Or do you think they will award Camel Crushes instead?”
Female Surf World Champ Received Cigarettes as a Prize | And liked it!
Phyllis O’Donnell was Australia’s first female world surf champion after topping the podium in 1964 and was a self-described terror in the water. The surf Walk of Famer was at the top of her game back when women’s surfing wasn’t quite at the more equal level it is at today. In some events the winners wouldn’t even get any prize money and in others she would win cigarettes. Craven A’s to be exact!
Did Phyllis care?
“I used to smoke so I didn’t mind so much. But I gave that up 30 years ago now,” she told the Daily Telegraph.
Thankfully things are much different and pro women surfers are making millions a year thanks in part to the work surfers like Phyllis did.
Surf scholar Chas Smith compares it to today:
“Do you think the World Surf League will draw inspiration from the past and award future champs cartons of Camel Blues once Samsung officially implodes and the Ziffs get bored?
Click over to the Daily Telegraph for the full story on the legend Phyllis O’Donnell.
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