This article ran in the August 1994 issue of Surfing magazine. It has been slightly edited.

"People literally hung from the rafters of the Dana Point Community Clubhouse, [as] the brilliant future of an eleven-million-dollar small craft harbor for that area was outlined and unanimously approved Friday in a public hearing, conducted by the Army Corps of Engineers." [Santa Ana Register, March 8, 1959]

 Some friends and I laugh in the sunlight and dry off after riding Second Spot, the worst and middle break at Doheny. We warm ourselves near a beach fire in front of Boneyard, the best and southernmost break at Doheny. Someone casually mentions that a harbor has been proposed at Dana Point. We look north in disbelief. It was the first any of us had heard about it, and I still remember my response. “No harbor could stand at Killer Dana. The first big south swell would destroy it.” I don’t recall now if I thought that a swell would destroy the harbor on its own, or if it would be aided by some supernatural hand bent on doling out swift justice for this offense against nature. I do remember that all the other kids agreed with me, and that we quickly returned to the shelter of our naive world without thinking anymore about a harbor.

We didn't know that each of the boulders destined to encircle Dana Harbor would weigh up to 20 tons. We also didn't know that two years earlier, in 1962, Public Law 87-874 had been unanimously passed to authorize the building of Dana Point Harbor. We didn’t know just how many people in the area thought that a harbor would be a good thing, the best thing ever to happen to the sleepy little community. We would have been shocked to hear that the announcement of the $1,000,000 allotment for the initial phase of construction on June 24, J965 would trigger a three-day victory celebration by the Dana Point Chamber of Commerce.

With total disregard for a rapidly growing surfing population, the natural environment, and a historically important site, civic leaders representing 32 local organizations had applauded the coming harbor. In contrast to that mountain of support, just one protest was recorded. It came from a surfer.

The great waterman Ron Drummond, who had surfed Dana Point on surfboards and in canoes for decades, eventually resigned himself to the idea of a breakwater. Still, he tried repeatedly to convince the builders to make artificial surfing reefs near the harbor entrance, believing that they owed us at least that much to compensate for the surf spots that would be lost.

George “Peanuts” Larson, a man said to have ridden the biggest waves ever to break at Dana Point, had surfed there since the 1930s. Like many others, Larson felt the loss deeply. With tears in his eyes he said, “One of the world’s natural and beautifully magnificent surfing locations is gone forever. To hundreds who knew Dana Point for its historic, natural beauty and surf, and to those who never will, think from time to time of this gruesome 

 most tragically portrayed by modern politics.”

As kids, we had great reverence for Dana Point and the people who surfed there. To us it was strictly a big-wave rider’s world. When we finally rode some of the bigger days we found that the surf was not really as heavy as the old-timers had led us to believe. Still, on the biggest days, we would sit and watch in awe and respect from shore. Lorrin “Whitey” Harrison would sometimes catch waves far outside on his outrigger. Drummond would be out in his canoe, sometimes taking his dog along for a ride. There were a lot of good standup surfers also. Corky Carroll, Herbie Fletcher, and Billy Hamilton were among the best of the kids. I didn’t know the names of any of the older guys, except Phil Edwards. Nobody in the water was ever close to him. When we heard that some kid had stolen Phil's trunks, we threatened to pound that kid until he returned them.

 A test model of Dana Point Harbor, with slips for 2,150 boats, is built to scale by the Army Corps of Engineers. Congress forks over their promised million for Phase One. Total budget for the combined breakwaters and navigational channels is $9,439,000, the cost to be shared by federal and county budgets. The irony is not missed by some of the surfers who complain that they are working to pay for the destruction of Dana Point.

That summer, David Nuuhiwa, Jackie Baxter, and Billy Hamilton put on an amazing show in five-foot waves at Boneyard. Nuuhiwa does some of the first fin-first takeoffs ever witnessed. Visiting Hawaiian surfer Jock Sutherland paddles out alone to a distant and empty reef called Fishermans. There he finds solitude, clear water, hollow tubes, and an empty beach. Upon his return to shore, he compares the spot favorably to Ala Moana. But Fishermans’ days are numbered. It will not break even a dozen more times.

In the lineup, the conversation bounces around from the surf movie 

, to Aussie power surfer Nat Young, to The Doors, marijuana, and Vietnam. Darryl Diamond and George Miracle achieve hero status by hanging ten with perfect style.

It is a typical summer, filled with surf and beach parties. None of us realize t hat it will be the last time we're all together in one place. Mike Malsie, Joey Hamasaki, Joyce Hoffman, Jack Ferris, John Neubaur, Bruce Jones, Steve Kroll, Chuck Erikson, Bob Moore, Jack Cantu, Corky Carroll, Juan Shelton, Bill Andrews, Jay Truax and Dee Dee Arvelos are just a few of the people I remember seeing (some of them for the last time) at Doheny that year.

 A crane drops a ceremonial eight-ton boulder onto the sand as a crowd of 2,000 applauds. The rock has a hole drilled into it, and within that hole is a time capsule. Director of the Orange County Harbor District Ken Sampson speaks for other dignitaries when he says that great growth and change will come to the south coast because of the harbor.

The Ft. MacArthur 72nd Army Band plays, marines salute, and surfers surf. There is a historical reenactment where fake Indians and fake padres wave at a ship impersonating 

, the trading vessel that Richard Henry Dana first sailed to town on.

After the ceremony, the crowd enjoys a barbecue, compliments of the Dana Point Chamber of Commerce. Lured by the smell, a few of the surfers paddle in and fraternize with the enemy. The price of loyalty appears to be two hamburgers and a Coke.

On August 29, Dana Point is closed to all “marine activities.” Ron Drummond and a few other surfers say their final good-byes by riding one last wave.

 It takes two years and 27,000 truckloads of granite boulders to subdue Killer Dana. By August the breakwater is finished and the waters lie quiet. Two-hundred seventy-eight acres of what had been some of California’s best surf stir only with the moving of the tide.

 The harbor has been fully operational for more than a decade, and the changes prophesied by Ken Sampson 12 years earlier are now apparent. Did anyone in the audience on that day in 1966 realize that he was talking about smog, gridlock, and a Jack In the Box Restaurant when he spoke about great growth and change?

Many in the old crew moved away—Hawaii, Utah, Oregon, Australia. One at a time they returned, took a quick look and left again. Those who stayed learned to adapt. Some even benefited from the harbor and got work as bartenders, cooks, or waiters in one of the many new restaurants. Some continued to ride the little waves that still rolled into Doheny, behaving as if nothing had happened.

Nobody said much about the loss of Dana Point. It happened to us, that’s all. For years we lived in group denial. Personally, it took five years just to look at Doheny when I passed it on the highway. It was another five years before I decided to make peace with the place and surf it again. The park there looked like every other suburban recreation area: concrete and asphalt with big bathrooms, lots of pigeons, with littler spilling out of trashcans during the weekends. Little kids on Big Wheels, older kids on skateboards or rollerblades, their parents sitting nearby eating potato salad and grilled hot dogs. The surfers were mostly unskilled, but friendly and well-equipped. Lots of webbed gloves, waterproof hats, colored zinc, dayglow wetsuits. The weekenders know nothing of the work of the Doheny Longboard Club, one of the only organizations trying to save what remains of the place by eliminating toxins from the creek the kids are wading in.

 I sat within the harbor area waiting for a friend. The smell of diesel competed with that of prime rib. Feeling a little claustrophobic, I walked over to a railing and looked out to sea. There the full impact of the harbor hit me all at once. There was no ocean to look at. At least not that ocean I had known as a young boy. True, there was water of some sort, but where the tidepools filled with brittle stars, and the sea anemones? Where were the millions of colorful fish? Where were Whitey and Ron? Where were the waves that had terrified me as a kid? What happened to Fisherman's, and Mee Pees, and Boneyard?

I think I was standing on top Mee Pees right then. The break had been filled in with dirt from the cliffs order to make the road, the parking and the foundations for the restaurants. As close as I could reckon, the Mee Pees takeoff area was now cement slab with a chrome handrail that anyone could grab.

I was surrounded by nice, smiling people. They liked the place, and there was no faulting them for it. They like it because it is easy, unlike Fisherman’s which could only be accessed by paddling a boat or a surfboard. They liked it but could not love it, not in the same way that we had loved it. Not in the way that the coastal Native Americans loved it. Those in line for a plate of hot food would pay for their lunches, enjoy the sun and cool sea breeze, and get on the freeway and drive home.

I wonder what will happen when city officials finally open the time capsule now resting inside that boulder? I imagine some kind of ceremony, and the Dana Point mayor flashing a bright-white smile to a gathered crowd as he reaches into the hollow of the rock and quickly locates the time capsule. He opens it up, spreads the contents on a linen-covered table, and stands back to look upon the relics. Among them is a black and white photo of a rugged looking man and his canoe. Twenty or so surfers stand behind him holding their boards. The mayor pokes light fun at the primitive people in the photo, then asks for a round of applause for the work of progressive men like the late Ken Sampson.

Or maybe not. Maybe the mayor will be a Surfrider Foundation member who looks at the photo with deep regret. Maybe he’ll understand how badly we blew it, and struggle with the fact that he now has to say something upbeat to the gathered crowd, even though he realizes that nothing within view is as good as that which has been captured in the old photo.

"THE BREAKING OF KILLER DANA," BY CHRIS AHRENS (1994)

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