Continuing now with a series of scene reports by Jeff "JT" Tatum that range from the 1970's to present, the original longboarder has another gem for us regarding the legendary Ameron Pipes.   These massive concrete pipes are now submerged as the intake and exhaust for seawater used to cool the San Onofre nuclear power plant, but for a magic time in the late 1970's, they were a private playground for a very few skaters and photographers.  This time, JT gives us a tale about one such shooter, Joel Broida...    [UPDATE:  Joel Broida gave us a call:  one of skateboarding's earliest photographers went on to become a highly-respected professor of mathmatics and physics.  Professor Broida is faculty at the University of Colorado at Boulder and the University of California, San Diego.  He and JT are back in touch, and JT's got more photos dug from Joel's archives that will be uploaded to his gallery.  In the meantime, let's take another look at: ]

Nukeland Part 2:  The Tale of Crazy Joel Broida 

Sonny Miller, Art “Rat” Mingeaud and I had taken Joel Broida and his camera to the Ameron Pipes a few times and he got some killer photos!  Joel was a very eccentric guy we’d met at the Del Mar Skate Ranch when he’d approached and asked if he could take some sk8 photos of us.  He became one of our regular shooters when we saw how his photos came out!

Joel was good enough to get recognized by Skateboarder Magazine, and he got some photos of me published.  This story is about an adventure that led to some of those shots, including some that have never been published before either or my previous article on Silverfish about the Amerons.

After a few photo sessions at Nukeland, Joel got the crazy idea that he would hang down through one of the manholes that were on the top of some of the huge pipes.   His plan was to use his mountain climbing gear, so Jole brought ropes, carabiners... the whole nine yards, and we picked a pipe with a manhole on top and good jumper gaps on each side.

Joel spiked down his rope on one side of the pipe, threw the rope over the top and then spiked it into the ground on the other side.  He loaded himself up with a bunch of climbing gear and his cameras, and then climbed to the top of the pipe.  He lowered himself through the hole and hung, suspended in the middle of the pipe.  We started blasting front side and backside pipe transfers and Joel started snapping.  The only problem was that he couldn’t help spinning around on the end of that rope, so we had to time our jumpers and his shots for when he was spun around to face the gaps! 

After shooting for about 45 minutes, sure enough, we received our Nukeland Welcoming Committee:  up drives a USMC Jeep with two MP jarheads holding M-16’s.  This would be the third time I’d been caught by the MP’s at the pipes and they were starting to get really pissed off!  It was a very serious thing to trespass where the Amerons were located, because they were on a secured military facility—if they wanted to, the MP’s could throw you in military jail for some time.  One of the two MP’s in the Jeep had caught me before and told me that, if it happened again, he’d kick my ass and throw me in jail.  So, we thought we were in some real shit.

Most other times, when the MP’s showed up, we’d run and hide in between the pipes until they left.  There was a long dirt road leading to the pipes, so we could see them coming unless they really snuck up on us.  This time, we saw them coming alright, and we wanted to run, but we couldn’t leave Joel just hanging there.  Besides, he was our ride home, anyway!  So, we just stood there with dumb looks on our faces.

 

The MP I knew from before looked at me and said, “Hey, Mr. Tatum!” I replied with a “What’s up?”  He had a really pissed-off look on his face and I thought he was gonna do me in, for sure.  Then, both MP’s looked up at Joel, hanging there and spinning on the end of his rope.  Joel looked at them and said, “Hey guys!” in a cheerful voice, like nothing was wrong.  The MP’s looked at each other and busted out laughing.  We couldn’t really tell whether it was a “these guys are hilarious” laugh, or a “these guys are dead meat” laugh and, just when we thought they were going to let us go, they said, “pack up your stuff and get in the Jeep!”  They asked us where our car was and started driving us down the hill.  It started smelling real bad, because all four of us crapped our pants by then. 

When the MP’s pulled up to Joel’s truck, they looked at each other, laughed again and then turned around to say, “You guys are f-ing crazy.  Get in your truck and get the hell outta here.  If we catch you in here again, we’ll shoot you in the legs and throw you in the brig!”   

Threats like that were totally believable in the 1970’s, and probably again now in the same place.  After that, we didn’t go to Nukeland for a while.  When we did, it was only a few times because we were so paranoid that it was hard to have fun skating.  But, ever since that day, we called Joel, “Crazy Joel Broida” and that’s where he got the name.  This was in 1979, and Joel hung out with us for another six months or so, snapping great photos, and then he disappeared.  Some of the best photos ever taken of skaters in the Amerons and me were shot by Crazy Joel, but I haven’t seen him since then.

Joel, if you’re out there somewhere, reading this, get in touch with me through EBasil at Silverfish Longboarding.  I would dig on seeing you again and maybe we could shoot some skate photos, too.    –JT

You can read JT's first article on the Amerons, here.