Some Like It Cold
Some Like It Cold
Surfing the
Malibu of the Midwest
William Povletich
WISCONSIN HISTORICAL SOCIETY PRESS
Published by the Wisconsin Historical Society Press
Publishers since 1855
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© 2016 by State Historical Society of Wisconsin
E-book edition 2016
First published by Clerisy Press in 2010
For permission to reuse material from Some Like It Cold (ISBN 978-0-87020-746-4; e-book ISBN 978-0-87020-747-1), please access www.copyright.com or contact the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc. (CCC), 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-750-8400. CCC is a not-for-profit organization that provides licenses and registration for a variety of users.
Unless otherwise noted, all images are courtesy of Lee and Larry Williams. Images on pages xiv, 60, 118, 176, and 229 are courtesy of Carey “Corky” Henning, and the image on page 222 is courtesy of James Gardner.
Cover photo: The Elbow at Sheboygan, Wisconsin, courtesy of James Gardner
Cover design and interior typesetting by Biner Design
20 19 18 17 16 1 2 3 4 5
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Povletich, William, author.
Title: Some like it cold : surfing the Malibu of the Midwest / William Povletich.
Description: Madison, WI : Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2016.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015040489| ISBN 9780870207464 (paperback) | ISBN 9780870207471 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Williams, Larry (Surfer) | Williams, Lee (Surfer) | Surfers—Wisconsin—Sheboygan—Biography. | Surfing—Michigan, Lake—History. | Sheboygan (Wis.)—Biography. | BISAC: SPORTS & RECREATION / Surfing.
Classification: LCC GV839.65.W47 P68 2016 | DDC 797.3/2092—dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015040489
Contents
Author’s Note
Prologue
FIRST WAVE
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
SECOND WAVE
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
THIRD WAVE
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
FOURTH WAVE
Chapter Ten
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Author’s Note
It has been said that history is only as accurate as the particular perspective from which it was told. This book comes from the unique perspective of Lee and Larry Williams, who, like great fishermen, understand that any story worth sharing often becomes richer after it has had time to ripen at its own pace and of its own accord from memory.
To summarize, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, is a real place. Lee and Larry Williams are real people. And the events chronicled in this story actually transpired. . . .
But long enough ago that the statute of limitations has since expired.
Prologue
As sunlight cracked the horizon, fog began to lift off the cool water. The village had yet to awaken, but inside the Weather Center Café a few blocks from shore, a lone utility light glowed, indicating the town’s first sign of life that day. The uneven light created shadows as the café’s owner, Teek Phippen, fumbled in the darkness for his cell phone. The determination of a man in his mid-forties awake at 5:30 in the morning wasn’t going to be denied. He soon found his phone under a row of tipped-over paper cups, dialed a number, and waited for the groggy greeting on the other end.
“Waves,” Teek whispered into the phone. “Let the rest of the gang know. We’ve got waves.” The phone tree had been activated, and soon Teek would find himself among friends.
Moments later, the snow-covered grass of Deland Park crunched under his feet as he walked from his parked car along Broughton Drive to the shoreline, a mere hundred yards away. He cautiously navigated his way across the ice-covered embankments, further jeopardizing his uncertain balance with a ten-foot longboard under his arm. Standing a solid six feet tall and weighing over two hundred pounds, he conceded that the gusting winds made carrying his longboard feel like “wrestling a giant lizard.”
The winds howling at twenty-five miles an hour seemed to freeze what moisture he had in his pores but also generated the waves he hoped to surf, which were crashing violently ashore only a few yards in front of him. Cresting at five feet and then seven, the rolling waves kept growing and multiplying. The water spilling onto the sand resembled the foam of a freshly poured beer. At thirty-four degrees Fahrenheit, the water seemed comfortable compared to the air temperature of two below zero. For Teek and the handful of surfers already surveying the conditions at the water’s edge, it was an ideal day to surf.
Riding is best when the weather’s the meanest, Teek thought. And these waves can be just as fierce as anywhere in the world.
Surfable waves this time of year were rare. The window of opportunity to ride them was even smaller. With a warm front scheduled to arrive later that afternoon, the ideal surfing conditions would soon disappear.
“We ain’t getting any younger, boys, and these waves aren’t getting any smaller,” said Jaime Ziegler, the thirty-something youngster in the group.
Alongside Teek and Jaime stood some of the area’s finest surfers, all of whom answered the call to adventure while wriggling into their tight, black wetsuits. Australian Grant Davey, who has often been considered the area’s most talented surfer, knew he only had an hour before the responsibilities as the head greenskeeper at the locally owned, world-famous golf course would pull him out of the water. Jim Gardner, adjusting the knit cap on his shaved head, held his camera tightly. He knew the day’s conditions would produce some phenomenal photos. Kevin Groh, whose salt-and-pepper sideburns were the only sign he was approaching fifty-something, slipped into his stretched-out, vintage wetsuit, long past its prime. “Comfort over style,” he always preached.
Knowing their knees, ankles, and hands would go numb under the fierce conditions in about an hour, the surfers were more determined than ever to race the clock of opportunity. As the last of them tossed their boards into the slush-filled waters, the unofficial patriarchs of the group, Lee and Larry Williams, arrived, pulling their cars alongside the Broughton Drive curb.
Stepping out first was Larry, who looked the part of a lifelong surfer with his Hawaiian print shirt, tiger tattoos wrapped around his arm, and a shark tooth hanging from his neck. A shade under six feet tall, Larry was built like a surfer and remained in good shape though he’d been surfing for more than forty years. As his thinning blond hair whipped into his eyes, he surmised, “It’s never a bad day if you’re at the beach.”
Lee got out of the car and surveyed the scene. He was a good five inches shorter than his brother, and his baggy chocolate brown Team Blatz jacket gave little indication he was still hovering around his high school weight of one hundred and fifty pounds. After chugging the last of his beer and adjusting his eyeglasses, Lee slipped the cumbersome wetsuit gloves onto his hands and trudged toward the churning water. He wondered if surfing had been like this in California in the 1940s—not cold, of course, but a pastime embraced by a fairly small group of dedicated folks following their passion.
Within moments, the six grown
men in black wetsuits were bobbing on the breaks a quarter-mile from shore, poised to ride the right wave when it presented itself. One by one, they climbed onto their ten-foot boards, balancing themselves by leaning in, arching back and standing tall while the torrential surf propelled them toward shore.
After nearly two hours of ripping up and thrashing through the quagmire of ice-filled Lake Michigan waves, the surfers finally succumbed to the early indications of hypothermia and headed in to shore—their limbs frozen and immobile. Out of the water, they needed to generate heat as quickly as possible, before their core body temperatures dipped below ninety-five degrees. It was November, and the gales had arrived on the Great Lakes with wicked gusts upward of fifty miles an hour. As the sun slid over the horizon, the surfers stabbed their boards into a nearby snowbank, standing them upright and evenly spaced like soldiers at attention. The boards looked like the ones on postcards from a sunny Hawaiian beach, except with snow instead of sand, pine trees instead of palm trees, and a sign that read, “Welcome to Sheboygan, Wisconsin.”
While America’s Dairyland usually conjures images of cows, cheese, and bratwurst, it is also home to a small but fiercely dedicated surfing culture more than two thousand miles away from the Pacific Ocean. It has become a Mecca to a different breed of surfer—one who prefers the perils of frostbite and icebergs to the unpredictability of shark attacks and turf wars. Thanks to the notoriety generated by the area’s elder surfing statesmen, Lee and Larry Williams, the fifty thousand residents of Sheboygan, Wisconsin, have begun to realize surfing on the Great Lakes is feasible and more or less reasonable—especially since their beaches are considered by many to be the number one freshwater surfing destination in the world, affectionately known as the Malibu of the Midwest.
Refusing to succumb to the elements, the surfers huddled around a freshly built bonfire that was already radiating plenty of heat. As the flames’ warmth melted away the lake’s slush from their wetsuits, they began peeling away the soggy layers and replacing them with dry sweatshirts and jackets. Chattering teeth soon gave way to hearty smiles, especially when Lee reached into a nearby snow bank and said, “What’s a bonfire without beer, boys?” Pulling a case of beer from beneath a mound of fresh snow, Lee started tossing cans to his friends, happy to take advantage of Mother Nature’s cooler.
Within moments, the group fell into their routine of swapping all-too-familiar surfing stories—tales that, thanks in large part to the beer, had grown into mythic tales of adventure and comedy. Always bringing perspective to the conversations was the group’s consummate storyteller, Larry Williams, who couldn’t help but express affection for his hometown surfing scene.
“How can you not love surfing here?” he asked the group, somewhat rhetorically. With a dramatic pause, he caressed the tip of his Mako shark tooth necklace. “It definitely wasn’t nicknamed The Malibu of the Midwest for its sunshine and bikini babes.”
“Who are you kidding?” Lee said. “They’re here for the beer.” He toasted with his beer can turned upside down, a signal that he needed another. The guys all laughed.
As the sun glistened off the Lake Michigan waters in the bright but still-cold November morning, Jaime, youngest of the Sheboygan surfers, asked, “What exactly inspired you guys to surf the Lakes?”
Lee and Larry smiled at each other. Without missing a beat, Larry said, “Have we got a story for you.”
First Wave
Chapter One
Not a day went by during the summer of 1966 when Lee and Larry Williams didn’t make the three-block trek from their shared bedroom on Sheboygan’s south side to the gravel-covered alleyway between Eighth and Ninth streets along Clara Avenue. Nestled behind a gas station across the street from several corner bars stood a musty, rundown garage. The garage stood among discarded construction materials, rotting yard trimmings, and abandoned vehicle parts. Nobody would’ve ever guessed it was the center of the Sheboygan surfing universe and home to the Lake Shore Surf Club. But for two thirteen-year-old fraternal twins, the opportunity to stand on the garage’s outskirts was worth every minute of their emerging adolescence. The chance to be acknowledged, even just slightly with a glance or a nod, by the local surfers three or four years their senior would justify the endless hours they had spent that summer standing off to the side in silence.
“Go home, you posers,” one of the surfers barked from inside the garage. “Don’t you have G.I. Joes to bury in the sandbox or something?”
But the insults only strengthened their resolve to become part of the group; any acknowledgment was a sign of progress. Larry whispered to Lee, “Today they call us posers. Tomorrow, we’ll be called Lake Shore Surf Club members.”
Lee looked away, feeling far less optimistic about their chances.
Only a few weeks earlier, the brothers had been completely ignored during an entire Memorial Day weekend spent standing on the outskirts of the garage. Lee was in it for the opportunity to surf. Larry was in it for the social benefits of hanging out with an older crowd. The Lake Shore Surf Club members were all suncrazed fools, obsessed with the call of Lake Michigan’s surfing wonders. It was a call only a handful of others in Sheboygan answered, including Lee and Larry, since surfing on Lake Michigan was the furthest thing from anybody’s mind that summer.
Life in Sheboygan was good then. The streets were clean and crime free. Jobs were plentiful. Families gathered around their RCA television sets to watch Gomer Pyle and Bonanza. Fathers groomed their modest Midwestern lawns with the latest Bolens Orbit Air power mowers. The General Electric portable dishwasher gave mothers more time to help their children with homework. The nation’s unrest generated by the Civil Rights Movement in the South and the escalating Vietnam War seemed far away. Sheboygan in the 1960s seemed more like the 1950s—a Leave it to Beaver family sitcom.
From left to right, Larry Williams, Kevin Groh, Rocky Groh, Lee Williams, and Jeff Schultz in 1968
So it was no surprise that Sheboygan’s miniscule surf culture was often misunderstood by adults who thought their teenagers were looking for excuses not to work, much like their counterparts in Malibu, Waikiki, and Tahiti. It had only taken a decade for surfing to capture the imaginations of millions across the country, regardless of how far away they were from the nearest ocean. Kids from inland America read Gidget, went to the theaters to keep up with the exploits of Frankie and Annette, and watched the endless array of TV commercials exploiting the romance and adventure of the surfing lifestyle. Names such as Miki “Mickey” Dora, Corky Carroll, Ricky Grigg, and Duke Kahanamoku inspired many of the kids who ran away from home to surf those legendary waves. For Lee and Larry Williams, the mythic exploits of those legendary surfers transported them to the world inside the faded brown garage, outside of which they had already spent the majority of their summer.
Although it was the heart of Sheboygan’s surf scene, the garage was nothing special. It was originally a single-story, horse-and-carriage barn with sideways sliding garage doors that allowed the group to fill half of the space with classic Indian, Triumph, and Vincent motorcycles. The other side was stuffed with couches and ratty tapestry rugs. Surfer Magazine centerfolds were tacked up across the wall like a patchwork quilt, featuring everything from big monster surfing breaks like the Bonzai pipeline to a serene Makaha sunset. An old record player spun the latest tunes since somebody was always bringing in records that had just arrived via mail order from the coast. Often, the popular songs of the Beach Boys and the Rip Chords were discarded for raw, pseudo-surf music from obscure groups on minor record labels.
When unoccupied, the garage stood silent except for an occasional creaking reminder of its age. As soon as the Lake Shore Surf Club members arrived, the structure exploded to life like a rambunctious toddler. More often than not, the group arrived with squealing tires and honking horns—a ritual that did little to endear them to the neighbors. The van plastered in surf stickers was hard to ignore when cruising the otherwise quiet avenues of Sheboygan. Bolt
ing through stop signs and crosswalks, they considered pedestrians nothing more than hazards. “If you don’t like our driving, stay off the sidewalks,” they’d holler.
Never ones to miss the adrenaline rush of near-death, they’d spin their cars into a frantic u-turn just as they were about to miss the turn into the alleyway. Putting themselves on two wheels, exposing the muffler and entire undercarriage with the brakes a-blazing, they would make the vehicle slam down on all four wheels, sliding up to within inches of the rotting wooden garage doors. The smell of smoking brakes served as a pungent reminder of the miraculous stop.
As soon as the car’s engine backfired, announcing its temporary resting place, a pack of eighteen-year-old boys pried themselves out of their ride with the grace of cattle caught in an electric fence. Amid the sticky eighty-degree heat, Rocky Groh got out of the car wearing a long-sleeved striped shirt underneath his pea coat, all the while keeping a Camel cigarette balanced on the corner of his mouth and his World War II leather helmet and aviator goggles from obscuring his view.
Next out was Genyk Okolowicz, sporting round John Lennon glasses and a shoulder-length, Jim Morrison haircut that complemented his dark complexion. As the group’s resident musician, he was never without his twelve-string acoustic guitar, even when crammed into the backseat of a convertible.
Behind him crawled out Mark Hall in a Hawaiian serape, matching shorts, and tan sandals, implying he had just returned from the islands after blowing “Tiny Bubbles” alongside Don Ho.
With the path cleared between the car’s backseat and the garage, Bill Kuitert followed, looking to avoid any obstacle that would risk wrinkling his finely pressed white pants and matching navy-and-white striped sailor shirt. He personified the dysfunction of obsessive-compulsive disorder back when such folks were just considered “neat freaks.”
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