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Welcome to my History of snowboarding page. Feel free to use this information as you wish for reports, research papers, etc. but please don't use it word for word. The Grueling History of Snowboarding The first Snowboard was invented in 1929 by M.J. Jack Burchett. This first invention was nothing like the Snowboards that we know today. It was made out of a cut piece of plywood and had horse reignes to loosly secure the feet to the board. This was the first Snowboard invented. Surprisingly enough after this invention no-one tried to further this idea of a snowboard for another 30 years. Then, in 1963, Tom Sims, a Student in eighth grade,constructed what he called a "Ski Board", for a class project. Again, nothing was built upon this idea for two more years when a man named Sherman Poppen invented "The Snurfer" as a toy for his kids. He made The Snurfer by bolting two skis together. His kids love these things he had built and he began to make more for the neighborhood kids. Sherman would later organize competitions with the Snurfer in his small town. Although these two inventions helped revolutionize the Snowboard, it wasn't until someone named Milovich really had a good idea by noticing he slid very fast if he sat on lunch trays and pushed himself down a hill. Milovich, who was a surfer on the east coast, started developing snowbaords based on surfboards and the way skis work. In 1975 Malcovich and his Snowboard, called winterstick, get a write up in the March edition of Newsweek and a two page article in in the magazine. Inspired by Malcovich, other people began expirimenting with this "Snowboard" including a man known as Jake Burton Carpenter who then moved to Londonderry, Vermont. From here Jake Burton began making Snowboards with steam bent wood and another version with fiberglas. The idea of bent wood and fiberglass sparked people to believe that the snowboard could be the new ski. In 1977 Mike Olsen built his first Snowboard in a Highschool Woodshop. Mike experimented with many types of snowboards until he decided to finally quit college in 1984 to open his own snowboarding corporation to be known and Gnu. Once an article about the new snowboards was published in the magazine Powder, the invention was moved to this new freestyle movement. The first real ski technology for Snowboards was introduced by Burton and the Winterstick in 1980. Their new prototype had a P-tex base and combined more of the ski technology into snowboards. In 1982 the first International Snowboard race was held in Suicide Six, outside Woodstock, Vermont. The goal of the race appeared mostly to be "survival" because the race consisted of a steep icy kamiaze downhill run, called "The Face". In 1985 still only 39, of the approximatly 600 snowboard areas allowed snowboards. That same year the first Snowboarding magazine come out. It's name was "Absolute Radical". Later on the name is changed into "International Snowboarding Magazine". In 1986 Regis Rolland, a French snowboarder, stars in "Apocalypse Snow". His staring launches a new European Snowboarding generation of fans who organize their own regional events, such as the Swiss championship in St. Moritz. Snowboarding from there has sky-rocketed. Now, one out of every 3 people are snowboarding and in some areas even 1/2 of all people are on a board. That is a very big accomplishment and it is still growing. More than 80% of mountains in the U.S. allow Snowboarders, and many depend on them for money. Snowboarders have come a long way from the Snurfer and the lunch trays, lets keep it growing. Copyright © 1999 - 2000 Gabe Hoggarth |