Ross Goodman.

I'm sure you can make the connection between gravedigger Ross and the fact that it is Halloween. Not as clever as what Chromeball had today, but I'm happy with it.

This interview is from a 1990 Transworld feature on new pros that included Mike Conroy, Ed Templeton, Tom Boyle, Omar Hassan, Jeremy Klein and Ron Chatman. I'm pretty sure they just gave a set of questions to everybody at a contest and had them write down their answers. Some of the questions are pure Transworld. Ross had the best answers.

1. How old are you, where are you from, and when did you start skating?

I'm old enough to legally buy anything sold in the United States. Sacramento, California. A mere six years and it shows.

2. Do you feel that you are a good all-around skateboarder or do you excel in one type of riding?

I ride vert, but I've been known to bust out no complys, over curbs, wearing Doc Martens. Of course, I intend to take the next street event, fully sponsored by Doc Marten. I usually skate at the San Jose warehouse and the curbs in front of Mr. A's Porno Shop.

3. What is your reason for turning pro, and does it intimidate you to skate against the pros whom you have looked up to for many years?

To get chicks, of course! No, I intend on taking them out like a bad disease when my leg heals. I skate with pros every day, so I'm used to/bored with it.

4. Who are some of the pros you look up to and why?

Kendall, Schroeder, Bod and Losi. They all rip and hold their liquor well.

5. How important is competition to you?

Not that important., Well, kind of actually. All right, it's my life!

6. What kind of goals have you set for your skateboarding in 1990?

None.

7. How will being pro affect your lifestyle?

It won't; I'm easy to please. That's obvious, isn't it?

8. When you told your parents about your becoming a professional skateboarder, how did they react?

I phoned, them, told them, and then the line went dead. They, too, are easy to please, so they don't care.

9. Are you enrolled in high school or any other type of institutional learning facility?

Why, yes. I'm enrolled at the Sequoia Institute of Truck Driving. When I'm old, I intend to become a trucker, so I can listen to Johnny Cash and the Vandals all day.

10. How often do you skate, and on the average how often do you come up with a new trick of variation of an old one?

Four times a week. I learn tricks about as much as the next guy, but I'm no Tony Way or Danny Hawk. I'll see people.

11. Is there anything you would like to tell our readers to help them understand what it takes to become a professional skateboarder?

Just stay away from Captain Morgan.

***

For the ad: Transworld - May 1991 Volume 9 Number 5

For the quotes: Transworld - August 1990 Volume 8 Number 8

Remy Stratton #5.

A little more G & S for the week. Those G & S rails are gigantic. Remy is riding Doug Smith's pro model.

***

RIP Sin Elgeljia.

***

Mike Ballard took the photo.

Transworld - February 1990 Volume 8 Number 2

Doug Smith.

Doug rode for Powell Peralta and turned pro for G & S. He had some good runs in that park in Tijuana for Public Domain.

The photo is credited to Ransack. No first or real name given.

Transworld - October 1989 Volume 7 Number 6

Dan Wilkes.

The elusive Dan Wilkes. Another guy I don't know all that much about. When you get props from Jeff Phillips and Tom Groholski, you must be doing something right.

Thrasher - December 1989 Volume 9 Number 12

Mike Vallely.

I always liked this photo. I had the board he was riding and I liked the shape of it much more than his Powell Peralta board with the elephant. As for Mike, I honestly don't know anymore. So much of the stuff that he does these days makes me cringe, but he still has his moments that are worthwhile, such as his footage shredding at the Berrics.

O photo.

Transworld - August 1990 Volume 8 Number 8

Tom Knox #2.

Let's go skate some curbs.

Transworld - August 1990 Volume 8 Number 8

Mike Youssefpour #2.

I always get requests for Mike. Along with Mike Prosenko and Ross Goodman, he was one of the next wave of vert pros for Santa Cruz. Rob Roskopp wasn't going to be around forever.

Transworld - March 1991 Volume 9 Number 3

Bo Ikeda.

Bo rode for Hosoi and then a revamped version of Vision in the early 1990s before switching to Acme. He skated both street and ramps well back then and I bet he is still riding today.

Cesario "Block" Montano took the photo.

Thrasher - December 1989 Volume 9 Number 12

Brandon Chapman.

Brandon rode for Powell Peralta and then turned pro for SMA. I really enjoy the graphic design of the Santa Monica Airline ads.

Thrasher - September 1990 Volume 10 Number 9

Phil Chen.

This guy had a couple of cool photos in the late 1980s and early 1990s. That's all I know.

Thrasher - December 1989 Volume 9 Number 12

Brian Lotti.

This seemed like the right thing for today.

If I had the choice of seeing Where The Wild Things Are* or going to Spike and Pat's night of skateboard videos** at the MoMA last night, I would pick the skateboard videos hands down. I'm not big on movies. I'm also getting worried about my attention span since I don't watch anything that has a plot these days. It's either sports, skateboard videos or dumb crap on Adult Swim.

* The movie theater in my town just closed down. It could only be closed for remodeling, but the newspaper story didn't sound very promising about the potential for it to reopen. Supposedly WTWTA isn't even playing Jamestown, which is a half hour away. I'm not driving an hour to Buffalo to see a movie. I don't care how good it might be. I don't roll that way.

** Hypothetically factoring in an opportunity to see No Age again is always a plus in my book.

Grant Brittain took the photo.

Transworld - March 1991 Volume 9 Number 3

Mark Roach #2.

Mark was the other young vert pro with Buster for Planet Earth. He was an amateur for Santa Cruz before that. Mark is from Texas. Some of his favorite pros at the time included Chris Miller, Jeff Kendall and Ben Schroeder. He liked skating at Jeff Phillips' Skatepark.

For the minimal background info: Transworld - August 1990 Volume 8 Number 8

Thrasher - September 1990 Volume 10 Number 9

Buster Halterman #2.

A little more Buster for the week.

Niko Achtipes was the photographer.

Transworld - December 1990 Volume 8 Number 12

Buster Halterman #1.

Buster rode for Schmitt Stix before turning pro for Planet Earth. He is from Wellsville, Pennsylvania and had a vert ramp in the barn at his parents' farm. The ramp even got a two page feature in Transworld.

Transworld - December 1990 Volume 8 Number 12

Planet Earth.

Chris Miller started Planet Earth at about the same time the New Deal started. He left Schmitt Stix and partnered with Tony Magnusson at H - Street. The team was fairly small at first - Miller, Brian Lotti, Buster Halterman, Mark Roach and Eric Jueden. Things grew quickly and more riders were added. Barker Barrett, Felix Arguelles, Matt Schnurr, Brian Howard and Markus Wyndham were some of the many names who rode for the company.

Later in the 1990s, Rhythm Skateboards was added as a second brand. Adio Footwear was also started. Eventually K2 acquired the whole package and things were consolidated. Rhythm was dropped and Planet Earth was reduced to just being a clothing company before shutting down completely a few years ago.

David Walsh took the Miller photo and Grant Brittain took the Buster Halterman photo.

Thrasher - June 1990 Volume 10 Number 6

Chris Miller #6.

Handrail attack.

Steve Sherman was the cameraman.

Thrasher - May 1991 Volume 11 Number 5

Chris Miller #5

This is from a 1993 interview with Neal Hendrix:

"My wheels are way too small, especially for vert skating. I just learned that because Chris Miller gave us the biggest lecture ever, and I was actually stoked. We went to Planet Earth one day with Brian Howard, and I was stoked to see Chris because he's always been my mentor, ever since I was a little skate rat. He was heckling us so hard for riding small wheels, he was all, "What are you guys doing? Quit with the fad, you've got to go fast." It was rad getting a father to son lecture from Chris Miller."

It seems that I remember the oddest little bits about skateboarding.

For the quote: Transworld - November 1993 Volume 11 Number 11

Thrasher - December 1989 Volume 9 Number 12

Chris Miller #4.

Chris rode for Gullwing. He caused a big stink back in the day when he was photographed riding another company's trucks. Something like that seems kind of trivial today, although the message boards do need topics to talk about. Gullwings were very easy to identify, unlike these days when pros ride Ventures or Indy's instead of whatever brand they are supposed to be using.

In the late 1990s Chris started Mercury Trucks with help from Jamie Thomas. The brand didn't last too long. The friends that I know rode them weren't very happy with how they worked. I'm not sure if that was just because it was the first model and they were still working the kinks out or if they flat out weren't good trucks to begin with. The Jamie Thomas fans bought them so they could have the exact same setup as the Chief: Pig Wheels, Mercury Trucks, Zero deck and those kind of ugly Emerica Jamie Thomas shoes. Anyway, there was an interview with Chris a couple of years ago, possibly in the Skateboard Mag or a TWS Buyer's Guide, where he said he had a box of Mercury trucks left and still rode them. I thought it was cool that he kept using them even long after the company didn't exist.

The picture is by Spike Jonze.

Thrasher - July 1989 Volume 9 Number 7

Chris Miller #3.

It's Miller time.

Chris rode for Santa Cruz and turned pro for G & S. He went on to ride for Schmitt Stix and formed Planet Earth in the early 1990s. He also started Rhythm and Mercury trucks as the 90s moved along. These days he rides for Stereo and is still one of the best vert guys ever.

I like Chris' art.

The rest of this week is going to be Chris Miller scans and then next week will be stuff from the early days of Planet Earth.

Chris Ortiz took the photo.

Thrasher - April 1989 Volume 9 Number 4

Allen Midgett.

Midgett was pro for Schmitt Stix and Losi Skate Designs. I don't know all that much about him.

Have you seen the recreated Matt Hensley video Patrick O'Dell did?

Tod Swank took the photos. Jay Henry did the Midgett graphic.

Thrasher - November 1988 Volume 8 Number 11

Snaggle.

Don't know, don't care. Cool photo.

Thrasher - October 1990 Volume 10 Number 10

Riky Barnes #5.

I got the new Black Label and Tilt Mode videos yesterday. I'm happy that Bonus Round comes with an extra DVD that has the other two Tilt Mode videos on it. I somehow missed out on those when they came out. I haven't watched them yet, but I did watch God Save The Label last night. I thought the pros all had good parts. I skipped over most of the am parts because I was tired and didn't feel like watching somebody I hadn't really heard of.

After fast forwarding through a few parts, I had to wonder if I'm turning into more of a bitter old dude who doesn't want to see the young new whippersnappers. I decided I'm not. For the most part. I just like to give the new ams a chance to put some work in and see who sticks around a while. There's a lot of good skateboarding out there. It's sometimes best to not think about everything.

I did watch Vince Del Valle's part and thought he did a great job.

I also watched the stuff Billy Marks filmed at Steve and Eric's indoor playground the other day. I'm a fan of Billy and thought he had some cool tricks, like the nollie and then the nollie kickflip over the hubba. Must be nice to have access to a place like that.

Continue.

Transworld - February 1991 Volume 9 Number 2