Some 9 years ago I posted a pic of a package of Flex-o-Thane wheels, and now it’s time for an update. Surprisingly, since that time I have not managed to add any Sport Fun advertisements to the Skatemag Advert Gallery, but I did find photos of Flex-o-Thane wheels in different packaging. In the original post there was some question about what the extra long bolt was, since it was too long to be a kingpin. It was suggested by a reader that this was for a slip-through axle, and here we have photographic evidence that this is indeed the case with Sport Fun Wide Track trucsk.

Until the advent of concaves and laminated board construction, the barrier to entry in skateboard manufacturing was pretty low, especially if you already had a business that manufactured wooden objects. That’s why there were a plethora of small, regional skateboard brands in the 70’s like the Land Glider, made by Kentucky Woodcrafts in Gray Hawk, Kentucky. Gray Hawk is a small unincorporated community about an hour and a half south of Lexington. My bet is there’s someone in that community that still knows who made these. There does not appear to be business with that name currently, but I did find one 11 miles away in Mckee, Kentucky with a. dead phone number. Yes, it is 12:30pm on a Tuesday in Portland, Oregon and I am calling random wood shops in Kentucky trying to find out (what?) about an almost 50 year old skateboard.

– Thanks to Kurt Katnik for the photos.

Josh Baker spotted this Miller Beer fiberglass skateboard made by the folks at R.A.C.O. and noticed it wasn’t among those in a previous post. Apparently, (allegedly?) the going rate is $315. Insert joke about flat beer.

I just made almost 70 additions to the Vintage Skateboard Magazine Ads gallery, bringing the total to 617. This last batch is primarily from Skateboarder 1975 V2 N3 and Skateboard World Nov. 1977.

Pep #331 (November 1977) features a one page story with Archie skateboarding titled “Tide Ride,” as well as a Youth Opportunity Sales Club ad in which you can earn a skateboard by selling 16 boxes of greeting cards.

It’s hard to believe that the parties involved in making the infamous Stroker trucks went on to build Independent, a brand that by any metric inspired loyalty above and beyond anything else in the skateboard industry. Check out some painful over-engineering after the jump.

Lucy is so mean to Snoopy, and everyone else for that matter. Peanuts Wiki says this first appeared on March 26th 1979., otherwise I would have pegged this as being mid to late 80’s. Full frame after the jump.

Bugs Bunny #213 is from October, 1979. It was published by Western Publishing under the Gold Key and Whitman labels, the former in newsstands and the latter in poly bags for stores. A disapproving Elmer Fudd looks on as Bugs prepares to go into a double-truck carve grind in the pool he must have drained. That wascally rabbit… There are no other skateboard illustrations in this issue except for the one in an Olympic Sales Club ad that features a California Free Former plastic skateboard.

Brightly colored plastic boards are what comes to mind when I think of Grentec, which is was I was surprised to see this GT California Woody. It features Max-trax trucks and an aluminum flat bar on the bottom, something they used on some of their plastic boards as well. It also has a rare for the era 2 color screen printed graphic on the top.

–Thanks to Bill Dowell for the photos.

I had planned on adding a few pics of a slight color variation to the last Tres Assi post I made, which was a follow up to a 9 year journey, but in the process I stumbled on a third color variation that I had never seen. And so here we are at a 3rd post, this time adding a less translucent yellow model, some alternate pics of another red board, as well as the new-to-me black variation.