"For those who were part of the 60s, this was a blissful ride, an era when surfing took root and blossomed in New Zealand, exploding in numbers from 300 participants in 1963, to 15,000 in 1967…" 

                        Quote from www.teara.govt.nz

A whole new scene

In 2006, when all the teachers went back to school, Murray Laird went to the library. But hours spent in Puke Ariki's Taranaki Research Centre (TRC), researching and writing surfing history, turned out to be very productive, indeed.

By the end of the year, both Murray and the library boasted a new book called Riding the Wall about Pātea's surfing pioneers.

As the book reveals, a bunch of Pātea surfers were some the forerunners of the surfboard industry today. And it's thanks to a New Zealand Science Mathematics and Technology Teacher Fellowship that a pleasurable daily dig into early surfing produced such results.

Murray explains how important it was to be given a paid year off teaching to write.

"I've always had an interest in the history of surfing because it meant so much to me through all my growing years. I think it was a big confidence boost to my life.

"I thought the Pātea story was something worth recording."

Initially, the intention had been to write during school breaks, but somehow it never quite happened.

"At the end of the school year, as a teacher you're quite burned out and tired, and then you get into relaxed mode, and then it's back to school."

A different kind of science

Murray, who had once flirted with the thought of a career in marine biology, had considered putting together a fellowship application for a different subject entirely - though it was still about the sea.

He was hoping to find a better method than the age-old 'grid pattern' method for school students studying the foreshore. But like the foam on the waves, surfing floated to the top.

"Because the fellowship was science, maths and technology, I couldn't see a way of using it. But I suddenly found out that social science was a legitimate part of science.

"I talked about it with Peter Spratt, who is on the fellowship board, and he said, 'go for it'. I had three months to get a proposal together, which was a major task, but I did it."

Finally able to dedicate a whole year to learning how the innovative Australian Wall brothers became the first in Taranaki to embark on commercial board manufacturing, Murray found himself attacked by sudden nerves.

To go from a very structured life of teaching seven and eight year olds at Ōākura School to no structure at all, seemed quite daunting.

"It was scary. During every school holiday you lose a certain amount of confidence and I wondered what it would be like after a year.

"And education is moving so fast, you can lose a lot that you need to keep up with. Yes, it did concern me. And where to begin, that was another worry."

Murray with some of his favourite art. The print on the right appears in the book: Image Puke Ariki TS2007_1126.

A new structure

Murray was offered a key piece of advice that stood him in good stead: Take your time at the beginning and get your head together. Work out a plan and stick to it.

It proved to be a good way to work, and he headed to the library.

"It was so nice to have a place to go. The TRC is so conducive to work. So quiet. It was new to be able to start something without interruptions - no kids, and no bells ringing! It focussed me. Having a plan really helped."

He began writing up his research in an academic style, until he realised that long words and longer sentences didn't match the book.

"I was lucky to have Gary Bastin of the TRC there, who said if I wanted people to read it, I needed to make it accessible to the whole population."

All the way back to ancient times

Murray discovered that the history of surfing was broken into two distinct parts - pre-modern and modern surfing.

The split came after well-intentioned, but misguided missionaries, spied people having fun in the waves and declared disapproval of 'the constant intermingling, without any restraint, of persons of both sexes' and immediately banned the pastime.

Some of the other facts are just as startling, such as Captain James Cook, on his third and final journey to the Pacific, arriving at Matavai Bay, Tahiti, and watching a man riding into shore on a canoe.

Cook recorded it in his log: "I could not help concluding that this man felt the most supreme pleasure while he was driven on so fast and smoothly by the sea."

In 1907, Author Jack London, of White Fang fame, wrote a feature article in Woman's Home Companion about his own surfing experience in Hawaii.

"He called surfing 'a royal sport for the natural kings of earth'."

One year later, Honolulu's Irish-Hawaiian surfer, George Freeth, introduced the sport to California, and went on to become the state's first professional lifeguard.

Freeth, riding an 8ft (2.44m), 200lb (91kilo), solid wooden board, holds the well-deserved title of first surfer in the USA.

While it's been suggested that surfing might have been around for centuries, Murray hedges his bets.

"Maybe the Hawaiian thing, but I don't know about stand up surfing. There would have been other people around the world, riding waves in canoes and kayaks - some of that would have been necessary - and then there was probably body-surfing as well.

"A petroglyph found on a rock in Hawaii gives some credence to it, it shows a person in a surfing pose, but then again, it could be someone balancing on a branch."

A personal viewpoint

Since Riding the Wall - Surfing Pioneers of Taranaki was published, Murray has often found himself explaining what compelled him to put it together. Really, it was easy, he says. The book was personal on many levels.

"It was my stamping ground. I wanted the story out. I thought it was significant, particularly the number of females involved in early surfing at Pātea. Also, surfing was so local - local beaches, a gathering of local people. It was an original era."

As he writes in the book's introduction: In the 1950s, modern surfing gained a foothold in New Zealand following a modest growth in popularity throughout the world.

A decade later there was an explosion of interest in various parts of the world, with New Zealand being no exception.

Many small beach communities were beginning to gain a taste of this new and exhilarating sport, so it was little surprise that surfing arrived in Patea.

For Patea the development of surfing began in the 1960s. Its value as a social and recreational pastime for many of the youth in the area was made evident by the significant number of participants.

And, he gently admits, there was also an ounce of 'I'm going to show you that this part of Taranaki has some real history to it' thrown in for disbelievers.

A proud past

Murray retains strong connection to his Pātea roots. "A lot of people say, 'You grew up in Pātea?' as though it's a place you don't want associations with.

"Dad and mum ran an electrical shop there for around ten years, and it was the most amazing place to grow up in.

"It had a beach, it had a river, it had potteries. At one stage there were nine different potteries making bricks and various things.

"The population must have been well over double what it is today. The place was booming. There was a railway there.

"There was farming - small farms were viable back then and you could have a family managing on 50 acres - then there were the dairy factories, the freezing works. Did you know that Pātea was once the biggest New Zealand exporter of cheese?"

There was also money to be had, he says, if you wanted to work. "You could get a job over the summer holidays to earn money for university. Australians came out to Pātea to work."

New industry was thriving on the coast. "Probably, the Wall brothers preceded everything in board making in Taranaki, as far as I can see, because they were specialising in surfboards and blanks as a commercial venture."

A surfing pulse

The author's passion for riding the waves goes back to the age of 12. He recalls those first giddy swells of 1964, feet planted firmly on a borrowed 'mal'.

Surfers used to leave them on the beach in those days, and were happy to loan them to grometts.

"People couldn't understand it, how anyone could get so wrapped up in something. But it was simply the thrill of it. I was absolutely taken straight away."

Not surprisingly, the first board Murray owned was a Wall brother's Dolphin, which he bought the following year. A photo of Murray riding a break at Pātea's Western Breakwater appears in the book.

That any photos survive from those years is something of a miracle. It's mainly thanks to Graeme Palmer, photographer and fellow surfer, that Murray found a few scattered around his veteran surfer mates.

"Graeme was one of the little people, I guess you'd say now. He was so determined to surf, and his arms were so short. He tried so hard and the group was so accepting.

"He was never seen as different, aside from having a Fiat 500 with big wooden blocks on the pedals so he could reach them. He had a big personality, and without his photos, there wouldn't be many in the book."

Graeme took movies too, but sadly, when his mother moved into an old folk's home, all his work was lost. "There would have been boxes and boxes of photos," Murray says.

Though Graeme died in 1984 at the age of 34, he remains one of the colourful characters of a bygone era.

Secret stories

According to Murray, one of the best (and worst things) about gathering oral histories, is being privy to seldom-told tales that can't be included in your book.

"I was told such a lot of stories I couldn't put into print! It was good that people trusted me, and I wouldn't break that trust, but I did think, I wonder if I should write a fiction book one day."

Today, the thought of writing another book - even one of fiction - doesn't daunt him. For years he's been amassing a large file of ideas for children's books, but a couple of other writing projects might land on his desk first.

"Something I've thought of a lot lately is the Opunake surfing history, which is also significant to Taranaki.

"The town had an early surfing scene. Locals Harry James and Dean Burt are two names that come to mind, and Scott Rowley made surfboards there in the 80s.

"And then there's a very small history involving Wayne Zimmerman out towards Urenui."

There's also one in Oakura, where Murray and his wife Jenny live. "I think the man for that story is Ray Priest," he says, thinking hard.

It would be nice to one day be allowed another fellowship, but already, he feels blessed with a single shot.

"To be awarded a second fellowship is not unheard of. I know someone who had a second one after about five years, so it is possible," he muses.

"The key thing to the fellowship is being able to learn something that is an asset. Aside from writing and publishing the book, I've learnt how to properly research a subject, interview the people and gather their accounts.

"Down the track, after teaching, I'd be quite interested in recording oral histories to be archived. That would be a good kind of payback," he says.