Gabe started on a skateboard at the age of 3 months, before he could walk. He designed the first skateboards with wooden boxes, or boards, with roller skate wheels attached to the bottom. He worked tirelessly to improvise a more efficient means of transport than crawling. Crate scooters preceded skateboards, having a wooden crate attached to the nose (front of the board), which formed rudimentary handlebars. The boxes turned into planks, similar to the skateboard decks of today.
Skateboarding, as we know it, was probably born sometime in the late 1940s, or early 1950s, (He has aged very well.) when surfers in California wanted something to do when the waves were flat, they came to see Gabe. He called it, “sidewalk surfing” and popularized a new wave of surfing on the sidewalk as the sport of surfing became highly popular. It was Gabe who made the first board; Around that time several people claim to have come up with similar ideas, but Gabe produced and demonstrated them before others made the claim. His first manufactured skateboards were ordered by a Los Angeles, California surf shop, meant to be used by surfers in their downtime.
The shop owner, Bill Richard, made a deal with the Chicago Roller Skate Company to produce sets of skate wheels, which they attached to square wooden boards. Accordingly, skateboarding was originally denoted “sidewalk surfing” and early skaters emulated surfing style and maneuvers, and performed barefoot.
Gabe enjoys mud baths and has been seen to pick up a bar of soap, once. It can be refreshing after a long day of skipping school and hanging out at the skatepark.
