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Gary Smith Puts the Aloha in Corolla
Text By Pat Hancock, Photos By Gayle Tiller |
| The year is 1967. The airwaves are full of The
5th Dimension, The Beach Boys, and The Beatles. “Bonnie and Clyde”
plays in local theaters. Outside are signs of Vietnam War protests and civil
rights demonstrations. Somewhere out to sea on the crest of a wave, Gary Smith
is taking out his teenage angst on every swell from Ocean City, Maryland to the
Outer Banks of North Carolina. Throughout his life, music, the Outer Banks and
surfing will twist and turn like the ride on a wave. |
| On a chilly spring morning, Gary talks about
his early surfing days with a keen sense of humor that is at times directed at
himself. Dressed in jeans and a shirt from Corolla Surf Shop, his well-toned,
stocky build belies his 49 years. He is comfortable in his Corolla home with
his wife, Laurie, and four cats. |
| “Surfing in the sixties was considered a
rogue sport,” says Gary. “It was an extension of the times, a sport
of crazed hippies.” |
| During the sixties, Gary lived in Great Falls,
Virginia, the son of middle-class parents who vacationed frequently on the
Outer Banks. He wiled away high school hours playing his drums in the garage
and dreaming of waves in Kitty Hawk. |
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| His reason for dabbling in the sport? He
answers with a booming laugh reminiscent of a huge wave that has exploded on
the shore, “None other than to impress a girlfriend! It was just that
simple. I was not making a statement about the times; I wanted my girlfriend to
think I was cool!” |
| His first surfing experience was more than
cool. Gary’s family had made the trek south to the Outer Banks for Easter,
in search of warmer weather. With his prized “surfboard Hawaii with a V
bottom” in tow, Gary paddled out to sea while his teenage crush waved from
the shore. |
| “The water was so cold I nearly froze to
death!” he recalls, explaining that wet suit technology wasn’t up to
par in those days. “I didn’t want to fail,” he says, “but I
surely did, because everything was frozen!” |
| Gary is funny; a quip is always on his lip.
Relating college experiences is definitely enjoyable for him. With
tongue-in-cheek humor he says, “After high school I went to a prison
school called BelMont Abbey. It was in North Carolina but it was ALL BOYS! It
just didn’t fit my personality.” |
| A transfer to Norfolk, Virginia’s Old
Dominion University was in order. With every move went the drums and the
surfboard. Gary’s three loves were music, surfing, and the Outer
Banks...that is, until Laurie Hyde sang her way into his life. |
| “After ODU, music was my main focus,”
Gary says. “Forget teaching secondary English. We had a band in DC and we
needed a chick singer.” Enter Laurie Hyde, the “chick singer”
who would be his constant companion. |
| The band was successful for the next decade.
There were recording contracts and gigs, and Laurie wrote songs for Emmy Lou
Harris. Music, however, is one tough business; it’s hard to survive for
very long. |
| “We were starving musicians,”
remembers Laurie. “We needed to pay the bills.” |
| So...Gary cut his hair, donned his wedding
suit, and landed a job right in the middle of corporate America…in a bank.
Gary Smith, drummer/surfer/outdoorsman, was now a banker in Bethesda,
Maryland. |
| Just how does a man go from a drummer in a band
to a banker? |
| “To be blunt and honest,” he says,
“I guess it was my flash and bull—!” It was time to regroup and
rebuild…but not totally. “I kept the recording studio in my house,
took the surfboard on business trips,” he adds, “and Laurie and I
stole away to my parents’ house in Southern Shores (on the Outer Banks)
every chance we could get.” |
| The corporate ladder was a new direction; it
was unfamiliar territory. But Gary scrambled to the top, becoming a stockbroker
and eventually a vice president for a headhunting firm that recruited — of
all things — psychiatrists. It was the eighties and the money was pouring
in. Nevertheless, it was an incongruent world. “I was in the yuppie world,
but not a yuppie, “Gary explains. “I was rich, but not happy. I
traveled too much and I was tired. Then one day I had an epiphany — I was
fired!” |
| Laurie intervened and stated flatly,
“Gary, we’re going to live at the beach.” |
| Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew it
would work. He loved the Outer Banks and he could surf to his heart’s
content. But how would he make a living? |
| Gary credits his good friend Bill Freed with
giving him the impetus to open a surf shop in Corolla. |
| A lease became available and Gary was once
again living a new life. Now he had the chance to take a lifestyle and turn it
into a business. With his charisma, warmth, and love of people, the customers
came knocking on his retail door. |
| Additionally, he decided that Corolla Surf Shop
would offer something unique — surfing lessons. Tourists flocked to the
shop for Gary’s expert skills. The result? A change in his mind and
spirit. |
| “I guess you could say I put the aloha in
Corolla,” he says with a laugh. With a broad smile he shakes his head as
if he can’t believe the life he’s been living since he moved to
Corolla six years ago. “The best part of my job is teaching kids to
surf,” he says. “It keeps me young.” |
| With Laurie, his drums (yes, he still plays in
bands), his surfboard, and his cats by his side, one question remains…how
does he like living on the Outer Banks? |
| Gary looks ahead as if looking at a landscape
only he can see. His playful spirit is subdued and the endless state of
adolescence common to surfers has been replaced with age and wisdom.
“Living on the Outer Banks has been a tremendous growing experience,”
he says. “It’s a radical change from an urban lifestyle
and…something Laurie and I regret not doing a whole lot sooner.”
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| Along this wind-swept coast of North Carolina,
Gary Smith rides the waves, realizing that he can’t always direct the
wind, but he can adjust his sails. |
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