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Identified by pals and colleagues as a “planetary patriot,” a “blissful warrior” and the “Golden State Eco-Warrior,” Rob Caughlan, a political operative, savvy public relations specialist and one of many early leaders of the Surfrider Basis, died at his house in San Mateo, on Jan. 17. He was 82.
His spouse of almost 62 years, Diana, died 4 days earlier, from lung most cancers.
Environmentalists, political operatives and pals responded to his demise with grief but additionally pleasure as they recalled his ardour, expertise and humorousness — and his drive not solely to make the world a greater place, however to have enjoyable doing it.
“He’d all the time say that the actual winner in a browsing contest was the man who had probably the most enjoyable,” mentioned Lennie Roberts, a conservationist in San Mateo County and longtime buddy of Caughlan’s. “He was true to that. It’s the best way he lived.”
“When he walked right into a room, he’d have an enormous smile on his face. He was a terrific — a gifted — individuals individual,” mentioned Dan Younger, one of many authentic 5 founders of the Surfrider Basis. The group was cobbled collectively within the early Nineteen Eighties by a bunch of Southern California surfers who felt referred to as to guard the shoreline — and their waves.
In addition they wished to dispel the stereotype that surfers are lackadaisical stoners — and present the world that surfers might get organized and combat for simply causes, mentioned Roberts, citing Caughlan’s 2020 memoir, “The Surfer within the White Home and Different Salty Yarns.”
Earlier than becoming a member of Surfrider in 1986, Caughlan was a political operative who labored as an environmental adviser within the Carter administration. Based on Warner Chabot, an outdated buddy and not too long ago retired government director of the an Francisco Estuary Institute, Caughlan bought his begin throughout the early Nineteen Seventies when he and his buddy, David Oke, fashioned the Sam Ervin Fan Membership, which supported the Southern senator’s efforts to steer the Watergate investigation of President Nixon.
Based on Chabot, Caughlan organized the printing of T-shirts with Ervin’s face on them, beneath the textual content “I Belief Uncle Sam.”
“He was an early social influencer — par extraordinaire,” he mentioned.
Glenn Hening, a surfer, former Jet Propulsion Laboratory area software program engineer and one other authentic founding father of the Surfrider Basis, mentioned one of many group’s preliminary fights was towards town of Malibu, which within the early Nineteen Eighties was periodically digging up sand within the lagoon proper offshore and destroying the waves at considered one of their favourite surf spots.
Based on Hening, it was Caughlin’s distinctive means to influence and appeal politicians and donors that put Surfrider’s efforts on the map.
Caughlan served as the inspiration’s president from 1986 to 1992.
The inspiration grabbed the nationwide highlight in 1989 when it went after two massive paper mills in Humboldt Bay that have been discharging poisonous wastewater into a wonderful surfspot in Northern California. The inspiration took goal and in 1991 filed go well with alongside the U.S. Environmental Safety Company; the paper mills settled for $5.8 million.
Hening mentioned the victory would by no means have occurred with out Caughlan.
The mills had tried to brush off the go well with by providing a donation to the inspiration, Hening mentioned. However Caughlan and Mark Massara — an environmental lawyer with the group — rebuffed the gesture.
“The paper mill guys mentioned, ‘Nicely, what can we do right here? How can we make this go away?’” mentioned Hening, recalling the dialog. “And Rob mentioned, ‘It’s not going to go away. We’re not going away. We’re surfers.”
Roberts mentioned Caughlan’s legacy may be felt by anybody who has ever frolicked on the San Mateo County shoreline. Within the Nineteen Eighties, the 2 spearheaded a profitable poll measure nonetheless protects the coast from non-agricultural growth and ensured entry to the seashores and bluffs. It additionally prohibits onshore oil services for off-shore services.
The 2 additionally labored on a county measure that led to the event of the Satan’s Slide tunnels on Freeway 1 between Pacifica and Montara, designed to make that previously treacherous path safer for vacationers.
The state had wished to construct a six-lane freeway over the steep hills within the space. “It will have been harmful due to the steep slopes, and it might be going up into the fog financial institution after which again down out of the fog. So it was inherently harmful,” Roberts mentioned.
Chad Nelsen, the present president of the Surfrider Basis, mentioned he was first drawn into Caughlan’s orbit in 2010 when Surfrider bought concerned with a lawsuit pertaining to a seashore in San Mateo County. Silicon Valley enterprise capitalist Vinod Khosla bought 53 acres of Northern California shoreline for $32.5 million and closed off entry to the general public — together with a preferred stretch referred to as Martin’s Seashore — so Surfrider sued.
Nelsen mentioned that though Caughlan had left the group about 20 years earlier than, he reappeared with a “kind of unbridled enthusiasm and dedication to the trigger,” and the group finally prevailed — the general public can as soon as once more entry the seashore “because of ‘Birdlegs.’”
Birdlegs was Caughlan’s nickname, and in response to Nelsen, it was in all probability coined within the Nineteen Seventies by his fellow surfers.
“He had notoriously spindly legs, I suppose,” Nelsen mentioned.
Robert Willis Caughlan was born in Alliance, Ohio, on Feb. 27, 1943. His father, who was a parachute teacher with the U.S. Military, died when Caughlan was 4. In 1950, Caughlan moved together with his mom and youthful brother to San Mateo, the place he noticed the ocean for the primary time.
He rode his his first wave in 1959, on the age of 16, from the breakwater at Half Moon Bay.
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