In Oregon, the Lake Oswego Observer reports
that a kid named Kosh McClure was hit by a train while skating and lived to tell the tale.

Kosh McClure didn’t know how close he had come to dying until he awoke on a sidewalk on State Street. “I was laying on the ground and I couldn’t see,” McClure recalled. “Everything was really fuzzy. Everyone was like, “You got hit by a train!'”  As he recovered this week from a near-death experience, McClure and his mother, Jodi Roderick McClure, counted their blessings. The 15-year-old Lake Oswego High School sophomore spoke calmly about what it’s like to be hit by a locomotive.

And no, he wasn’t wearing a helmet, so that finally debunks that myth, huh kids? But the man won’t leave him be. The Lake Oswego police chief mentioned that Kosh should have been wearing a helmet by state law, and his case has been referred to juvenile court for a city ordinance regarding hazardous riding. That will teach him. Amazingly, some people are blaming the markings on the street and not the skater. Check out Train vs. Skateboard.

Fuel TV’s Insane Cinema series is running a feature called Skate Girl that focuses on the trials and tribulations of being a female skater, as well as a little history. It’s a pretty good feature, but not without it’s flaws. They interview Peggy Oki, who probably wasn’t too hard to track down, but nothing about other famous female pioneers like Ellen Oneil and Pat McGee. Also, it’s hard to comment on this film without mentioning something that is either funny or sad, depending on how you look at it. This documentary on the struggle of female skateboards to be taken seriously is continuously interrupted by little station bumps in the corner of the screen that are, more often than not, jiggle girls like bikini clad bimbo in the shot above. That has to be bittersweet for the girls in the viewing audience. An interesting side note, the credits reveal the the skate photographer is none other than Lisa Whitaker, the stunt double from the old Capri Slims skateboarding commercial we featured earlier.

Rob React has a small set of “Old School Boston Skateboarding” pics up on Flickr. Turns out he was part of the old “Limozine” crew. The spot above was known as Turtles. I have two old copies of Limozine that I need to add to our 80’s Zine Archives.

[Source: Drunken fist]

One of the things on my long list of “eventuallys” for this site is a gallery of dead skateboard magazines. I have a milk crate in my basement with some old skate rags, and I thought I had a few gems that would surprise people. Well I don’t have anything compared to Vintage Skateboard Magazines. It’s a work in progress without a lot of bells and whistles. What it does have are covers of skateboarding magazines from the 60’s to the 80’s from the US, UK, France, Australia and Japan. Some of the UK issues have scans of inside pages as well. There’s a lot of interesting documentation there, my only beef is that the scans aren’t larger. If it were up to me, every page would be available, but then again maybe it’s a good thing it isn’t up to me since our gallery isn’t even up yet. Check out the varied and often wacky past of skateboard magazine publishing at Vintage Skateboard Magazines.

It’s time for the annual Grind for Life awards benefit/contest/demo/party. If you are anywhere near the neighborhood of Cocoa Beach Florida you should consider making a day of it. Dan Hatcher writes:

Hey everyone, if you missed this one last year, you must have heard about it by now. Nearly 1500 attended last year so you don’t want to miss out this year. Saturday Nov 17 —

Along with the pro demos, free stuff, food and music from local rock band “Arkaydia” we will also be hosting an all ages flow course contest. Gates and registration open at 10am and contest will start around 11sm. Hope to see all of you there. This is a great event for a great cause and tons of fun!

The mission of the Grind For Life organization is to provide financial assistance to cancer patients and their families when traveling long distances to doctors and hospitals. They also educate and inspire cancer patients and their families about cancer survival and recovery. You can view the whole flyer after the jump or get more info from Grind for Life and the Cocoa Beach Skatepark.

This weeks SOTW comes from Kings Park in Bristols UK, courtesy of Bob Scumtash.

So we went to Kings Park t’other weekend and some tweaker turned up with a loada posh camera gear. “I used to skate, can I take your pic?” Errrm…Wayne had a quiet word bout “reprezentin tings” correctly and we did some stunts. Got a bit lame after a while and the dude started to take shots of us carving a corner, never one to miss an opportunity I hitched me kegs down a little a did a sweet carve over his head for the close up Harris shot. This one’s a keeper mate…

I had a hard time deciding on whether or not this was a candidate for Annoying Kid of the Month. I figured Shot of the Week was a better fit. Besides, I don’t want to have to start updating that section too! Check it out in all it’s, uh, full glory.

Sure some of us struggle to put out one print issue every couple of years, and we make excuses. Meanwhile, others don’t seem to have a problem. A couple years ago I read about Lowcard in Thrasher and sent away for an issue. They sent me issue #8 from April of 2005. It’s 40 pages of photos and handwritten text and manual paste ups that looks like it was printed on a copier with a photo screening feature. Good stuff, nothing amazing, but ther was a lot of it. About a month ago I happened upon a copy of Lowcard #19 from September of this year. It still has the same page size, but it’s 92 pages offset print on glossy paper with a heavy stock cover, and the paste up has been replaced with computer type. There area ton of ads (someone one has to pay for that glossy paper) and lots more photography. That’s quite a difference for two years and 11 issues. It kind of reminds me of Concussion cut in half, right down to the feature on bad tattoos. I think Lowcard came through Portland this summer because one weekend all of the sudden everybody and their brother (sorry, I mean “bro”) was wearing Lowcard paraphernalia. I felt like I did in high school when everyone was wearing their Van Halen concert t’s on Monday morning except for the dorks that didn’t go. Print is rough. I wonder how they made it happen? Hard work and sacrifice, I’m sure. Check out Lowcard.

I reviewed Original skateboards deck and trucks a while back. They have a video that went up on YouTube a couple of days ago. Nothing in the way of radical skateboarding but a relaxed soulful feel. Makes me want to go ride some hills. The footage is from the coast of Maine.

Hood River Oregon’s small and dedicated group of young builders has accomplished allot of work in a short time. The team was headed by Mark Goddard of Benchmark Designs, but he recently departed and left in apparent puff over the design. I applaud the remaining crew for standing up for this communities local scene, hell, they skate it everyday and have serious pride in the outcome of this project.

UPDATE: I got a call (!) from Mark who informed me this was never a Benchmark project, he was never the boss, and he was just hired on as an employee. He didn’t leave on bad terms with anyone. It was one of those “agree to disagree” situations. Our apologies to Mark Goddard. – K.ed

Several of our jokes were thwarted at the opening of the Jim Griffith Memorial Skatepark in Tigard yesterday.