remember about surfboarding and you ’ll likely come up with a mental image of bronzed young men and women on California beaches , hair bleached by the sun and sporting rive abs . But from a historical perspective , you might as well call up of crime novelistAgatha Christiehanging 10 in a “ skimpy ” emerald - green wool bathe suit and leather booties . That ’s because Christie was anearly — if improbable — English innovator of the play .
Agatha Christie Books a Trip
In 1922 , the 32 - year - sure-enough author come with her hubby , Archie , on a world tour topromotean approaching exhibition intended to lionize the achievement of the British Empire . ( Itfeaturedsuch attractions as a butter carving of the Prince of Wales as well as elephants distinguish Simla and Saucy . ) The Christies deboarded in South Africa , where they were introduced to a local custom : surfing on Muizenberg Beach .
“ Whenever we could slip time off — or rather when Archie could — we took the train and go to Muizenberg , get our breaker boards , and went out surfing together , ” ChristiewroteinAn Autobiography , a memoir release posthumously in 1977 .
Initially , the span did their best on savorless boards — which Christie quetch “ poke you in the middle”—before graduating to “ lite curving board . ” find the wooden plank “ easy to persuade , ” she quickly take to the activity despite a few self - admitted face - plants into the sand .
The duet continued the tour of duty through Australia and New Zealand before find themselves in Honolulu , Hawaii , where , as one might expect , Christie found raft of waves to challenge her . It was probably slightly too advanced for a initiate , as Christie recall that the she and Archie were monish out of the water supply by a implicated local .
unshaken , Christie buy a woollen washup suit ( which she describe as “ a fantastic , skimpy emerald green wool bathing dress ” ) as well as leather boots intend to protect her from sharp coral and specify about perfect her technique in Hawaii from August to October 1922 . upper was a big part of the quiver for her — she afterwards wrote that surfing seemed like act at “ 200 miles per hour”—and soon she was capable to go from a prone position on the surfboard to bear up .
That latter feat take aim on some diachronic import . In 2011 , a researcher for the Museum of British Surfing named Pete Robinson find that Christie and her hubby were probable among the first British citizens to learn how to surf upright .
“ In the early 1920s very few British masses were channel-surf and the only one we know about earlier than her , digest up , was Prince Edward , ” Robinson toldThe Guardian .
Christie’s Novel Approach
It did n’t take long for Christie ’s new pursual to warrant a mention in her piece of work . In her 1924 novelThe Man in the Brown Suit , heroine Anne Beddingfeld finds herself in straddling a surfboard in Cape Town , South Africa .
That any Brit was surfing was strange at the fourth dimension , and that Christie , a woman , was doing it was even more curious . Women surfing had certainly predated her — a cleaning lady named Nakookootriumphedin an 1887 Maui competition — but surfing was perceive as a male - centrical sport for much of the 20th hundred . Mengarneredthe Panthera leo ’s share of plunder money and imperativeness reporting — an imbalance that has only started to change in recent age . ( It was only in 2019 that the World Surf Leaguemandatedequal fiscal reward to both men and women . )
It ’s unclearto what extent Christie continued on with surfing later in life , though she was known to have shop at a writer ’s retreat on Burgh Island that offered waves . It ’s plausible that , render her affection for the variation , she paddled out whenever she could .
enounce Christie : “ It is one of the most staring strong-arm pleasures that I have bed . ”
