Surfing legend Dick Catri honored during Sebastian Inlet memorial service, paddle out

Rick Neale | Florida Today

Show Caption Hide Caption Hundreds pay tribute to surfer Dick Catri Surfers from all over the country returned to Sebastian Inlet to pay tribute to legendary east coast surfer Dick Catri. Video by Craig Bailey. Posted June 10, 2017.

SEBASTIAN INLET STATE PARK — One day roughly 60 years ago, when the mullet were running and the tarpon were jumping, Dick Catri and Jack "Murph the Surf" Murphy decided to try surfing the shoulder-high waves at Sebastian Inlet — an exotic activity.

During that bygone era, Murphy recalled that Sebastian Inlet boasted little more than "a little village of old raggedy trailers" on the beach and Cracker Jack's bait shack. Neither the State Road A1A bridge nor the full concrete jetty yet existed.

"Cracker Jack said to me, 'What y'all gonna do with them pontoons on that car?' I said, 'We're going to take them pontoons out there, and we're going to ride them waves,'" Murphy recalled Saturday during Catri's memorial service.

"And Cracker Jack said, 'Just like they do in Hawaii?' " Murphy said.

He and Catri paddled out, and Murphy said a Coast Guard boat and sheriff's deputies tried to convince the duo to return to shore, to no avail.

"It's so appropriate that we're going to paddle out today. Because Dick Catri was the first one to ever put the board in the water at Monster Hole," Murphy said, eliciting applause from the crowd.

"On that day, we put the flag in the sand for East Coast surfing," he said.

Hundreds of people gathered at Sebastian Inlet State Park to honor the life and legend of Catri, the Melbourne Beach surfing pioneer who passed away last month at age 79. He is an inaugural member of the East Coast Surfing Hall of Fame.

Attendees shared laughter, tears and vintage surf stories during a memorial service near the breakwall on the south side of the channel. Afterward, surfers took to the sea for a paddle-out.

In the 1960s, Catri served as captain, coach and competing member of a legendary Hobie Surfboards team featuring Gary Propper, Mike Tabeling, Bruce Valuzzi, Fletcher Sharpe and Mimi Munro, according to the Florida Surf Museum.

"Dick's competitive spirit and personal surfing accomplishments on Hawaii's North Shore, in Peru, Puerto Rico and on the entire East Coast brought pride and notoriety to the East Coast," Cecil Lear, co-founder of the Eastern Surfing Association, wrote in a statement that was read to the audience.

"He was our first East Coast surfing champion-ambassador," Lear wrote.

Catri launched Satellite Beach Surf Shop and Shagg’s Surf Shop in Indialantic. He co-founded what became the Cocoa Beach Easter Surfing Festival. And later, he mentored a new generation of Space Coast surfers, including 11-time world champion Kelly Slater, Todd Holland, Scott Bouchard, David Speir and Sean Slater.

During Saturday's service, Catri and Murphy's pioneering feats were compared with the explorers Lewis and Clark. Murphy introduced Catri to surfing in 1957.

"Dick lived a fabulous life. He planted the seeds of the surf industry here on the East Coast of the United States," said Hunter Joslin, a Melbourne Beach surfer and East Coast Surfing Hall of Fame member.

"In Hawaii and California, there are many different names that were associated with the beginning of the surf industries in those areas. There's only one name synonymous with that happening here on the East Coast — and that's Dick Catri," Joslin said.

Contact Neale at 321-242-3638, rneale@floridatoday.com or follow @RickNeale1 on Twitter