Hobie Alter, the man most responsible for the modern age of both surfing and sailing, died yesterday (Saturday, March 29, 2014). He was 80 years old. According to a story on SurferMagazine.com:
A true waterman, Alter competed successfully in the Makaha International Surf Contest in 1958 and ’59, won a trio of tandem surfing championships from 1961-’63, and was elected to both the Huntington Beach Surfing Walk of Fame (1997) and the National Sailing Hall of Fame (2011). But Alter’s legacy will always be that of a pioneer of surfboard and sailboat production, called “the Henry Ford of the surfboard industry” by Steve Pezman, for his contribution to the large-scale manufacture of surfboards.
We had the honor of interviewing Alter for a surf magazine nearly a decade ago. It was a phone interview and he was sitting on the front porch of his home in the San Juan Islands of Washington State. We hit him with questions he’d been asked thousands of time before. But he didn’t seem to mind. At one point, we heard him say,” Whoa.” And we asked, “What just happened? You okay?” He laughed, “A Bald Eagle just got a big one.” We knew then, that Alter was living right. Our thoughts are with Alter’s family and friends.
[Link: Surfer Magazine]
