![\"\"](\"http:\/\/butchieboy.info\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/1963-RollerSkatesWeb.jpg\")
<\/a>Old steel roller skates<\/p><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n
I cut the board in the shape of a surfboard, shellacked it, and adorned it with black racing stripes and an Iron Cross. I had to take the skate apart, then I screwed it to the bottom of the board. The skates were steel and didn\u2019t have the best bearings to begin with. The wheels were only about 1\/2\u201d thick and the track of the entire skate couldn\u2019t have been more than about 3 inches. Not a very stable platform. The skateboard below looks almost exactly like the one I made, but it doesn’t have the racing stripes, etc.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Vintage 1960s homemade skateboard<\/p><\/div>\n
Equipped with my new board I skated down the driveway learning the basics of starting, turning, and dismounting. Only problem, our drive was only about 20 feet long before it emptied onto a pea gravel apron, guaranteed to stop a skateboarder on a dime. I even got so I could hang 10, hanging all my toes over the front of the board.<\/p>\n
So, once I had my technique down I was intent to try it out on a big hill. Just such a hill was one block away on Shaeffer Drive. It had a steep beginning, then it sort of leveled out for a nice run, then got real steep again for an exciting finish.<\/p>\n
Outfitted in my cutoff shorts and bare feet I headed for the hill. Pushing off, I started to pick up speed and was sailing along nicely. Reaching the flatter section I had some fun coasting along, slowing down a little. I got to the really steep part and started to pick up speed again. As I got going faster and faster I noticed the board was becoming less stable. Soon the sloppy tolerances in the wheels made them wobble a little. With greater and greater speed, that little wobble started to become more pronounced and eventually evolved into a nearly uncontrollable fishtail effect.<\/p>\n
At this point, I started questioning the wisdom of undertaking this adventure almost naked with only a pair of cutoffs between my skin and the cruelly abrasive pavement that whizzed by at an ever increasing rate. I couldn\u2019t jump off, I didn\u2019t have any shoes on and that would have resulted in the mother of all stubbed toes. To continue meant that I would be going even faster. I began to feverishly search for a grassy stretch and found one a lot or two further down the hill. Just as the board was about to self-destruct I steered it into the curb and jumped just as it struck. I must\u2019ve rolled and escaped unscathed. It\u2019s funny how you retain little or no memory of an actual incident. I know I didn\u2019t try that kind of stuff again without being fully clothed with a good pair of shoes. And not on that hill either.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Me skateboarding in 1977. Quite a few years later.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hard on the heels of the surfing craze of the 1960s, skateboards started showing up. I think there may have been commercially made boards, maybe in California. In Iowa you couldn\u2019t get them. If you wanted a skateboard, you had … Continue reading