He’s Up for the Surf at Age 80 : ‘Whitey’ Harrison Caught Wave of Future Nearly 7 Decades Ago, Is Still Riding

After more than an hour of surfing in the chilly water Sunday morning, Lorrin (Whitey) Harrison caught a last wave and beached his board among a crowd of folks waiting to celebrate his 80th birthday.

Not a typical day for an octogenarian, but to Harrison, who has been surfing for almost seven decades and is one of the sport’s patriarchs, it was just another glorious day at the beach.

“Surfing with all these kids keeps you young,” Harrison said with a grin, stripping his wet suit off before donning his trademark palm-frond hat.

According to Steve Pezman, co-publisher of Surfer’s Journal and a former editor of Surfer magazine, Harrison is one of a handful of people older than 70 who surf.

“He’s the oldest guy on a board that I know of and is easily the leader of the pack,” said Harrison’s longtime friend, Terry Tracy.

Tracy, a Southern California surfing legend in his own right, said that since the death of surfing patriarch Duke Kahanamoku, Harrison has unofficially assumed Kahanamoku’s place as the “No. 1 boy of surfboarding.”

For Harrison, a San Juan Capistrano resident, being on the water--whether surfing, canoeing or diving--is life itself. In fact, he is a retired commercial fisherman.

“I don’t think he could live without being at the beach,” said his wife of 46 years, Cecilia. “You can just see the difference in him when he gets near the water.”

Harrison, a native of Orange County, began surfing while attending Orange High School and has traveled throughout the world searching for the perfect wave. At times, however, Harrison’s enthusiasm for surfing has gotten him into a bit of a jam.

Tracy recalled that as a young man, Harrison would occasionally stow away on ocean liners bound for Hawaii in order to surf the islands’ famous waves. On one of those trips, Tracy said, Harrison was brought back to a stockade in San Francisco after he was discovered sleeping in a lifeboat on a cruise ship.

“They probably saw his surfboard sticking out from underneath the tarp,” Tracy said with a laugh.

Laguna Beach resident Ron Sizemore, 53, is a second-generation surfing partner to Harrison; Sizemore’s dad shared a wave with Harrison even before Ron was born.

“His whole attitude toward life is great! It can be raining and cold outside and he’s got a smile on his face and this elatedness about him. It’s infectious,” Sizemore said.

Harrison has passed on his love of surfing to virtually every member of his family. His wife surfed for more than 25 years and all six of his children as well as all 26 grandchildren and great-grandchildren surf, Harrison said proudly.

The former lifeguard’s hair is thinning now and the years have extracted some concessions; his wife and friends drive him to the beach these days and younger surfers sometimes help him with his board--but one look at the alert twinkle in Harrison’s eyes makes it clear that there is a youthful spirit that lives beneath the leathery brown wrinkles of his frail-looking body.

Still, there’s not much that can put Harrison on the beach for long. In 1984, Harrison underwent a quintuple heart bypass operation, but just two months after the surgery he was back in the water.

“I don’t know where my energy comes from, it’s just something I was born with,” Harrison said matter-of-factly.

Quickly stowing his wet suit, Harrison grabbed his guitar, and in moments an impromptu jam session--complete with ukuleles and a hula dancer--was underway. Moving continuously from one song to another for almost twenty minutes, Harrison paused to give his band of forty- and fiftysomethings time to breathe.

“Do anything that’s hard to do and anything you want to do, because life is only so long, and you should have a full life with everything you can think of,” Harrison said joyously.