The Examiner reports: “Skating a worldwide phenomenon.” Please click through for a thoughtful analysis of this late breaking news item.

Found after the Battle Ground grand opening.

Aside from being a place where you can buy skateboards online, Ward Boards has a couple of nice pages worth of photos that date from the 70’s through present day. The park in the top left (name?) reminds me a little of something else. It looks like it could have been a lot of fun or a complete nightmare. Let’s not forget the barrel jump shot directly underneath. That’s about the only aspect of 70’s skateboarding that hasn’t made a comeback.

I’m keeping the same deal in May as I did in April. No Jessees, Grossos, McGills or Hawks. We’re all sick of looking at them, right? Instead there will be more unusual stuff. Maybe not as high dollar, but a lot less dull. This month also saw the Ray Underhill charity auction. Lots of pros and industry bigwigs auctioned off items of interest to raise money for Ray’s medical bills. Now, while this a worthwhile cause and I applaud all of the people who bid high on the auctions, these were often one of a kind items, or more common items that were signed, whose prices were far higher than normal because of the cause. So I won’t be featuring a ton from the Underhill auctions, just a few random items that grabbed my attention.

This month, the column is fueled by nothing. I’m late getting this out because with the weather actually being good I’m out there skating more instead of typing this. So I’m trying to keep this quick and to the point. Also, I want to mention the Art of Skateboarding site. I use it for some of my research, and although it’s not 100% reliable (who is?), it is an invaluable resource. You should check it out.

eBay Watch for May 2007

Last weekend,as threatened, a couple of us went to check out the new Placed to Ride skatepark in Seaside Oregon. Drinving out from Portland, the weather looked like it was going to be a crap shoot. Luckily, although the pictures are all gray and it did sprinkle and mist several times throughout the day, down time was never longer than ten or fifteen minutes. The sporadic moisture kept the crowds at bay. The downside is that the session was not particularly heated so you’ll be getting a lot of general park overview shots. Check it out.

UPDATE: Ported the old static HTML and updated the link.

Old people skateboarding certainly has been done before. (See Granny Skates for CarMax) This is a pretty good commercial from the UK, although I was disappointed that the old guy was a stunt man. For some reason I thought he was actually going to get on a board. Maybe the happy music made think it was going to be one of those touchy-feely “don’t judge a book by it’s cover” public service type of commercials. Instead it’s an ad for something called 118 118 which, near as I can tell has something to do with a phone directory or phone service. The park is Something called BaySixty6, which is apparently sponsored by XBox, whatever that means. I guess Playstation has a park too, why not. What do these sponsorships mean? Are they permanent? We know who sponsors the park, but what about the stunt rider? Whoever he is, he rides for Vans and Quicksilver. Check out the old school varial in the action sequence. Nowadays it seems like all the pros forego the the varial for the shove-it instead.

Blackanthem Military News has a short piece on Marines who skateboard called “Lords of Devil Dogtown.” They don’t really make a connection with “devil” and “Dogtown” in the article, so I’m assuming “Devil Dog” has some special significance to Marines or military persons in general. Blackanthem.com seems to be geared for and staffed by U.S. servicemen and women, but the disclaimer at the bottom of the page says they are “not affiliated, endorsed, authorized, or associated in any way with any government, military or country.” OK, sure. Skateboarding in the U.S. military is nothing new. In the eighties I used to skate with a lot of guys from a nearby Air Force base in Rantoul Illinois. A couple of them became good friends for a while. heck, I’ just had the good fortune to get back in touch with one of them. I imagine there were lots of skaters serving during the 70’s as well. Some military bases even have skateboarding facilities on site, although ostensibly they were for the families of servicemen. I remember a few of those 80’s servicemen told me that skateboarding was frowned upon at the base, and they could find themselves in hot water if they got injured skating because it would interfere with their duties. Cut to the new millennium, skateboarding seems to be accepted in the military. There’s guys on the news skateboarding in Iraq, for cryin’ out loud. [Photos: Lance Cpl. Kyle Davis, Cpl. Raymond Peterson III and Lance Cpl. Kyle Davis by Cpl. Brandon L. Roach]

13 years of highbrow Maximum Rock and Roll punk journalism has come to an end. Chicago’s Punk Planet is ceasing publication due to “bad distribution deals, disappearing advertisers, and a decreasing audience of subscribers.” You can get Punk Planet at my local hippie grocery store for cryin’ out loud. Those hippies must not be paying their bills. So it goes without saying (except I’m saying it anyway) that Punk Planet’s other title, the skateboard/culture magazine Bail, will officially die as well. Although I haven’t seen a new issue of Bail in what seems like years already. It’s got to be hard to keep an independent magazine in print. As one star fades out, another is in ascendance, so go on over to Razorcake.org and help them make it.

[Source: Time Out Chicago]