Images(5)

Country Club de Villa trophy (bird)

Date17 March 1962

Object number00054967

NameTrophy

MediumSilver, bronze and onyx

DimensionsOverall: 295 × 540 × 185 mm

ClassificationsCeremonial artefact

Credit LineANMM Collection Gift from Dawn and Jack Eden

Terms

DescriptionPart of an onyx, bronze and silver trophy awarded to Bob Pike for winning the Villa's Country Club's Beach Category. The trophy has three parts: an oval shaped onyx stand with a bronze wave cresting towards the left and a silver plaque in the shape of parchment reading 'Trofeo Country Club de Villa 1er Puesto Habilidad Playa Villa 17-3-62, Bob Pike Australia'. On top the wave, sit two bronze sea birds (see 0054967 and 00054968). Bob Pike (1940-1999) was a prominent big wave surfer who was riding big waves in Hawaii in 1962 when coaxed to Peru with several Hawaiian and mainland American surfers to compete against Peruvian surfers at an event funded by a wealthy resort owner to encourage the sport in that country. At the time an unofficial event, the Peruvian surfing contest shows the growing popularity and internationalisation of the sport of surfing in the early 1960s. HistoryBob Pike (Robert Hughes Pike 1940-1999) is regarded as Australia's first and one of its best big sea riders. He travelled to surfing's big-wave Mecca, Hawaii first in 1961, to the north shore of Oahu. 'I felt like I'd discovered where my umbilical cord was connected to,' Pike said of his introduction to the tropics. He featured in the surfing films Surfing Hollow Days (1962), Angry Sea (1963), and The Endless Summer (1966) exposing his 'driving big-wave style' to global surfing audiences. http://encyclopediaofsurfing.com/entries/pike-bob From Hawaii Pike was invited to compete in Peru where he went on to win the 'small-wave' competition. It was the first overseas win by an Australian. Bernard Midget Farrelly was to follow with his win at the Hawaiian Makaha championship in January 1963, the major global event of the era. Bob Pike surfed regularly at Sydney's northern beaches Long Reef, Dee Why, the Bower. He travelled to Hawaii in 1964 to compete in the Makaha championship in January. According to Jack Eden 'in a freak west swell at the treacherous Banzai Pipeline Pike was dumped by a wave of such force that his shoulder was pulled form its socket and some ribs were displodged from his spine. He was pulled from the water by a photographer Leroy Grannis.' Surfabout revisted collection nd. c1999. He continued big wave surfing. As the Australian surf industry blossomed from the mid-60s, Pike removed himself almost entirely from the commercial surf scene and worked as a fireman. He also married the sister of 1964 world champion Midget Farrelly. 'If nobody had ever heard of me,' Pike said in a 1998 interview with Australian Longboarding magazine, 'if no one had ever known if I'd surfed or not, it wouldn't have mattered one iota. I did it because I loved doing it.' The following year, the 59-year-old Pike killed himself by asphyxiation. A bronze plaque dedicated to Pike was installed at Manly Beach in 2000, with the inscription describing him as 'The first and greatest of Australia`s big-wave riders.' http://encyclopediaofsurfing.com/entries/pike-bobSignificanceThe trophies won by Bob Pike in Peru, South America in 1962 are significant because alongside Midget Farrelly's Makaha and Manly First International world championship trophies, they reveal the profile and growth of the sport of surfing as an international phenomenon in the early 1960s. More than that the shape and form of the trophies evoke the longboard technology in surfboard design and the hotdogging hanging ten surfing style of the era.

Bob Pike (1940-1999) was a prominent big wave surfer who competed with success on the international circuit until he was injured in 1997. The trophies, especially the large bronze onyx trophy, are the first won by an Australian on the international circuit.