SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Of course, it's Labor Day weekend and on this unofficial end of summer, many Americans are headed to a beach. A growing number might be surfing. The sport's been growing in popularity. It's almost as popular as BJ Leiderman, who does our theme music. But few Americans know how the sport first came to the U.S. 140 years ago. NPR's Chloe Veltman has the story.
(SOUNDBITE OF WAVES CRASHING)
CHLOE VELTMAN, BYLINE: The mouth of the San Lorenzo River in Santa Cruz, California, isn't a great place to surf. Rocks, pollution and swift currents make it precarious almost year-round. But before the construction of a harbor in the mid-1960s altered the surroundings, the spot was a surfer's paradise. It had easy, consistent swells that looked...
GEOFFREY DUNN: Very much like the breakers in Honolulu.
VELTMAN: This is cultural historian and longtime surfer Geoffrey Dunn. He says this reminder of home is what inspired three teenage members of the Hawaiian royal family in 1885 to unleash a sport, then known as surfboard swimming, on an unsuspecting American public.
DUNN: It was a royal sport. They were part of that tradition in Honolulu.
VELTMAN: Dunn says brothers David Kawananakoa, Jonah Kuhio Kalaniana'ole and Edward Keliiahonui were sent to study abroad at an elite school not far from Santa Cruz to prepare them to be worldly and well-informed modern rulers.
DUNN: As part of the globalization of trade in the 19th century, people came from all over the world to Hawaii.
VELTMAN: The brothers had grown up riding the waves atop giant surfboards made out of native Hawaiian woods, such as ulu and koa. In California, they fashioned them out of the local redwood. Dunn points out gleaming replicas of these artifacts currently on display at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History. They are based on boards from the princes' estate held by the Bishop Museum on Oahu.
DUNN: They probably weigh eight times more than current surfboards, at least.
VELTMAN: They were also twice as long and didn't have fins to help with stabilization.
DUNN: So much tougher to surf. But, of course, that's what they had been using in Hawaii.
VELTMAN: In California, the royal brothers made a big splash. An article from the July 20, 1885, edition of the Santa Cruz Surf, read aloud here by a colleague, tells all about it.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Reading) The young Hawaiian princes were in the water, enjoying it hugely and giving interesting exhibitions of surfboard swimming as practiced in their native islands.
VELTMAN: These aquatic feats left a lasting impression on the citizens of Santa Cruz following the princes' departure. Eleven years after they first demonstrated their art, the Santa Cruz Surf noted how it had been picked up by locals.
BRIAN KEAULANA: The story about the three princes is a famous story in our culture.
VELTMAN: Brian Keaulana comes from a line of legendary Hawaiian surfers. He says people on the U.S. mainland weren't the only ones who benefited from the Hawaiian princes' visit. Hawaiians got something out of it too.
KEAULANA: They came back with redwood boards.
VELTMAN: Keaulana says the new technology caught on in Hawaii. Redwood eventually became the dominant surfboard material on the islands for decades in the 20th century.
Chloe Veltman, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF THE VENTURES' "PIPELINE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
