Surf historian Malcolm Gault-Williams wrote about the Palos Verdes Surfing Club in his "Legendary Surfers" series of articles, from in the 1990s and early 2000s. "Doc," below, is surf photographer and PVSC cofounder John "Doc" Ball. This version has been slightly edited.

Doc graduated from the USC Dental College in 1933. In March 1934, he opened an office on South Vermont Avenue, in Los Angeles. “He rented a five-room suite above a movie theater,” wrote surf historian Gary Lynch. “One room was dedicated to working on patients and one room served as his bedroom, office, darkroom, and laboratory.” A third room was the Palos Verdes Surfing Club headquarters. The landlord gave Doc the first two months rent-free, due to the Depression, and charged forty dollars a month thereafter. 

“The interior of the clubroom,” Lynch said, “was elaborately decorated with photographs of [PVSC] members with their boards, trophies, surfing paintings, a president’s desk with gavel, and a set of shark’s jaws that housed the club creed.”

I, as a member of the Palos Verdes Surfing Club, Do solemnly swear
To be ever steadfast in my allegiance to the club and to its members
To respect and adhere to the aims and ideals set forth in its constitution
To cheerfully meet and accept my responsibilities hereby incurred
And at all times strive to conduct myself as a club member and a gentleman
So help me God.

For non-members, entrance into the PVSC clubroom was by invitation only. The club had a sergeant-at-arms and no smoking was allowed. 

Crag Lockwood described the Palos Verdes Surfing Club rules and by-laws for a 2006 Surfer's Journal feature titled "Granny and Doc." This version has been slightly edited.

The PVSC constitution was organized into Articles and Sections, and formatted according to 

 with secret ballots, and six-month terms for officers who were not allowed to serve twice in succession. It was professionally typed onto a mimeo-stencil machine and reproduced so that each member would have his own identical copy.

Doc, with the kind of careful attention to detail and form that would prove to be his hallmark, took his club seriously enough to spring for a professional typist.

According to the constitution, the Palos Verdes Surfing Club was "built upon the principles and dedicated to the purpose of COURAGE, HONOR, and SERVICE." 

The club creed was required to be memorized and recited by each member upon initiation and at every meeting. [See above]

A PVSC member was expected to: "create an active interest in the art of surfing by elevating and maintaining the moral of those concerned and by promoting the good fellowship of all concerned.” High-minded ideals such as these, by today’s standards of surfing behavior, seem not only quaint but also invasive. Not to mention misogynistic, since a member must: “Be of the male sex.”

Indicative of the nature of Depression-era surfing was the demand that each club member, “own his own board,” and “ride his own board satisfactorily” as well as “provide himself with the Club wristlet.”

“Swats with a paddle" were doled out at PVSCD meetings.

A club pledge, after paying the initiation fee of $6.00—a portion of which was used to defray the wristlet cost— was required to attend four “compulsory” meetings in succession, every Wednesday night. Smoking was not allowed at meetings.

Initiation was a serious and formal affair requiring that members, dressed in suits, "shall be seated in semicircle facing the official table,” with the “officers on the right according to rank.” The only was was to come from  "three burning candles set in the abalone shell on the president's table."

Thus began the secret process of a pledge’s initiation.

WELL-REGULATED: THE PALOS VERDES SURFING CLUB

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