Neverland’ documents the colourful history of the American and Australian surfers who made Byron Bay their home in the 1960s and 1970s. Told in their own words, the book illustrates how this eclectic group of surfers shaped the Byron Bay we know today. There are 45 interviews of surfers and173 striking images including the famous: George Greenough, Nat Young, Bob McTavish, RustyMiller, and the not so famous: Bob Newland, Peter Green, Earl Cochran, Garth Murphy. Below are two excerpts from the new book by Tricia Shantz.
George Greenough
I first came to Byron Bay in 1965 and then came back again in 1967. Good surf brought me here. It was different surf to where I’m from, Montecito, California. Over those early yearsI went back and forth for winter surf here in Byron and Lennox and summer surf in California.
At school I loved wood – shop and metal – work.My dad was good with his hands. That’s whereI get it from. My parents always took me to the beach. From the beginning I rode air mattresses.I still ride a mat. It gets me closest to the wave. I have shaped no more than 100 boards in my life.In California I fished lobsters. In Australia I made films. The first was The Innermost Limits of Pure Fun (1970) filmed in 1968. I came up with the name. It’s what surfing is all about.I filmed at Broken Head, Lennox Head, and Angourie with Australian surfers Gary Keys, Chris Brock, Robert Conneeley and others. I was the first to film in the tube. Everyone else followed 20 years later.
When I got to Byron Bay Chris Brock (Brockie) was here. For a while I lived and camped on the road behind Lake Ainsworth at Lennox Head.Rusty Miller was there also, living in a tent. I lived in a car, my 1955 Humbler. I gave it to David (Baddy) Treloar, who crashed it on the Story Bridge in Brisbane.
I stayed at Wategos Beach for a couple of weeks once. There wasn’t much development in Byron or Lennox. Kings Corner was in Lennox. The caravan park was further south on the seaward side. It had a little shop and you could rent vans. It was very small. I went fishing with Mr.King, Ben King’s dad, who ran the caravan park. It was down the little road that exists now behind the shops on the beach side. The pubs in those days closed at 10pm so it was quiet. I have vague memories of eating Marsha’s Granola Cereal, pouring milk straight into the plastic bag. I knew Bob Cooper from Santa Barbara.The board that is in the photo of me in front of San Juan, I shaped for Terry Keys, Gary’s brother.
While surfing, I used a camera in a waterproof housing strapped to my back to film inside the tube. David Elfick sold the stock foot-age of my filming for $10,000 to be used in an advertisement. It paid for one third of the property I bought. Pink Floyd provided some of the music to the Elfick/Falzon film CrystalVoyager in exchange for my slow motion film footage shot inside the wave that they used in their concerts.Sometime in the ‘70s I bought 45 acres at Broken Head, where I still live. I had a pyramid shaped house built on my land around1980. It is 600 x 60 x 600 built on heavy posts.
David Elfick
I met George when he walked into the Tracks magazine office. He’d made the film The Inner-most Limits of Pure Fun (1970)and Albe Falzon and I were making the Morning of theEarth (1972) film. George was the first surfer ever to film inside the tube which featured in his film. The camera and waterproof housing he created was made from parts scrounged from war surplus cameras used for photographing bombing raids in Vietnam. The camera went from filming the destructive effects of Napalm to the inside of the big grinding waves ofLennox Head with the dawn breaking through the feathering lip. George was an integral part of the short – board revolution and designed the flexible fin after observing how dolphins swim and swerve. A renaissance man who could turn his extraordinary mind to almost anything, he became the subject of the second film from Albe Falzon and I, Crystal Voyager, which documents George constructing his sail-boat the Morning Light and the beginning of his voyage from Santa Barbara, his Californian home to Ballina.
The end of the film is George filming inside the wave edited to the 23- minute song Echoes by Pink Floyd. The band allowed us to use the music in our film in exchange for the use ofGeorge’s footage as a visual background when they performed the song Echoes in concert.The film was shown in the marketplace at theCannes Film Festival and created quite a buzz..It then played for six months in London at the St Martin’s Lane cinema.
Bob McTavish
Byron was a very different place back then in the 1960s and 1970s. You knew everyone; every surfer knew every surfer. The surfers had been living here and suddenly the hippie shit town… the Aquarius Festival in Nimbin in 1973 and it was peace, love and happiness.Before they came, we surfers had Byron to ourselves.
I first visited Byron Bay with my family in 1956 and fell in love with it. Sharks and dolphins viewed from the lighthouse. Haul-ing whales along the jetty. A guy catching sharks with bullocks’ hearts on a one-inch rope and a meat hook. After surfing all overAustralia, Hawaii, New Zealand, and California, I could find no better place anywhere than Byron, except maybe Hawaii. There was great climate, waves, an interesting working class culture, and friendly people.But moving to Byron Bay was prohibitive in those early days. I first camped at The Pass. In 1968 I rented at Wategos. In 1972, Lennox became my home. I built my first house on the Lennox clifftop in1978 and remained there untilI moved to Suffolk Park in 1997 where I still live.
In the 60s it was mostly just the locals: Max Pendergast, Jonno, the Keever brothers, siblings Brian,Donny and Denise Campbell, and the surf club guys. Probably the first visitingYank was surfing’s style master, Phil Edwards.Phil arrived with Paul Witzig and Bruce Brown in 1961. Derek Beckner was the first Yank to live here permanently. Californian, BobCooper, had a huge influence on me and our progressive surf culture from 1963 onwards, though he first visited Australia earlier than that. His Beatnik culture fascinated me; the books, the music (jazz), the beard, his surf passion, his history with Velzy and Dora.
In 1966 Denny Aaberg was a mighty influence with his Cooperesque jive talk and guitar and crazy humour. His band, Farm, made the music for George Greenough’s film, TheInnermost Limits of Pure Fun (1970). I met Greenough in 1964 at Noosa with Cooper. It seemed to me the Yanks were first with everything: skateboards, vans, music, board design, surfing styles, Levi’s, beanies, cool jackets, shoes, moccasins.
When Ken Adler started San Juan Surfboards around 1967 or 1968, the Americans began to visit regularly. Skip Frye and the Windanseacrew showed up in 1967. Greg Weaver, DonMorley, Randy Rarick and Bob Newland a year later. I was a shaper at San Juan in 1968, and again in 1972. There was also Joe Hollow from San Diego. In 1969 Joe and I travelled the east coast of Australia together and scored amazing Double Island Point. Best ever.
It seems all Yanks gravitated to Noosa and Byron Bay around that time. Russell Hughes returned to Australia with Garth Murphy.Rusty Miller arrived then too. I started my own factory in 1974 in the then-new Byron Industrial Estate. A big gang from Palos Verdes and Hermosa lobbed in about then:Bob Franjosie, Peter Green, and of course, Roy Meisel. They gravitated more to Broken Head and Lennox.
Town businesses included Tony Feros’ grocery shop, the little twin Ryan sisters who ran Ryans Café (out of our price range). Mrs. McGettigan ran the homemade pie shop in the middle of town. The best! It’s where Saltys is now. She was a wonderful woman who nurtured us homeless drifters with cheap prices and credit. Mrs. McGettigan was not one of the wealthier McGettigans from St Helena. She was the poorer relative. Fred Poolman ran the engineering shop on the corner of Marvel Street andJonson Street. The Timperley’s ran the BP onthe main corner coming into town. North’s was the electrical shop next to the newsagent. Mexican Mick opened on Jonson Street where Cheeky Monkeys was. There was also a weird take-away joint at Wategos where Raes is now.
The Shortboard Revolution actually spread over the years 1967 to 1969. In 1968 at Byron and Lennox we took board lengths down further; from around eight-foot to mid-six-foot. Surfboard weight dropped from around12 pounds to six or seven. Bob Newland was a vital glasser (laminator) in achieving that. No doubt about it, Byron Bay played a part in the Shortboard Revolution.
