I am pretty nostalgic.....I can't help it...I was just wondering how many of you remember Samurai Skates? It was the only skateshop in Rochester, NY back in the late 80's....I know...that's pretty weird for you young skaters seeing how skateshops are all over the place these days. Well anyways...when I was 9 back in about 1987 all the kids in my neighborhood were talking about this skateshop in the city that sold all the good stuff....all we were used to was Nash and Veriflex.....the only pro models we saw at first were from a couple of the older kids and then from Transworld and Thrasher......all I know is that I was soooo amazed, excited, stoked, in awe of all those 80's Skateboards back then.....the whole image of Skateboarding pulled me right in...so a couple kids started begging their parents to take them to Samurai.....and they ended up being the first of our group to get Skateboards...real ones that is....there was a Schmitt Stix Lucero Jester, A Madrid X-Team Rider, a Lester and of course a hot pink Tony Hawk..these were all my friends first decks....then after what seemed like an extra extended period of time....I finally got my parents to take me to the almighty Samurai...which at that point was just a myth like Animal Chin....except my parents and I were on a "Search for Samurai Skates" so we found it...my Dad complained about the parking or lack there of and all I could smell was Chinese food from the Cathay Pagoda....this was 1988 by this point....and all these older kids were skating out front of the shop.....I was in awe....we went up to the door of the shop and they were actually handing out tickets with numbers on them because only a few people could be in there at one time because of the fire hazard....for those of you who were there...the first shop on Windsor street was real small.....to my parents it was like walking into a closet, but for an impressionable little 9 year old kid, this shop was the size of 10 Zumiez combined! I looked at all the decks and the shirts all over...the walls , ceilings.etc......my parents complained about the prices but they still let me have free reign picking out my deck.....I walked out of there with a blue Powell Peralta Steve Caballero, with blue Tracker Ultra Lights and Blue mini rat wheels....all that shit had to match! I still have that deck to this day..That complete was $150.00 back then...it's weird how Skateboards haven't gone up with inflation as much as other things....when Art at Samurai handed the finished complete over to me, that was when I had made it.....I was legit now...I had a bad ass board and I could now turn my Nash Executioner into a snowboard! You remeber a lot when you are that age...I bet if I was just a few years older, I wouldn't remember that experience the same way I do......all I can say is....with starting Old Skull Skateboards some 20 years after my first skateshop experience, I will feel that we succeded if at least one kid had a similar experience buying their first board at our shop.....I have a feeling that every local skateshop owner since Samurai would hope the same thing and if we all achieve that...we are all huge success stories in my eyes...
Please write back with a story of your about the late great Samurai Skates
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