Joe Donnelly
Venice: How a forgotten corner of ‘70s LA gave birth to modern skateboarding
Raising the ghosts of Dogtown — Writer Joe Donnelly’s essay ‘Venice Bohemia: From Abbot Kinney To The Z-Boys’ explores how the crumbling, surfer’s mecca of Venice in the 1970s gave rise to the legendary Z-Boys and skateboarding as we know it. It appears in ‘Los Angeles in the 1970s: Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mine’, a collection of essays and short stories that attempts to fill a gap in the literature about culture during one of the City of Angels’ most vibrant decades. It also includes the ‘Cruising Van Nuys’ photo essay by Rick McCloskey, featured here.
Written by: Joe Donnelly
Is Trump manipulating fears to mobilise the masses?
Fear and loathing in the United States — With violence erupting at Trump rallies across the United States, writer Joe Donnelly considers what may be at the root of people's hatred, the fears that Donald Trump is tapping into to create tension, disunity and malcontent.
Written by: Joe Donnelly
How the breakup of a marriage inspired the world's toughest free climb
El Capitan's Dawn Wall — Tommy Caldwell and Kevin Jorgeson may well be climbing’s first household names. But not everyone knows the demons they stared down when they completed the world’s toughest free climb.
Written by: Joe Donnelly
Contemplating Cassady
The Peculiar Appeal of the Rebel Muse — Are you you? Or are you who it/they/the system wants you to be? A look at the enduring appeal of Neal Cassady and the rebel muse.
Written by: Joe Donnelly
Shaun Tomson
Magic and Loss — There was a tipping point in surfing history when the door of possibility was busted open wide. And Shaun Tomson dealt the final blow. As the first South African World Champion, his transgressive energy helped legitimate surfing as a professional sport. But the determination he showed back then was nothing compared to what came next, when his family was rocked by tragedy.
Written by: Joe Donnelly