I am of an age to have witnessed the passing of too many friends. Andy Conahan was such a friend and one of my original surfing buddies. Andy died way too young from ALS, at age 61. Long before he passed, however, he achieved unique recognition on a national scale for his surfing prowess. In the late 1960s he performed in tandem with his girlfriend Candy on ABC Television's Wide World of Sports.
Anyone who remembers that weekly, Saturday afternoon program will recall that it was not about any particular sport, but rather unique athletic challenges. This particular episode was live footage of the world surfing championship at Huntington Beach, California. Although growing in popularity, surfing was still somewhat of a novelty for the average TV viewer.
Andy was one of those people you never forget. He was blessed with a sly smile, an athletic body and a daring sense of adventure. He was also the most observant person I have ever known. And he had an uncanny understanding of the criminal mind.
We started surfing together in 1962 mostly at Doheny State Beach in south Orange County. It was a point break, river mouth paradise. We got around on bicycles then, but when my parents and sister went to see the World's Fair in Seattle and, incredibly, left me home alone, Andy was quick to locate the keys to my father's commuter car in the garage. We were 15. I had never driven a car before, but within 24 hours we were tooling 75-miles of highways across OC to Doheny. He had found the keys but I insisted on driving.
By the time we were seniors in high school, Andy was ditching school every day to go surfing. He had a part-time job at a pharmacy from which he pilfered prescription paper he would use to write excuses for his absence from school. I would forge his mother's signature on the excuse slips. I went to class; Andy went surfing.
He drove a souped up '56 Ford that he would race on Pacific Coast Highway between Doheny and Poche early in the morning when there were no waves. I remember him shutting down a local braggart one morning with his pink slip on the line.
In the water Andy would sit as far outside as possible and wait for the biggest wave, regardless of how long it took. I remember him breaking his wrist on the rocks at Killer Dana. I gave up surfing, which was more of a weekend thing for me, and left town for college. Andy kept riding waves, during which time he performed before a TV audience of millions, as noted above.
Some years passed before I saw him again. We met for coffee and I learned that he was an investigator for the Torrance Police Department. That figured. His knack of careful observation and understanding of "criminal" behavior, I'm sure, made him a good investigator.
"I was driving one day and I heard an ad on the radio for police officers in the city of Montebello," he told me. "I was just bumming around surfing, so I checked it out." The rest is history, as they say.
The last time I saw him was in Palm Springs at a class get-together for a few of the guys and our wives. He looked good. He said he hadn't surfed in years, but I could see that he had been lifting weights from size of his chest and biceps. He still had the broad shoulders that enabled him to ride tandem on a surfboard while holding up an acrobatic woman.
I mentioned that I was surfing again in Santa Cruz. He asked me if I knew Bob Scott, one of his fellow tandem competitors in the '60s, who was from Santa Cruz. I said, yes, assuming he was referring to Doc Scott, a local icon and developer of Pro-Plugs ear plugs to protect the ear canal from the cold Northern California water. I made a note to ask Doc the next time I saw him if he remembered Andy.
He was driving a Corvette, his car of choice following high school. He liked fast, high-profile cars. He married an Italian woman whom he had rescued one night while on his police beat.
"Look at Paul," he turned his head toward a mutual high school friend who was standing, arms akimbo -- hands on his hips -- chatting with a few of the guys. "That's the same stance he took standing behind the starting blocks before a race."
Sure enough, Paul, at one time a top sprinter, had taken that same posture. I thought to myself, only Conahan would have noticed and remembered. It was Paul who informed me of Andy's passing. Paul had called to catch up a year or so after Palm Springs and talked to Andy's wife who explained his unexpected and hasty demise from ALS.
I am so glad that I got to see Andy again after so many years. In my mind, he will always be a surfing giant.
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