It was the summer of '77. Probably. I was on a skate-tour on the east coast of the country headed by photo editor Warren Bolster of SkateBoarder Magazine. He put together three skaters for this trek: Gregg Weaver, Wally Inouye and myself. The trip’s purpose was to skate and photograph as many eastern skateparks as possible from Northern Maine to Southern Florida in just under three weeks.
Five days into the trip we stopped off at a skatepark in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. As was typical of most eastern parks, this one was close to being unrideable; a few poorly designed snake runs accentuated by a handful of small to medium size banked bowls - kinks and bad transitions prevailed.
An hour into the session I was interrupted by a skater calling out from across the park. He requested that I come over to see a trick that a local Floridian kid was doing. I skated over. Took a look. Standing alone atop the three foot cement bowl was a small Jewish kid skating in long pants. He looked out of place. No one skated in pants back then. No one. While awaiting his turn I looked down at his board. The first thing I noticed was the placement of his back trucks, the close proximity to the tail of the board, maybe within two and one half inches instead of the usual four. I thought this odd.
It was his turn. He dropped into the bowl and climbed up the other side. When he reached the top of the bowl his board suddenly popped off of the cement lip, lifted off the ground, and in mid-air switched 180 degrees and then landed. He just as quickly dropped back down into the bowl and approached the opposing wall. I was dumbfounded. It happened so fast. I wasn’t sure what I’d just seen and thought for a moment that it was some kind of an illusion. I looked closely to see if his feet were fastened to the board. They weren’t. Whatever he did, I needed to see it again. It went too fast. I urged him to do it again. He didn’t say a word, he just turned around, dropped back in and repeated the move. When he reached the top of the bowl he used his back foot to horse-kick his tail, this act shot the tail of his board almost crashing it into the concrete lip. It seemed the harder he kicked it the higher his board would pop or “Ollie.” I was amazed. I’d never seen anything like that before and he did it so fast and effortlessly.
I had no idea at the time that I was witnessing the birth of a maneuver that would have such a revolutionary effect on skateboarding that it would change the way people ride skateboards.
I learned his name was Alan “Ollie” Gelfand. "Ollie" being his nickname. A local Floridian skater of 13 or 14 years of age. He talked real fast with lots of nervous energy. Like a used car salesman. He told me his friends decided to call his popping maneuver the “Ollie”................
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