Vicky Heldreich Durand - Wave Woman: The Life and Struggles of a Surfing Pioneer

PRAISE FOR WAVE WOMAN

There are some people who venture into uncharted territory. They are referred to as pioneers, and that they are. In the world of surfing, one such pioneer was Betty. She was prominent, accomplished, and a champion surfer when women were not supposed to surf. She also ventured into bigger waves when most others were content to watch. Every young woman enjoying surfing in contemporary times should remember and appreciate Betty Heldreich. She made it happen.

Fred Hemmings , author, keynote speaker, and former surfing champion

Betty Heldreich Winstedt was a lover of the ocean and a true surfing pioneer whose experiences in California and Hawaii were exceptional for the mid-1950s. Wave Woman is daughter Vickys heartfelt tribute to this capable, gifted woman who taught those around her to live in the moment. Wake up and be somebody, Betty would challengeadvice that resonates soundly today.

Jane Schmauss , historian and founding member of the California Surf Museum

Wave Woman is a heartfelt tale about an inspiring surf pioneer. Betty Heldreich approached her life as a grand adventure, and Wave Woman captures her trailblazing triumphs and struggles.

David Davis , author of Waterman: The Life and Times of Duke Kahanamoku

When Vicky Durands mother spurned 1950s America for the life of a surfer in Waikiki and then Makaha, she plunged her daughter Vicky into a world of wonder.... Pick up Wave Woman and youll enter that dreamtime in such exquisite, evocative detail that it may cause painful surges of nostalgia for whats been lost. But what youll gain by reading Vickys wise study of a painful marriage and a womans need to express herself in the ocean could also inform your own life and those you love.

Don Wallace , senior editor of Honolulu Magazine

Reading Vicky Durands Wave Woman made me wish that I had met her mother, Betty, in person. But by the end of the book, I realized that I had met this extraordinary woman, because Bettys gentle personality and fierce spirit come alive in this story. A surfing pioneer, Betty rode the turbulent waves of her life with grace and style. Wave Woman is a moving tribute to an amazing woman.

Stuart H. Coleman , award-winning author of Eddie Would Go, Fierce Heart, and Hawaiian Hero

WAVE WOMAN

Copyright 2020 by Vicky Helderich Durand

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

Published by SparkPress, a BookSparks imprint,

A division of SparkPoint Studio, LLC

Phoenix, Arizona, USA, 85007

www.gosparkpress.com

Published 2020

Printed in the United States of America

ISBN: 978-1-68463-042-4 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-68463-043-1 (e-bk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019912670

Interior design by Tabitha Lahr

All company and/or product names may be trade names, logos, trademarks, and/or registered trademarks and are the property of their respective owners.

Names and identifying characteristics have been changed

For all the women who have surfed,
and who will surf, in Bettys wake

T o me, Betty Heldreich was Makaha in its positive aspects. In 1958, when I came to Hawaii to teach at Punahou, the historic private school in Honolulu, I got to know Bettys oldest daughter, Vicky, who had won the Makaha contest the year before and was a senior at Punahou. Through Vicky, I became good friends with Betty. The Heldreichs had a home adjacent to Makahas surfing beach. Whenever I came to surf on the weekend, Betty let me park my old woody station wagon (with a mattress in the back) on their front lawn. I could look out at the surf break from my overnight perch. During those pleasant visits, Betty and I would talk about our times in Santa Monica, where I grew up and where Betty lived after graduating from USC.

Although Betty was there in the 1930s during the Depression and I was there later, we had a lot in common. We were both competitive swimmers and had mutual friends in the swimming world and on the beach. We shared a friendship with Pete Peterson, a lifeguard and probably the best all-around waterman of the twentieth century. Another old-timer who swam with Betty for the Los Angeles Athletic Club was Paul Wolf, the USC swim coach when I was competing at Stanford. My Stanford swim coach, Tom Haynie, had competed against Paul while at the University of Michigan in 1960 and came to Punahou, where he coached swimming for twenty years. Both Paul and Tom knew and admired Betty as a successful all-around water girl.

When Betty swam for the Los Angeles Athletic Club, she found herself among some of the best swimmers and water polo players in the world. During different decades, we both swam laps on our own and, coincidentally, at the Uplifters Club in Santa Monica CanyonBetty in the 1930s, and I in the 1940s. Even though we were fifteen years apart, Santa Monica for both of us was a wonderful place to grow up. Fellow Santa Monicans like Buzzy Trent, Kit Horn, and Matt Kivlin started surfing in 1941 and mentored Corny, my twin brother, and me. Buzzy, along with George Downing and Wally Froiseth, became the best big Makaha Point surfers at the time, while Betty and her good friend Ethel Kukea were establishing themselves as early haole women to surf Makaha. Buzzy, George, and Wally admired Betty and Ethel and became their friends.

If Betty and I shared a bond because of Santa Monica, what really cemented our friendship was our love of the ocean and beaches at Makaha (where Betty lived and brought up her family) and Sunset Beach (where I have lived and brought up my family).

Betty remains always in my mind a one-of-a-kind person. She inspired men and women alike with her athleticism, her humility, and her fierce independence.

Peter Cole, Sunset Beach, Hawaii

Laugh

Build for yourself a strong box,

Fashion each part with care;

When its strong as your hand can make it,

Put all your troubles there;

Hide there all thought of your failures,

And each bitter cup of that you quaff;

Lock all your heartaches within it,

Then sit on the lid and laugh.

Tell no one else its contents,

Never its secrets share;

When youve dropped in your care and worry

Keep them forever there;

Hide them from sight so completely

That the world will never dream half;

Fasten the strong box securely

Then sit on the lid and laugh.

Bertha Adams Backus, 1911

I n August of 2015, I was looking for clues to the mystery of my mothers life. I knew the outlines: She came from pioneer stock in Utah, she fled a middle-class family life in Chino, she fell in love with surfing at age forty, she outlived two husbands and a few lovers. She was and is admired by surfers worldwide. She died at ninety-eight. But then I discovered a tattered cardboard box hidden on a dusty shelf in our Makaha Beach garage. The receptacle contained a forgotten trove: what my mother called her autobiographywritten to cover her years from birth to age twenty-fouralong with her collection of memorabilia, letters, and photos spanning the rest of her long life. Among the contents was a poem, Laugh, by Bertha Adams Backus, which my mother had hand-copied on a small piece of paper and safeguarded for more than eighty years.