A-frame

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Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

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Abellira, Reno

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academia and surfing

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advertising and surfing

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angle

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Auster, Ken

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Benson, Becky

Benson, Blanche

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

Not so much an isolated swell as a long season of big waves; the sport's first year-identified big-surf milestone, beginning a chain that continued with the Swell of 1953, the Swell of 1969, and onward. "On May 17th, 1939, the waves got large. and I mean, 

 surfing pioneer Wally Froiseth recalled in an interview decades later. "And then they got big, and then they got huge, and then they got monstrous. I haven't seen anything like that before or since."

Weather records from the period are scarce, but scientists now believe that 1939 and 1940 produced the third-strongest El Niño condition in the 20th century. The big surf started on the last weekend of September 1939, when 15-foot waves from a huge storm off Baja California moved into Southern California. On Sunday morning, at Malibu, Grannis and a few others rode 15-footers from the top of the point to near the end of the municipal pier; by early afternoon, strong winds and heavy rain chased everyone from the water.

Coastal communities from San Diego to Santa Barbara, meanwhile, were taken completely by surprise, and results were devastating. At least 45 people were killed by the storm, most in boat-related accidents—the weather had been warm and calm just prior to the storm hitting—beachfront homes were swept away, and flooding was severe. On Mount Wilson, in east Los Angeles County, over 11 inches of rain were recorded in a 24-hour period. It was later determined that this was the only tropical storm to make landfall in California during the 20th century. (To this day, it is still described as a hurricane, but in fact the system was no longer hurricane-strength when it made landfall.) Just one year earlier, a pair of back-to-back winter storms had also flooded Los Angeles County, killing 113.

Another giant swell hit California on Thanksgiving Day, this one from the west. "I counted 13 breaks [separate lines of broken-wave whitewater] from the shore all the way out to Carpinteria reef," Santa Barbara surfer Mike Sturmer later recalled.

The surf was back up again on New Year's Eve, and Grannis remembers watching a school of dolphins riding 20-footers out past the end of Hermosa Beach Pier.

Swell of 1939

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Encyclopedia of Surfing

History of Surfing

Interviews

The Sunday Joint

Encyclopedia of Surfing

History of Surfing

Interviews

The Sunday Joint