Snowboarding visionary Jake Burton Carpenter dies at 65 [View all]
Last edited Fri Nov 22, 2019, 12:57 PM - Edit history (1)
Source: Associated Press
Snowboarding visionary Jake Burton Carpenter dies at 65
By EDDIE PELLS November 22, 2019
Whether you had a gold medal hanging from your neck, were just learning how to stand on a snowboard, or were one of those flustered skiers wondering where all the kids in the baggy pants were coming from, you knew the name "Burton." ... Jake Burton Carpenter, the man who changed the game on the mountain by fulfilling a grand vision of what a snowboard could be, died Wednesday night of complications stemming from a relapse of testicular cancer. He was 65. ... In an email sent to the staff at Burton, CEO John Lacy called Carpenter "our founder, the soul of snowboarding, the one who gave us the sport we love so much."
Carpenter was not the inventor of the snowboard. But 12 years after Sherman Poppen tied together a pair of skis with a rope to create what was then called a "Snurfer," the 23-year-old entrepreneur, then known only as Jake Burton, quit his job in Manhattan, moved back to Vermont and went about dreaming of how far a snowboard might take him. ... "I had a vision there was a sport there, that it was more than just a sledding thing, which is all it was then," Burton said in a 2010 interview with The Associated Press.
For years, Burton's snowboards were largely snubbed at resorts -- its dimensions too untested, its riders too unrefined, its danger all too real -- and many wouldn't allow them to share the slopes with the cultured ski elite in Colorado or California or, heaven forbid, the Swiss Alps.
....
At a bar in Pyeongchang, South Korea, not far from where snowboarding celebrated its 20th anniversary at the Olympics last year, there was a wall filled with Burton pictures and memorabilia -- as sure a sign as any of the global reach of a company that remains headquartered not far from where it was founded in Carpenter's garage, in Londonderry, Vermont.
....
His final years were not the easiest. ... Not long after being given a clean bill of health following his 2011 cancer diagnosis, Carpenter was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease, Miller Fisher Syndrome, that left him completely paralyzed for a short time. ... After a long rehab, he was back on the mountain, and in 2018, he was standing near the finish line to watch White win his third Olympic gold medal.
This month, Carpenter sent an email to his staff: "You will not believe this, but my cancer has come back," he said, while outlining his intention to fight the good fight. ... Not two weeks later, Lacy sent out another email, notifying employees that Jake had died peacefully. The email included one, simple directive. ... "I'd encourage everyone to do what Jake would be doing tomorrow, and that's riding," Lacy wrote. "It's opening day at Stowe, so consider taking some turns together, in celebration of Jake."
Read more: https://apnews.com/42efe5c01f7844aea670099f7220d930
Sherman Poppen himself died a few months ago. His obit is at DU. I'll link to it when I have a faster connection.
My first snowboard is a mid-90s Burton Twin 58. I owe both Jake and Sherman a lot.
Hat tip, {redacted}
DU, August 11, 2019:
The "grandfather of snowboarding," Sherman Poppen dies at 89
https://www.democraticunderground.com/100212371871
= new reply since forum marked as read