Women In The Waves
Stephanie Gilmore
7 World Titles
Women have been surfing from the very beginning of our surfing history, with Isabell Latham joining the Duke at Freshwater Beach in 1915 but if you look at the timeline of surfboards there is a hull shaped board captioned as Bubbles, I have listed it in the 1920s but this is really a guestimate and could be from the early 1900’s the lady who owned it wasn’t quite sure?
In these very early days, it was the rebellious women that would go surfing, as it wasn’t seen as ladylike but as with all of the early surfers it wasn’t that we were bad people, we just loved to surf and would do whatever it took to maximise our time in the ocean. During these early years, it was accepted that some of the women would surf with the guys on fairly equal terms.
The 1964 world titles in Manly Beach, saw Midget Farrelly win the men’s world title and Phyllis O’Donnell the women’s title. Surfing became a bit more accepted after this as the mainstream media published positive comments about how healthy the sport was. I had the pleasure of surfing with a few women over the years and never really had an issue with this but as the 70s progressed into what became the animal era when it was thought normal to act anything but normal. my opinion of this was that surfers had been oppressed and victimized for being different for so long they rebelled even more and did anything anti-social to draw attention to the fact we were different.
It was during this time that women in surfing were being abused in the surf and forced to give up surfing. During this period I surfed with a friend and she was just a really good surfer but no prize winner however she was taunted and dropped in on and I had to step in on a few occasions to help her out. To her credit, she kept surfing all her life where many others gave up and it was such a shame to witness this. There was, of course, many women that gave back as much as they received and continued to surf with a women’s contest circuit continuing throughout.
The women that followed the contest and the professional circuit earned a great deal of respect as they were never given the sponsorship or credit they deserved however they kept at it, always chasing enough money to get to the next country, sleeping on the beach in their board covers and even if they won it was a mere pittance compared to the men’s prize money. It was considered that the women’s surfing was inferior to the men as surfing maneuvers demanded strength. In my opinion, it was really a social thing and the women’s events didn’t draw the crowds like the men’s event. It is only my opinion but I think the women never really had the support and training to challenge the men. This is evident in todays surfing with women receiving equal prize money and the stars like Stephanie Gilmore and many others receiving the credit they so richly deserve.
Today when you go for a surf, you could be in the water with an equal amount of men as women, which is so great to see as surfing is such a healthy sport and a great leveler.
The women in the waves night at Surf World Gold Coast is a testament to the fact women’s surfing has a huge following as tickets sold out early and we had to turn people away, which is the same every time we held a women’s event. The stories these champions tell of the difficulty they had following their dream but doing what they loved, is the ongoing essence of surfing history. The camaraderie and respect the champions that attended Surf World that night was a pleasure to witness and the stories were both funny and an insight into the strength of character these women display.
No matter how many obstacles or outside pressure from parents, employers or society in general. Surfers will continue to do what they love and the women in the waves are as much a part of surfing history as anyone else.
