A history of snowboarding created by Elena Korogodina

  • First experience

    First experience
    How old is snowboarding? no one really knows...
    Austrian miners who have been riding long wooden boards with handles or ropes since the 16th century, and possibly even raced in the 1800s, or a similar invention in the Swiss Alps that allows a rider to sit or stand.
  • Snowboard like sled

    Snowboard like sled
    M.J. "Jack" Burchett cut out a plank of plywood in 1929 and tried to secure his feet with some clothesline and horse reins. Burchett came up with on of the first "snowboards"
  • Sideways on a sled

    Sideways on a sled
    Vern Wickland rides sideways on a sled from a small hill in Chicago. He patents a snowboard-like sled.
  • Ski board

    Ski board
    The world's first snowboard was made from plywood by a man named Tom Sims in 1963. He called it the "ski board." Tom later opened his own company, which had a big impact on the world of snowboarding in the early years - Sims Snowboards.
  • The Snurfer

    The Snurfer
    Sherman Poppen made his first snowboard in 1965 and named it “Snufer”. In fact, the name came up with his wife. Sherman simply glued and bolted two skis, made support for the legs. He gave it to his daughter and she tested it on a small hill. Soon everyone in the neighborhood wanted the same. Snufer was a great success in the market because it was simple, cheap and sold in supermarkets. But it was not a long hobby.
  • Roundtail

    Roundtail
    Surfer Dimitrije Milovich, having tried to ride trays in New York, begins to develop surfboard-like snowboards. He came up with a device for downhill skiing, which, in fact, became the direct ancestor of modern snowboarding. The board was surf-shaped and wore vestigial traces of belonging to the ski slalom. Also in his board were metal snowboard edging.
    He later created the WInterstick Company in 1975, which became the first snowboard company.
  • Yellow Banana

    Yellow Banana
    Bob Webber gets a patent for his first Skibord project. Bob Webber was the first to use polyethylene to make the board, therefore decreasing the friction and letting the riders go faster than before. His Board was called the yellow banana. In years to come, many different materials were used to create the snowboard such as fiber glass.
  • Burton

    Burton
    Jake Burton, who loved the "Snurfer", kept improving it on his own, such as to add foot traps and adding wooden pieces to make the board wider. He then started his own company in Vermont and called his new inventions snowboards. They were flexible wooden planks with water ski binding. Burton is still one of the largest snowboarding companies today.
  • P-tex sliding surface

    P-tex sliding surface
    In 1980, the parallel developments of Burton and Winterstick almost simultaneously led to the idea of using ski technology in the manufacture of boards. The base of the P-Tex has finally become the sliding surface of the snowboard.
  • First high-back

    First high-back
    In 1983, Jeff Grell develops high-back, which allows the boards to stay stable on solid snow. These mounts are first used on Flite snowboards, but later appear on Sims snowboards. It is believed that high-backs were invented earlier by Louis Fornier.
  • Snowboard as a sport

    Snowboard as a sport
    Snowboarding is permitted in 39 of the 600 ski resorts.
  • Modern snowboard boots

    Modern snowboard boots
    With a lace-up, ski-boot inner bladder, Burton produces what will become the standard design for soft-boot snowboarding.
  • Popular winter sport

    Popular winter sport
    Snowboarding becomes the fastest growing winter sport on the planet with more than 6 million people. More than 80% of the kids participating in alpine sports choose snowboarding.
  • Olympic discipline

    Olympic discipline
    The snowboard was first included in the program of the Olympic Winter Games in 1998 at the Olympics in Nagano.