Welcome to I Check The Mail Only When Certain It Has Arrived week. I've got a bunch of things scanned in that were mailed to me from five different skateboard companies a long time ago now.
Back before Crailtap and 411 if you wanted to find out about your favorite company and/or skateboarder, you had to write something on a piece of paper and mail it to said company. Usually there was an address in an ad that also promised stickers if you sent a buck. Depending on the company, either the owner, the secretary, a team rider or a minimum wage hired helper would stuff a newsletter or catalog in an envelope with a couple of stickers and mail it back to you. The response time was somewhat variable and contingent upon how successful a particular brand was versus how much they liked to party in their spare time. Of course being fourteen or fifteen, you had no real awareness of this sort of thing and just wanted some stickers in the mail with maybe a quick note from your favorite pro.
This here would be the H - Street team letter from 1990. All the typing errors, and possibly the spelling mistakes, are a result of a now nearly extinct machine called a typewriter. You've got updates on the team, some hype about the products and the rundown on the staff.
In a completely unrelated note, I went skateboarding again this weekend at the local outdoor park. (Thank you, global warming.) I noticed that I need some new shoes and I'd like to get something with a cupsole. I'm slightly intrigued by the waffle/cup combo from Vans if the new sole material wasn't attached to what appears to be the flimsiest upper ever. Does anybody have suggestions for good kicks currently on the market with a cupsole?
4 comments:
This is great. I actually received a Hensley king size deck with the 6 ply/metal core after sending H-street back a John Sonner deck that basically fell apart on me in a month of owning. They must have only been a prototype board construction and never shipped out to shops because I never saw any besides what I had received in the mail.
The Hensley 6ply/meatal core delammed in a week or two (not that I'm complaining they sent me a free board). The "metal core" was two thin strips of aluminum or tin that ran down both sides of the length of the board stopping before truck holes. Very weird.
metal plies. If you rode one of those to the point of razor tail, it would become a real hazard to skate.
The letter sounds so robotic lol TMag always came across as kinda kooky.
I haven't skated a pair of vulcs since the summer of 2010. Skated a pair of Lakai Jericho lakaitning (terrible), eS trilogy cups, Lakai Biebel 2 lakaitning and some Lakai Manchester cups. Was happy with the last three. I liked the biebel 2's the most out of all of those.
So the metal ply decks did exist? My friends and I always debated about it. Thinking about it now, that's just asking for design flaws.
I would like to get some Lakai's again for skating. I had a pair with Lakaitning when it first came out and I found them to be horrible. The sole was too thick. I'll check out the Biebel's. I don't like how lean the toe piece is on the Manchesters.
Boy Tony Mag sure does like to talk himself up. The guy ripped and boosted some huge airs for someone his height, but could have shown a little more humility or maybe pumped up Mike T a little more.
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