Gordon grubby clark biography

Gordon Clark, the founder of the leading producer of polyurethane foam blanks from the early 1960s through 2005, is an inevitable name in the history of surfing.

Clark was born on January 19, 1931, in Gardena, Los Angeles, and he was raised in Whittier.

He learned to ride waves while attending Pomona College in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

His first surfboard was made of redwood and weighed 90 pounds.

Before hitting 20, Clark had already learned the secrets behind surfboard shaping with Tom Blake and Bob Simmons.

The Polyurethane Blank Empire

Gordon, who earned a B.S.

in Engineering, spent two years in the army and, in 1955, he started working as a laminator for Hobie Surfboards.

Rapidly, Clark began to replace balsa wood with polyurethane foam.

In 1961, Gordon Clark agreed on an amicable split from Hobie and founded Clark Foam.

In five years, he was already dominating the market of surfboard blanks