Countdown to 2000: Culture

Alex Coolman

The movie was dopey, inane and inaccurate. “Gidget,” which was released

in 1959, was also a huge hit and it encouraged the blossoming of popular

surf culture in the ‘60s in Newport Beach.

“It was a combination of that, and [1966 surf movie] ‘Endless Summer,”’

said Bill Sharp, publisher of the Newport Beach-based surfing

publication, “Surf News.”

Sharp noted that foam surfboards coincidentally began to replace heavy

wooden boards during this period, meaning that every would-be Big Kahuna

from here to Flagstaff suddenly found it easier to paddle into the

surfing lifestyle.

Newport Beach had an odd reputation for a time during the ‘60s, Sharp

said, because it was the only city around where the lifeguards required a

license for surfing.

“You had to have a sticker on your board, and every so often the

lifeguards would come around to check,” he said.

But surfing wasn’t all that was going on. The same countercultural

sensibility that was behind the beach lifestyle’s popularity also spawned

some of the first organized environmental efforts. Friends of Newport Bay

was formed during this decade and promptly began locking horns with the

development plans of the Irvine Co.

In 1964, Martin Benson and David Emmes formed South Coast Repertory, with

Moliere’s “Tartuffe” kicking off its first Orange County performance and

Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot” gracing the stage of SCR’s Second Step

Theater.

Don Took, who appeared in some of the first productions, recalled the

early days nostalgically.

“We did all the roles,” he said. “And all of our patrons came to see us

-- this handful of guys in this little theater. They watched us sweat.”

Harbor-area comedians Bill Skiles and Pete Henderson came into vogue

during this period, performing with the likes of Dean Martin and Red

Skelton.

The 1960s also saw serious progress in local support of fine art. In

Newport Beach, Flo Stoddard, Betty Winckler and 11 other women worked to

form the Newport Harbor Art Museum -- what would eventually become the

Orange County Museum of Art.

It also saw the short-lived flowering of the Newport Pop Festival, an

event that was actually held in Costa Mesa at the Orange County

Fairgrounds. The 1968 rock concert showcased acts like Sonny and Cher and

Steppenwolf and devolved as the day went on into a muddy, disorderly

mess.

“They were a bunch of animals,” former Costa Mesa Police Chief Roger Neth

said of the concert crowd. “We lived through it by the grace of God and

cool policemen.”

Sources: The Daily Pilot; “Newport Beach, the First Century:

1888-1988,” James P. Felton; Bill Sharp of “Surf News.”