05/12/2026
In the early ’90s, in an old VW bus on a vert mission to Beaver Creek, Oregon (I hadn’t even shot my first skate photo yet), we met a cast of Oregon skateboarders who would later shape the DIY movement — Red, Monk,Davey and a few others whose names escape my burnt memory. Not only was vert skating dead at this point, but skateboarding in general was just coming off life support, so to meet a whole gang of rippers who not only had a sick vert ramp but shared the same passion for skateboarding was a moment in time I’ll never forget….
I mean, these dudes were the craziest f’ers we’d met in a long time, so when Red asked us if we wanted to crash at his house after the contest and check out a spot he was building under a bridge in Portland, we couldn’t say no……
Not sure if anything else was there, but all I remember was the big face wall and thinking, that is the future of skateboarding. If no one will build cement tracks for us, we’ll build em ourselves.
Fast forward a few years (1995), and the rumors of what Burnside was becoming — and what was being built there — were too good to pass up. Heads were making the pilgrimage from Nor Cal to Portland on the regular, and we weren’t about to be left out.
Always trying to get my film paid for at that point, I contacted Greg Carroll to see if he had anyone for me to shoot up there, and he said he needed a shot of Andy Bohna for a Hornet Wheels ad…. At least that’s how I remember it
Nonetheless, I somehow met up with Andy and shot this single photo along with an invert of Sage….. the only two photos I ever shot at Burnside. The ad was never run due to Hornet going out of business but these photos sure make a nice insta post 30 years later!