. Notably missing, however, if an interview with the guy who designed and built the place, Joel Jackson. The Tampa Bay Times interviewed him in conjunction with the Bro Bowl being nominated for the National Register of Historic Places as one of only two 70’s era public skateparks still in existence in the USA. The par was originally surrounded by housing projects, but the whole area is slated for redevelopment. It’s not quite the same situation as Southbank, the redevelopment is in advance of a State of Florida Department of Transportation edict to widen the road adjacent to the skatepark. The city has advised locals to accept a the funding of a replacement park as the best possible outcome, over any temporary reprieve that activism may be able to achieve. The history…