Sam Egan is upfront about his head-long plunge into shaping in the early 1960s. “I just grabbed a couple of blanks and had a go,” he says over the phone. “Scotty Dylan helped me a bit … and Barry Bennett.”

Sam, now 82, started out fixing dings at the Ray Richards (Mark’s dad) surf shop in Newcastle. Propelled by autodidactic inclinations, it wasn’t long before he was confident enough to go out on his own. Sam opened his first shop directly opposite the beach at Merewether, next door to the Beach Hotel. However, when another spot came up on Patrick Street, Merewether, where Sam was living with his mum and dad, he figured it was a better option. 

The featured an image shows an ad from the April 1971 issue of Tracks. It shows Sam, (the tall one on the right) and his glasser, Ronnie White, outside Sam’s Patrick Street shop.

Ronnie was a bank teller who, according to Sam, ‘just wanted to fix dings’. With Sam as a mentor, Ronnie soon swapped counting 50 for a trade in fibreglass. “I considered him to be, at that time, the best glasser in the country,” insists Sam. Boards were evolving quickly and to make sales you had to keep up with whatever shape was in vogue. In the ad, Sam and Ronnie are showing off their interpretation of the Tracker model, which was first developed by Bob McTavish under the Morey-Pope brand. “They were fashionable for a while, but they didn’t go that good when you think about it,” says Sam matter-of-factly.

Luke Egan rode his father’s boards when he claimed a famous victory in the 1997, Quiksilver Pro G-Land. Photos: Joli.

While the Patrick Street shop served as a showroom, Sam and his team made about 70 boards a week ...