Beth O'Rourke from Withitgirls.com talked to Sandy Ordille about Sandy's early years. The text here has been slightly edited from the original. 

From 1955 to 1967 I was raised by my mother and father, Nancy and Henry Ordille, Sr. My father's family owned Renault Winery in Egg Harbor, New Jersey, along with an Italian restaurant in Atlantic City. We lived in Linwood, New Jersey, in a large two-story, four-bedroom home owned by my father's estate, surrounded by a half acre of land, with the boundary set by a white picket fence. I built a fort in the yard next to the garage, which housed a ping-pong table and a quiver of my older brother's surfboards, rafts, styrofoam boards and stinky wetsuits.

Things deteriorated as my father had a gambling habit, and a nasty temper when he lost. He would come home every couple of days to eat dinner and my mom would slave over a hot stove in an effort to cool his temper from his losses. This only seemed to make him angrier. Finally, one evening at dinner, my father started in on my brother, making fun of his long hair, which was not much longer than below his ears. All of a sudden my dad lunged across the dinner table, grabbed my 16-year-old brother, threw him on the floor, pinned him against the corner, and started beating him in the head. I was 12 years old. I jumped up to try and help my brother. I don't know what I was thinking; My dad was over 200 pounds and I was just a child. I jumped onto my dad's back. In one motion, he turned around, lifted me up, and threw me against the metal radiator on the other side of the dining room. I blacked out. I remember it was peaceful. Nothing hurt. Next thing I felt was my mother's tears hitting my face, as she leaned over me, crying. She thought I was gone. My mom had been through a lot and I was determined to make her think I was not injured, so I jumped up to show her I was okay. A trip to the hospital revealed I had a concussion. My brother had a black eye. My mom kept us out of school and we spent several days aimlessly riding around in her car. We didn't talk about what happened and avoided contact with neighbors and friends; we'd often end up at the beach, the place where all three of us found peace and healing.

Two weeks later, after my father disappeared on another one of his gambling flings, a moving truck pulled up outside our house. This was 1967. My mom divorced my dad and moved all of us to an apartment in Ocean City, above a surf shop called Surfings New Image, and we never looked back. I was so relieved. I was now free to pursue my love of surfing.

Beth O'Rourke interviewed Sandy Ordille in 2021 for Withitgirls.com. This version has been slightly edited.


I grew up on a barrier island off of New Jersey and began surfing in the summer of 1960 on these popular molded styrofoam boards that my mom would buy at the local drug store. These boards were light, short, and easy to carry. They also allowed me to surf all day in the swimmers-only area. My big brother Pete had already started surfing, and he helped me learn the basics. My competitive surfing career began in 1967 when Cecil Lear founded the Eastern Surfing Association.

My mom would drive us up the Garden State Parkway on weekends to participate in these fun events where we all got T-shirts, trophies, and prizes.

I left home at 16 years old and moved to Satellite Beach, Florida, where I lived in an abandoned beach duplex with surf friend and mentor Mary Ann Hayes. She was 21 and was able to become my legal guardian. I stayed in school, but since there was a really nice break directly out the back door of the duplex, getting me to school when the surf was good was a big challenge. But I kept my grades up, despite having the school record for the highest number of absences, and graduated in 1973.


I didn't make it on my own. I never would have been able to participate without the love and kindness of the families I met on Tour. In particular, Lynne Boyer and Becky Benson's families took me in and treated me as one of their own. They never asked questions or pried into my family's past. I mostly hung out with the Hawaiians because they were the most authentic, kind people on Tour. They also surfed the best.


There wasn't enough money in the 1970s, at least not for the women, to live off of tour earnings. I first made a living by doing ding repair in my backyard. It was sticky work with hazardous materials, so I moved on to working in restaurants. My mom did the book at a restaurant, and she got me a job there. I'd surf in the morning before school, get in a short session after school, and work at the restaurant. Later on, after I moved to Hawaii, I worked food and beverage for convention gatherings at resort hotels. This was perfect for surfing as we didn't have to work until after 3:00 pm. That was a good-paying job, and I had a studio on the beach in Kauai. In the early '90s, I moved to Oahu and attended the University of Hawaii at Manoa, and lived on campus. I worked in the Multimedia lab in a work-study program and graduated in 1996.


Mary Ann Hayes founded Blue Dolphin, the first custom women's boardshorts company. I was her first team member. No other watersport company at the time was designing or marketing athletic wear for women surfers. One year I worked the Blue Dolphin booth at the Action Sports Trade Show in Long Beach. Mary Ann had a meeting and asked me to hold down the fort on the tradeshow floor. "Happy to," I said. Barely three minutes later, the new owner of one of the biggest surfwear companies sat down in the chair directly facing me. He introduced himself, and basically said, "I am going to take your company down." My reply was, "Good luck." He scampered away down the filthy carpet of Long Beach Arena, mumbling to himself. I never told Mary Ann what happened. The guy probably has no recollection, either. But I remember it well because, for me, an opportunity to support my friends and shut down the self-proclaimed "big boys," even if just for just a moment, was time well spent.

1970s WOMEN SURFERS: THE FORGOTTEN GENERATION


I don't believe it's a conspiracy. I think there are challenges to keeping history alive, and this is true for many women's sports, not just surfing. There wasn't much coverage of women in newspapers or magazines, so much of our history has been lost—except in the memory of those of us who are still alive and living it. The surf movies were even worse. They only featured men, or if women were shown we were meant to be seen as sexual, not for our athletic accomplishment.


I stopped competing in the early '80s because it really fell apart for women. There were very few events—just two WCT events in 1980, for example. Women's prizemoney for that entire year was just $10,000. For the men it was $208,000. It also became apparent the judges just weren't paying attention during heats. By that time I'd already traveled, lived, and surfed in all the countries that did have events. I'd been to Australia, South Africa, Brazil, and Japan. It was time to move on to something else.

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