surfing
1955, verbal noun from surf (v.).
the craze went nationwide in U.S. from California in 1963…
What chance has a lonely surfer boy
For the love of a surfer chick,
With all these Humbert Humbert cats
Coming on so big and sick?
For me, my baby was a woman.
For him she’s just another nymphet.
The Crying of Lot 49
Surf-board is from 1826
originally in a Hawaiian and Polynesian context.
It is highly amusing to a stranger to go out into the south part of this town, some day when the sea is rolling in heavily over the reef, and to observe there the evolutions and rapid career of a company of surf-players. The sport is so attractive and full of wild excitement to Hawaiians, and withal so healthful, that I cannot but hope it will be many years before civilization shall look it out of countenance, or make it disreputable to indulge in this manly, though it be dangerous, exercise.
The Rev. Henry T. Cheever, “Life in the Sandwich Islands,” New York, 1851
surf (n.)
1680s, probably from earlier suffe (1590s),
of uncertain origin.
originally used in reference to the coast of India
perhaps of Indic origin
or perhaps a phonetic respelling of sough
which meant “a rushing sound.”
surf (v.)
“ride the crest of a wave,” 1917
Surf in the internet sense, first recorded 1993.
