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High-born and highly-accomplished brothers from Miami Beach; believed to be Florida's original surfers. Bill (born in 1916) and Dudley (1920) moved with their family from Chicago to Miami at a young age. Their father, William, was a printing executive who at one point owned Chicago's second-largest printing plant; in Miami, he was responsible for developing the still-popular Española Way, as well as the 10-story 150-room Whitman-by-the-Sea hotel, an Art Deco monolith advertised as "the aristocrat of Miami Beach."

Bill and Dudley began riding homemade wooden bellyboards in 1932. The following year, after two Virginia Beach surfers visited Miami Beach with a redwood stand-up board, Bill Whitman built a 10-foot, 87-pound copy out of sugar pine, and Dudley followed with a board of laminated spruce.

The Whitman brothers became lifelong friends with American surfing pioneer and boardmaker Tom Blake after Blake visited Miami in 1934. At that point, the Whitmans, along with nearly all of the small numbers of East Coast surfers, switched over to the Blake-style hollow boards. The brothers soon introduced boardriding to Daytona Beach.

In 1937, Bill and Dudley tied their boards to the top of their convertible and drove from Miami to Los Angeles, where they spent a week surfing with Blake before boarding the 

 bound for Honolulu. "Plain and fancy surf-board riding was demonstrated by William and Dudley Whitman during their summer sojourn in Honolulu," the society page of the 

 noted in 1937, "where they competed in various other water sports in a way that reflected glory to their hometown." Upon returning to Florida, the brothers introduced spearfishing to the state—something they'd picked up on during their visit to Hawaii.

Both were excellent fishermen and sailers; Dudley, in 1940, won the first Miami-Bimini race, covering the 50-mile course in just over 14 hours.

In 1955, Bill met West Coast surfboard manufacturer Hobie Alter, and he eventually became Hobie Surfboards' first East Coast distributor.

Meanwhile, the brothers were also working on submersible movie cameras, and 

, the 1953 Acadamy Award winner for Best Documentary, used the patented metal-encased cameras they developed.

Bill's greatest renown, however, was as a self-taught horticulturalist. "Among rare-fruit devotees," the 

 noted, "Bill Whitman was hailed as the only person to have coaxed a mangosteen tree into bearing fruit outdoors in the continental United States. 'Bill was a monomaniac,' said Stephen S. Brady, his doctor and friend, who traveled with him. 'He’d hear about a fruit tree, and pursue it like a pit bull to the ends of the earth.'” Whitman was responsible for introducing over 80 varieties of new tropical fruits to the continental US. (Middle brother Stanley Whitman, also a surfer, founded and developed the high-end Bal Harbour Shops, the first retail center in the world to feature both Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue.)

Pam Whitman, Bill's daughter, surfed part-time on the world pro tour in the late 1970s and early '80s.

The Whitmans were both still active surfers when they were inducted into the East Coast Surf Legends Hall of Fame in 1998.

Bill Whitman died in 2007, at age 92. Dudley died in 2011, at age 91.

Whitman, Bill and Dudley

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Encyclopedia of Surfing

History of Surfing

Interviews

The Sunday Joint

Encyclopedia of Surfing

History of Surfing

Interviews

The Sunday Joint