Skateboarder Jake Phelps, who served as the editor of the San Francisco-based “Thrasher” skateboarding magazine, has died. He was 56. Tony Vitello, the magazine’s publisher, confirmed Phelps death in an Instagram post on Thursday.
“I never met anybody who loves anything more than Jake worshipped skateboarding,” Vitello wrote. “Just as we need food and water to survive, Jake needed skateboarding to keep his blood pumping. It was more than a hobby or form of transportation or way of life – it was his oxygen.”
His uncle, Clark Phelps, posted on Facebook on Thursday that his nephew “died suddenly and easily today.” Further details on his death have not yet been made public.
Phelps became the editor of “Thrasher” in 1993 and was one of the most well-known figures in the skateboarding world. The magazine is known as “the bible” to skaters, and according to a 2016 California Sunday Magazine profile on Phelps, he liked to consider himself as the “brand personified”:
Phelps is an unreconstructed punk rocker in a city that has little need or space for them anymore. He refuses to pay his Muni fare, instead slipping through the rear doors. He bums cigarettes everywhere he goes; he calls kids blood. He barks at strangers and screams at drivers. He sails through lights with an unearned confidence, directing traffic with cryptic hand gestures. He shoplifts candy bars just to see if people are paying attention.
He was known to brag about his violent close calls while skateboarding, including in 2017 when he suffered a serious head injury skating on Dolores Hill in San Francisco.
Upon learning of Phelps’ death, fans and fellow skateboarders took to social media to mourn his passing.
“He was a true skateboarder to the end, a fan of diverse styles and a passion for the history of skating,” tweeted skateboarding legend Tony Hawk.
Tony Hawk on Twitter Such tragic news about the passing of Jake Phelps. He was a true skateboarder to the end, a fan of diverse styles and a passion for the history of skating. He jokingly called my weird fakie footplant impossible the “Spaghetti Western” so I will forever use that name in his honor.
Many fans cited Phelps and “Thrasher” as important parts of their lives.
DXR on Twitter again, rest in peace to this walking legendary inspiration. Skateboarding has played a major role in my life & always will. thank you for shaping the culture & doing it out of love. past weeks have reminded me why I began skating. i’ll forever be in debt. #jakephelps #skate https://t.co/j7wkX1TXIG
on Twitter rip jake phelps heaven is a half pipe
Dan Sena on Twitter RIP Jake Phelps. Skateboarding wouldn’t be what it is today without you. #thrashermagazine
YOURE GONNA BE OK on Twitter REST IN PEACE JAKE PHELPS. YOUR MAGAZINE SHOWED ME WHAT SKATEBOARDING WAS. I WAS A LITTLE BLACK BOY ON THE WESTSIDE OF CHICAGO THAT HAPPENED TO LIVE WALKING DISTANCE FROM A CONNIVENCE STORE THAT CARRIED THRASHER MAGAZINE. YOUR DOCUMENTATION GAVE MY LIFE PASSION. I THANK YOU
Dante Ross on Twitter Every skater in the world is connexted to Jake Phelps one way or another. His influence was masive. He was never rich, never so called famous and definitely never close to politically correct. He also would ridicule anyone being sentimental about his passing. #SaluteJakePhelps
Phelps’ brash attitude and use of homophobic slurs made him a divisive figure for some in the skating community. In 2016, he lashed out when celebrities including Rhianna and Justin Beiber started wearing Thrasher apparel.
Phelps spent the first 11 years of his life in California before his parents divorced, and then he moved to Massachusetts with his mom, according to the California Sunday Magazine profile. That’s where he first learned to skate and was briefly sponsored by Pepsi in the late 1970s.
He returned to San Francisco in the 1980s, working at a skate shop in the Haight before starting to write for “Thrasher” and boxing the brand’s hats and T-shirts at its Hunter’s Point warehouse. Phelps would give editorial input on the magazine while working the warehouse before eventually being tapped to take over the publication in 1993.
“Jake Phelps was 100% skateboarder, but that label sells him way too short,” Vitello wrote in his Instagram remembrance, “because beyond his enormous influence in our world, he was truly an individual beyond this world.”
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