It’s the Winter Olympics and I can’t help but think of all the amazing female snowboarders from decades past like Morgan LaFonte, who also happened to be an awesome skateboarder!
Above: a photo of Morgan skateboarding appeared in the May/June 1998 issue of Punk Planet
Morgan was born in June 1967 in Boyne Falls, Michigan and originally took up skiing at her local resort Nubs Nob, near Harbor Springs. Upon graduation from Marian High School in Bloomfield Hills, Morgan “got on a bus with a small duffle bag of clothes and $400 in my pocket, and headed out to Colorado. I got a job at Club Med at Copper Mountain and started skiing every chance I got” (Dietze).
Morgan pursued snowboarding in 1987 at age 20 after meeting and dating Shawn Farmer, although she broke her coccyx on her very first run. Fortunately, Morgan was not deterred and got back on board.
A photo of Morgan by Aaron Sedway performing a backflip at Mt Hood, rocking red snowboard pants and a bra was pretty iconic. It was published in the February 1996 issue of TransWorld Snowboarding magazine. She was also the first woman snowboarder to have a double backflip captured on film for her part in No Man’s Land, and featured in a Sony PlayStation video game!
Morgan is best known for her courageous snowboarding stunts in the 1990s, that gave her some mainstream success in magazines like Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Fresh and Tasty, and Conde Nast Sports for Women, among others like TransWorld Snowboarding. Morgan was also named the female “world champion extreme snowboarder” in 1993 and 1995, and over the years she was sponsored by Roxy, Oakley, Helly Hansen, Quiksilver, Arbor, DaKine, Arcteryx, and K2, who designed her signature board.
Even better, in the May 1997 issue of Thrasher, Morgan was interviewed explaining that she dropped into her first ramp at age 21, a year after taking up snowboarding. When asked, “Why so late?” she replied, “I never really knew any skaters. Skating is the kind of sport one has to be turned on to. Luck finally came my way one day in the shape of a young named named Mikey Merrick. Mikey had a ramp in his backyard and time to teach me what I needed to know.”
Morgan felt that there were many similarities between skateboarding and snowboarding, especially when it came to catching air in a bowl or snow halfpipe. Morgan said, “I try to skate once a week in the winter, which is definitely not enough to progress.” And the reality was that she needed to keep herself injury-free for the winter snowboard season. Morgan loved skating ramps, including vert and mini-ramps with spines. At the time of her interview she said that she “just recently had the pleasure of skating a concrete park, which I plan to do lots more of.”
And when asked about her favorite skateboarder, Morgan went directly to Cara-beth Burnside, her greatest influence. CB has “taken the time to skate with me and has given me great insights to help me progress. She’s the shit as far as I’m concerned. Thanks for being there for me, CB. You rule!”
References:
- Dietze, Geri. “Morgan Lafonte Comes Home.” Northern Express (Dec. 8, 2018).
- Sedway, Aaron. “Morgan La Fonte.” Thrasher (May 1997): 110-111.
Womxn Skateboard History 