Tom Morey Invitational

Surfing's original prize-money competition, held in Ventura, California, on Fourth of July weekend, 1965; better known as the Tom Morey Noseriding Contest. Surfboard manufacturer Tom Morey—who would later create the wildly popular Morey Boogie bodyboard—developed the Invitational as a way to promote his new factory-retail surf shop.

The Morey contest was notable not just for its $1,500 purse (gathered for the most part by the $50 entry fee paid by each of the 24 competitors), but for its ori...