Greg Noll

Big Wave Surfer - Greg Noll Surfboards

Greg Noll is the most mythic of big-wave surfers. Known as “Da Bull,” he was born Greg Lawhead on the 11th of February, 1937 and changed his name after his mother Grace married Ash Noll, a chemist. They lived near the Manhattan Beach pier, where the young boy fished and worked as a bait-disher. Out on the pier, he whiffed the wisdom of the fishermen and first felt the euphoria of the “kook-box” and redwood surfboard sliders riding the swells below. That, he thought, is what I want to do with my life.