A-frame

Aaberg, Denny

Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

Abbruzzi, Sid

Abellira, Reno

Abubo, Megan

academia and surfing

Adler, Tom

advertising and surfing

Aeder, Erik

aerial

Aguerre, Fernando

Aichner, Scott

Aikau, Clyde

Aikau, Eddie

Aipa, Ben

air-drop

airbrush

Airshow

Ala Moana

Alabama

alaia board

Alaska

alcohol and surfing

Alexander, Kala

Alexandre, João (Dapin)

Allen, Chuck

Alms, Paige

aloha shirt

Alter, Hobie

Alvarez, Pepe

Ancell, Kevin

Andaman Islands

Andersen, Lisa

Anderson, Craig

Anderson, Simon

Andino, Kolohe

Angel, Jose

angle

Angola

Angourie

Antarctica

Apocalypse Now

Arabian Sea

Aragon, Janice

Arakawa, Eric

Archbold, Matt

Arena, Eduardo

Ashton, Juan

Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)

Atlantic Ocean

August, Robert

Aurness, Rolf

Auster, Ken

Australia

Avalon, Frankie

Azores

backdoor

backside

backside attack, Pipeline

backwash

bail out

Bain, Rob

Baja California

Baker, Bernie

Baker, Grant “Twiggy”

Baker, Tim

Bali

Ball, John “Doc”

Ballard, Bill

Ballard, Rochelle

balsa

Baltic Sea

Banks, Jim

Barbados

Barilotti, Steve

Barland, Michel

Barreda, Sergio “Gordo”

Barry, Michael

Bartholomew, Wayne

Baxter, Jackie

Bay of Bengal

Beach Boys, The

Beacham, Debbie

beachboys

beachbreak

Beachcomber Bills Grand Prix

Beachley, Layne

beavertail

Becker, Phil

Bedford-Brown, Stuart

Belgium

Bells Beach

Bendall, Ma and Pa

Bennett, Barry

Benson, Becky

Benson, Blanche

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

High-profile husband and wife team from Caloundra, Queensland; the quirky, well-traveled, and beloved elders of Australian wave-riding during the 1960s and '70s, described by 1978 world champion Wayne Bartholomew as "Our closest thing to surfing royalty."

Charles "Ben" Bendall was born (1909) in Plymouth, England. At age five he and his family moved to Canada, and during World War II he was a Leading Aircraftman with the Royal Canadian Air Force. In 1949, after a failed marriage, Bendall moved to Australia with his nine-year-old daughter.

Marjorie Browne was born (1910) and raised in Brisbane, Australia. For five years, beginning in 1935, she lived in various European countries; in 1940, recently divorced from an Englishman, she sailed for Australia pregnant with her first and only child.

Back in Queensland, Marjorie bought a three-story beachfront apartment building in Caloundra. In the mid-'50s she and Bendall met. Their marriage date is unknown, but around 1959 Ben began surfing, at nearby Moffat beach, and Marjorie started a year or two later. After getting out of the water, the two would leave their boards on the Moffat rocks, sometimes for days at a stretch.

In the 1960s, and into the early '70s, the couple began traveling up and down the coast in a big white van with board racks on the side; the "Ma and Pa" nickname they picked up was likely a play on Ma and Pa Kettle, the popular movie characters from the '40s and '50s. In 1964, while visiting Hawaii, Pa Bendall wiped out at Sunset Beach, broke two ribs, and was left with double-vision in one eye. In a separate surfing accident, Bendall knocked out his front teeth.

Ma and Pa were mildly eccentric and eternally cheerful—and Pa looked the friendly rogue with his black eyepatch and long whiskers—and the Australian media fully embraced them. The pair were regularly featured in newspapers, magazines, and made a few TV appearances. 

, a documentary on the 1970 World Surfing Championships in Victoria, featured a segment on Pa Bendall, much of which was set to a folksy song whose lyrics included these lines:

If I get to be 65, I'd like to be like you. 

While unconventional in many ways (the couple earned a living from Marjorie's apartment building), the Bendall's were in some respects old-fashioned. In the mid-'60s, as Aussie surfing moved further away from the lifeguard-associated respectability and closer to the nascent counterculture, the Bendalls formed a surf club for teenagers called the Moffateers, whose members were expected to always act with "good sportsmanship, modesty and integrity" in order to further a "supreme image for the surfboard rider and his sport."

After his death in 1974, from motor neuron disease, the Pa Bendall Memorial professional surf contest, held at Moffat Beach, was founded. Richard Harvey earned $1,500 for winning the debut event; later winners included Michael Peterson, Simon Anderson, and Wayne Bartholomew. When future world champion Joel Parkinson won in 2000, he donated his prizemoney to Ma Bendall so she could go on vacation. After Ma's death in 2001, the event was renamed the Pa and Ma Bendall Memorial. It is the second-longest running pro contest in Australia, following the Rip Curl Pro.

Making Waves: the Ma and Pa Bendall Story

, a documentary DVD, was released in 200.

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Encyclopedia of Surfing

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