In the winter of 1977 Rick was an out of work elementary school teacher with little hope of finding a teaching job on Long Island. In the late 70's school districts on Long Island were cutting back, closing schools, selling buildings & laying off teachers. Rick knew he didn't want to work for a big corporation. He thought about going into business but what kind of business could an ex-teacher with no business background be able to be successful in. He thought about a surf shop since he had surfed since he was 9 but at the time surfing was pretty underground. In the end he bought a card & gift shop called, Cards n' Stuff located in a strip mall in Rick's home town, East Islip on Feb. 19,1977.

In April several local skaters talked Rick into adding Skateboards to his card shop. Rick invested $150.00 in skateboards, wheels & trucks & that was the beginning of Rick's Action Sports. The first skate dept. took up a 4 foot shelf & small glass cabinet. It soon took over an entire wall & bigger cabinet. Rick carried all the latest decks from Sims, G&S, Hobie, Powell/Peralta, Dogtown along with Road Rider & Kryptonic Wheels & Tracker & ACS Trucks. As summer approached Rick added Tom Morey Boogieboards & Doyle Soft Surfboards. The following winter Rick saw an ad in Skateboarder Magazine for a product like a long skateboard, made out of wood with rubber non-skid pads on the top which you rode on the snow. It was called a snowboard, so Rick ordered Burton Snowboards & became the first skate shop on the Island to carry snowboards.

Rick's Action Sports was taking over more & more of the card shop so Rick decided he needed more space. There was a larger vacant store in the strip mall. In March 1980 Rick's/Cards n' Stuff moved & by June of that year Cards n' Stuff was history. That summer Heritage, Quiet Flight & G&S Surfboards were added along with Body Glove Wetsuits, Vans, Vision & Airwalk Skate Shoes, Sundek, G&S, Jams, & Quiksilver Surfwear & Oakley Sunglasses..

Rick's continued to grow adding Wave Riding Vehicles Surfboards, Aleeda & Rip Curl Wetsuits. Surfing was gaining popularity & new products were coming out all the time. Rick & his staff of surfers & skaters, guys like Glenn Graham, Kirk Ingrebretsen, Ron Croteau, Brenden Babenzien, Ang Santoro & Dano Brandenstien attended trade shows looking for the latest & greatest surf & skate products along with working with the ESA to promote surfing & get more beaches open to surfing. Rick's sponsored Surf Contests on his own with the help of his team & in association with the ESA & sponsored Team Ricks with some of the Best Surfers, like Dano, Shawn, Bob, Glenn, Ronnie, Stephanie, Susie, Paulie, Scrub, Pau, Laurie, Jody, Allen, Tattoo John, Jeremy, Stephan, the Norton Bros, Chris, Chip, Scott, Dave, Carl, Bruce, Greg, Jay, Mike, Muff, & Looney Tunes ever surf on Long Island.

Once again Rick's was bursting at the seams & needed more space. The ceiling was covered with surfboards, the racks were crammed with wetsuits, surfwear, everything else a skater or surfer needed. Rick knew he needed a bigger shop but also wanted a location where he could do promotions at the shop like skate clinics & contests. One night on the way home from his brother Dave's apartment in Islip Terrace, Rick saw a for sale sign on an old white house on Carleton Avenue that had been a funeral home when Rick was growing up. The next morning Rick called the owner, to take a look at the old house. After looking the house over Rick knew he wanted his shop there, signed a lease & on March 3, 1988 Rick's moved to its present location. At the time Rick's first moved in he shared the building with some "biker chicks" who rented the second floor apartment. After a couple years they moved out & Rick's moved up filling the second floor with High Performance Shortboards, Bodyboards, Wetsuits & Travel Bags.

Since the beginning, Rick's has been the center for Long Island's Surfers & Skaters, a shop that has always offered the best equipment but just as important worked to promote & protect our right to surf & skate. On the promotion side of things with Rick's acre of land he's been able to host events like the Powell Team complete with Half Pipe, Surfboard Truckload Sales, Swap Meets, Skateboard & Snowboard Clinics & Videos on the Lawn. Pro Surfers like

Tom Curren, Peter Mel, Tim Curran, Cory Lopez, Matt Archbold, Scott Daley, Pat O'Connell, Wingnut, Wes Laine, and many others have visited Rick's over the years in addition to Pro Skaters like Charles Wilkens, Steve Caballero, Mike Vallely, Gershon Mosley & Mike Santarosa for the Powell Tour. Rick's invited World Class Shapers like Michael Baron, Jesse Fernandez, Gurney Collins, Tommy Moore, Lynn Shell, Mike Doyle to come to the shop to talk to surfers about surf board design. Rick's walls & photo albums are filled with photos of all the people who have passed through the Wave at rick's. In addition the first Long Island Surf Clinic was a concept developed by Matt Kechele & Rick & held at Robert Moses in 1998.

Rick was there to get Moses opened to Surfing & when Surfing was threatened in Long Beach & Babylon he was at the forefront fighting to keep these areas open to surfing. Rick's only failure has been to get Islip Town to become more Skater friendly & to build some skate parks in the town. In the future he will continue to push for public skate parks.

To close out the 20th Century Rick's hosted an Etnies Skate Clinic & several Bodega Skate Demos along with weekly "Videos on the Lawn" nights. At the Beach Rick's helped bring Matt Kechele to Long Island to do a couple of Quiksilver/Roxy Surf Clinics, along with the Biggest Surf Event to hit Robert Moses, The O'Neill Inspired Tour & Air Contest with Ratboy Collins & Cory Lopez. The event included some awesome surfing by the pros followed by an amateur contest judged by Ratboy, Paul & Cort.WRV's Pro Team stopped by several times to surf with the locals & hang out at the shop & putting on slide shows with some incredible shots of places like Puerto Rico, Barbados, Costa Rica & Hawaii .

The year 2000 saw the addition of a new member of the Team, that being a Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier named Rascal. James & Jarrid were there to introduce her to her first Guinness on St. Patrick's Day.

Its been an awesome journey over the past 25 years, & Rick's Action Sports continues to do what it has from the start & that's bringing Long Island's Surfers & Skaters the Best Surf & Skate Equipment & promoting the Surf & Skate Lifestyle.

While Rick at age 49 doesn't skate much anymore, (the back & knees are shot) Rick's a surfer & for Rick it continues to be a blast turning people on to the Greatest Sports on the Planet, Surfing, Skateboarding & Snowboarding. Most mornings throughout the year you will see him checking the waves at the crack of dawn at Robert Moses to call into the shop report. If there's waves you'll find him in the water somewhere surfing.

Lately, Rick has been busy planning for the Summer of 2001 with Jeff , John, Dan, Dave & Pinky. Their plans include adding a Street Skate Park next to the shop & to host Several Clinics, Demos & Contests at the shop with Joe Bragan from Sole Tech & Oscar from Bodega Skateboards. Video Nights will continue & you can be assured WRV, Natural Art & Hunter from Indo Boards will be stopping by. At Rick's you never really know who you might bump into. Last fall several customers got autographs from ex-Beatle Paul McCartney who stopped by to pick up a pair of wetsuit boots.

We hope you have enjoyed learning about where Rick's has been & where Rick's is going in the future. Rick has a nephew, Dave who learned to surf last summer at age 9 who most likely will carry on the traditions of Rick's Action Sports well into the next century. We all look forward to sharing the love we have for board sports.