Bruce’s Story
Who is Bruce Jones?
Bruce, born and raised in Los Angeles, adolesced through the LA-based Lumber Company, Jones Lumber, founded in 1924 by his grandparents and, perhaps interestingly, still in family operation today at the same location. In the summers, a young Bruce (and his brothers) would work the yard completing tasks as diverse as pulling weeds or delivering (and dropping!!!) loads of lumber before they had their driver’s licenses. Dad caught the surfing bug as a young teen and shaped his first board in an old boxcar on the yard’s property out of what he described as a block of blue-colored PU foam. It wasn’t worth glassing but he never gave up! One hot summer day he decided he had enough of the weed pulling at Jones Lumber. Before long he was glueing up blanks at Clark Foam and planing stringers flush with a Skil 100. Indian summer days and south swells would cut Clark work shifts short with trips to Trestles and SanO.
This little bit of history (a humble beginning) is very important. He may not have been aware of it at the time, but it would eventually define major (yet seldom spoken of) aspects of his career. Clark Foam eventually introduced Bruce to Hobie Surfboards where he was employed with finishing off the rough shapes of shapers like Phil Edwards, John Grey and Ralph Parker. Eventually, Bruce picked up a night shift shaping for Gordon Duane of HB’s Gordie Surfboards which in turn led to a shaping position at Vardeman Surfboards where Bruce designed and shaped the Jackie Baxter Model.
The shortboard evolution was setting in by the late 60s. Bruce did various shaping stints in Huntington as well as in Maui for Brewer. After traveling to South Africa and Europe, Bruce found solid footing at Russel Surfboards in Newport where much of his style would begin to take “shape” and become influential for other Orange County shapers. In 1971, Bruce bought Sunset Beach property previously owned by Bob “Ole” Olsen, which he rented to the McElheny family’s surfboard operation until September 1973 when Bruce opened the doors to his own surf shop and to Bruce Jones Surfboards.
The 70s is the decade that defines much of Bruce’s career. Bruce Jones Surfboards from this period are sought after collector’s items characterized by Jericho Poppler’s hand-drawn logos, fine pin lines, impeccable opaque lamination work and just plain-old clean, functional design. For Bruce Jones Surfboards, the 70s were also marked by one of the sport’s earliest female world champs, Jericho, being crowned at Sunset Beach, Hawaii on a Bruce Jones single-fin, pintail sled.
The Longboard Revolution began in the 80s and Bruce was eager to take part. This era produced the Bruce Jones Modern Longboard which became a long-lasting design known for its functional rocker, outline and all-around usability. Longboarding had made a full comeback by the early 90s. Young surfers were beginning to pick up the old ideas. Bruce took notice and hastened to put together a team of young longboards consisting of Matt Steuyck, Jody Lemmon and Cody Simpkins (some of California’s finest longboarders). This grouping soon expanded to include (in this order) Cody Faircloth, Dodger Kremel and Greg Irvin before further expanding to Cyrus Sutton, John Husak and Dave Roberts. This group flew under the radar at the time, but they represented some of the finest longboarding in the world and left a lasting impression on the Orange County/California scene as well as on Bruce’s lineup of designs. Furthermore, Bruce exclaimed several times that it took him back to his favorite era of surfing in the early/mid 60s, before things became psychedelic.
Bruce maintained his own glassing operation in Costa Mesa all the way until 2005 when he eventually moved his shaping over to the Waterman’s Guild in Santa Ana where he carried out the remainder of his career.
Throughout his career, Bruce maintained a good rapport with his California-based blank providers, Clark Foam and eventually US Blanks. These relationships were important and have had a lasting impact on the blank industry. Not only did Bruce design several important longboard blanks for US but he had also designed a handful for Clark Foam before its closure. In the 90s, Bruce, along with a couple of Clark employees, also took it upon themselves to take a closer look at the then existing mold plugs. They developed a simple system to search for twists or inconsistencies in the plugs and, if found, corrected the plugs to make new molds. This aspect of Bruce’s career has major significance because it means that Bruce’s designs, ideas and values are present (in the form of his blank designs) in longboard shops the world over. His legacy continues to serve the community.
The sighting jig built by Bruce and Reid Price to search for twists in blank mold plugs.
