Mike Hynson, surfing star of ‘endless summer,’ dies at 82
Mike Hynson, who put the image of the god of the blonzald surf as the star of the hit 1966 cheap book “endless summer” and, with his sports status, including the colossus of it Curl, died on Jan 10 in Encinitas, Calif. He was 82.
His death, at the hospital, was confirmed by Donna Klaasen Jest, who collaborated with Hynson in his 2009 autobiography, “reminiscences of a surf revivalist.” He said the cause was not yet known.
Hynson arose at a time when surfing was often dismissed as a curious culture of the west coast, due to frothy matinee fates such as “bach bambet bingo” (1965) and a swell of beach boy hits. He was recognized not only for his skills in the waves, but also as a noted builder of boards, especially the red red board, designed by the manufacturer Gordon & Smith in 1965.
Jake Howle Once Lived “One once lived,” said Jake Howard in Surfer Magazine after Hynson’s death, describing him as “a fiery player, a molded genius, a cosmic surfer” who changed surfing in an indescribable number of ways. “
Hynson’s life became a practice in 1963, when he was invited by Bruce Brown to join him and Robert Agasti, who went on a trip that would lead them to Senegal, Ghana, South Africa, Australia, Tahiti, New Zealand and Hawaii. Hopping is a great way to avoid cold weather while looking for the right wave.
Hynson was only 21 years old but had already built a reputation as a maverick Power using the beaches around San Diego. He could be full and appear, friends remember – but without reason: He just proved his mettle as one of the first Hawaiians who are not of the background to ride a pipe, on the north coast of the island of Hawaii, at one time called the most dangerous wave in the World, in 1961.
He really saw the right camera, with caramel tan and han-hanwelen white hair returned to the fashion of Dracula, soon the hairstyle will be humbly imitated around the world.
Mr. Brown had only $50,000 for his project, leaving his stars to pay for their tickets around the world. To finance his trip, Hynson turned to the famous board maker Hobie, who worked for him, to give him $ 1,400 to steal nine floor boards,” he said in a 2017 interview with the British newspaper The Guardian.
Unbeknownst to his friends, Hynson brought with him amphetamines and a three-month supply of Tijuana marijuana. “I was young, stupid and loaded,” she said in a 2009 interview with OC Weekly, an Orange County, Calif., newspaper.
The first stop was Senegal, where the locals “used Belly wooden planks to go around the waves, so when they saw Robert and I were surfing.”
A big game awaits them. Hynson finally saw their Quinry in Cape St. Francis, on the coast of South Africa, where it is perfected “by hand, with no visible sight,” as Surfer Magazine once described it.
“On Mike’s first visit,” said Mr. Brown recounts his ‘endless summer,’ “for the first five seconds, he knew he was finally getting that gag.” The waves, he added, “looked like they were made by some kind of machine. The ride was so long I couldn’t get a single piece of film.”
In his autobiography, Hynson recalled the experience: “I have never had so many halves of adrenaline in my life, something pure and natural. It was electric. The hair on my neck stood up straight. “
Michael Lear Hynson was born on June 28, 1942, in Crescent City, Colif. In his early years, the family split their time between Hawaii and San Diego, finally settling in southern California when he was ten.
After graduating from La Jolla High School in San Diego, Hynson found himself filing letters from the draft board in the early years of the Vietnam conflict. He wrote in his book for three years. “I was breaking them for three years. A trip close to the world of the film, he added, “was the miracle I needed.”
The trip brought no shortage of challenges. While in Mumbai en route from South Africa to Australia, Hynson had to type five 16-millimeter tapes containing a Capeaiian baggy shirt under an Indian. and film on unauthorized photo cracking.
Distributors initially showed little interest. Warner Bros., Hynson wrote, “predicted it would never go more than 10 miles from the ocean.” Mr. Brown eventually proved them wrong, attracting lines around the block for a screening in Wichita, Kan. “Endless Summer” went on to gross more than $30 million.
In the late 1960s, Hynson was closed with another desire, this time to find the enlightenment of the eternal brotherhood of love, a group of psychonauts and drugs in the Laguna Beach Area. A brotherhood that combines elements of Eastern religion and faith in the transformative power of psychedelic drugs, which they deal with in such large numbers that the authorities treat them as “hippie mafia.”
Hynson soon took regular LSD, but he was arrested long enough to make another cinematic foray: You’ve Got a Rainbow Bridge “(1972), which was originally conceived as a hot film. The film, directed by Chuck Wein, ProterĂ©gĂ© of Andy Warhol, turned out to be it’s a quasi-documentary about blackouts, surfing and drugs, culminating in the juileakala volcano on Maui.
For one moment, Hynson enthusiastically breaks open the surfboard and produces a hidden bag of hashish (actually an ovaltine), showing the intelligence that promised the dealers and the brothers.
Despite the film’s giddy depiction of drug use, Hynson’s addiction to drugs, particularly cocaine and methamphetamine, eventually led to a backslide, including time behind bars for drug possession. “I hit a rock bottom,” he told OC during the week, “and he stayed there for a while.”
Eventually he gave up his flying and started designing surfboards again. He named his ex-wife, Melinda Merryweather, a former model for the Ford Agency, and his longtime partner, Carol Hannigan, as his angels. “
Mrs. Hannigan survives him, as does Michael Hynson Jr., her son from her first marriage.
In a 1986 video interview, Hynson looked back on his great trip to South Africa and wondered if he and his friends developed a passion to match it or if they simply reflected one that was already ingrained in the available perception. “If we wouldn’t be in the endless summer, he asked,” Do you think there is still this request for the right wave? Do you think anyone cares about them? “
“I don’t particularly care,” she said. “But when I saw it, I knew at that moment that we just popped the bubble and made the dream come true.”
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