Stunning Photographs of Ellen O’Neal, The Greatest Woman Freestyle Skateboarder in the 1970s
Ellen O’Neal is the godmother of female pro skateboarding who proved that skaters aren’t just a group of delinquents living in Venice Beach and helped bring the sport into the mainstream by skating on the Wonder Woman TV show.
Born and raised in Southern California, Ellen had only been skating for a year before she was sponsored by Gordon & Smith, Bennett Trucks, and Vans. Here are some of interesting photographs of Ellen O’Neal taken by Jim Goodrich in the 1970s.
h/t: vintag.es
Ellen’s photos from Skateboarder Magazine are also some of the most iconic girl skater photos ever shot, and in 2012, Complex Magazine named her number four in their “Sexiest Female Skateboarders” list. In the ’04 book, The Legacy of Warren Bolster, Warren Bolster offered this on Ellen: “She invented her own variations on many maneuvers and added grace, style, and composure to the circuit.”