Surf and Rescue: George Freeth and the Waterwoman Tradition in California Beach CultureFeatured
George Freeth (1883-1919) created the foundation of California beach culture by pioneering its two major activities: surfing and lifeguarding. His Native Hawaiian heritage and upbringing made him more progressive than most in the Progressive Era. At a time when women were not encouraged to compete seriously in sporting events, George Freeth taught them how to swim, row, dive, and surf. He entered them in state and regional tournaments even though their accomplishments were not officially recognized because the Amateur Athletic Union didn’t sanction women’s events until 1914. Freeth’s sense of beach culture always included women. He trained them hard and promoted their achievements. Although Freeth taught writer Jack London how to surf at Waikīkī in the summer of 1907, his work with women in many ways represents a counter-narrative to London’s hypermasculine stories of mastery and dominance in the surf. With some exceptions, Freeth’s egalitarian sense of wave riding — traditionally practiced by both sexes in Hawai‘I — was not the path that California surfers chose to follow in the decades after Freeth’s death. But it could have been. Freeth started coaching women soon after arriving in Venice in 1907. On Labor Day, 1908, two young swimmers known as the…
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