Because this is what skateboarding is all about. FOR AUCTION IS THIS VINTAGE (1950?) BUNNY RIDING A SKATEBOARD. ABOVE HIS HEAD IS A RED UMBRELLA, ATTACHED TO WHICH ARE SIX SPOKES WITH STARS AND BALLS. WIND UP THE BUNNY AND HE TRAVELS IN CIRCLES WHILE ABOVE HIS HEAD THE UMBELLA SPINS AND THE STARS AND BALLS EXTEND OUTWARD. THE PICTURES OF THIS TOY IN ACTION DO NOT DO IT JUSTICE. THIS TOY IS ALL CELLULOID, EXCEPT FOR THE SHAFT OF THE UMBRELLA, THE WHEELS AND THE HOUSING OF THE CLOCKWORK MECHANISM. IT IS IN MINT CONDITION. IT MEASURES 8” HIGH; THE SKATEBOARD IS 2.25” WIDE AND 3.5” LONG. IT WAS MADE IN JAPAN. These stars and planets revolve around his head as he rolls on the skateboard. Maybe it’s a cartoon slam simulator.

The new skatepark at Schiffler Park in Beavertron, Oregon is officially open. Video barge courtesy of K.C. after the jump. – Thanks to Mike Estes for the photos.

I’m just getting over the sequel to my recent bout with strep throat, which came back with a vengeance a few days after my meds ran out. I’m on different meds now, but still feel a little wrecked. Posts will be light for a few days. Speaking of wrecked, some genius drove a van into Robb Field skatepark in San Diego last week. At least the last Burnside drive through was on purpose.

Dynamite Magazine Volume 2, Number 9 has some a slight skateboard running through it. The cover story is on Kristy McNichols’s and Leif Garrett’s onscreen breakup in the TV show “Family.” It mentions Leif’s appearance in Skateboard: the Movie. There’s a groovy 3D pull out poster inside and a small cartoon with a skateboard in the “Bummers” section. Dynamite Magazine #58 was published in 1979.

Long time (decades!) fixture on the Chicago skate scene, Stevie Dread made a skateboard out of Lake Michigan driftwood. He originally started making little fingerboards out of driftwood until I pointed him to MC’s life-sized creation. Stevie set out to make one of his own, but large driftwood doesn’t wash up every day on the beaches of Chicago, so it took a while for him to find a worthy specimen.

After two 7” records, the first album of San Francisco´s Hot Lunch was finally released. Germany´s Who Can You Trust? Records put out this vinyl only record.

One of the joys of bootleg skateboards occurs when the perpetrator can’t quite decide which board to rip off, so they combine two or more into one. In this case we’ve got a Natas / Grosso hybrid that was literally printed on paper and then laminated on both sides of the so-called deck. So sloppily in fact that the panther looks like it’s about to slide off the side of the board. Available on Ebay, where the seller calls it a Natas Caupas. – Thanks to David Maes for the tip.

It’s (going to be) called the Garage, and it just got funded by Kickstarter. They’ve got 16k for building materials, now I guess it’s time to build.

About a million years ago (10 or so, actually) I did a write up of concrete skateparks in the greater Chicagoland area for a pre-blog print issue of S&A. It was pretty dismal, especially coming from a Northwest perspective. In most cases the design or finish were flawed, often times both. Most spots weren’t built by actual skatepark builders. Some have expansion joints where the transition meets the flat, filled with whatever soft goo they use on sidewalks. Some even have brushed cement. That’s not to say you couldn’t have fun in those parks, because you are skateboarding after all. Since that time, Chicago got an adequate, professional, but not especially exciting park on Wilson, plus a prefab junker on Logan, and think some other satellite parks in the burbs, but again, nothing to write home about. Who knows, (I don’t) maybe there are a other new parks in the area that I don’t know about. Admittedly, I’m going on old information, although I did hit some more suburban spots in 2009. This new skatepark in Villa Park by Portland’s Evergreen Skateparks has a small-ish footprint, so it’s kind of hard to dazzle, but still it’s got to be a…