Bud Browne, 1959 ...

Bud was in his late 40's when this footage was shot (b. 1912, d. 2008), and he was wearing a home made dry suit. Here's an entry from Legendary Surfers...

"At first we just went in the cold water in bathing suits. Then, I got some rubber from a company called Rubber Craft, made a pattern and glued some suits together with rubber cement. We put on long woolen underwear, then pulled the dry suit over them. You had to be careful, because if you tore a hole in the rubber with a spiny lobster or crab claw, water leaked in on the wool and you started getting wet and cold."

"I saw the first 2 dry suits," Bud remembered, "by Charlie Sturgill, and began making my own from then on."


More on Charlie Sturgill here and here...