Kenny Mollica was one of Apple's top locals. He skated the park daily, won many of its amateur contests and was sponsored by Sims. Interview conducted via email on March 18, 2003.
I was born and raised in Upper Arlington, Ohio (also known as "Lumbo Town"), a suburb of Columbus. My house was about six miles from Apple. I was born in 1965 and was seven or eight when I got my first garage sale board and eleven when the Road Rider wheels came out in 1976. That was when the skate scene in Columbus came alive. We all rode for the Le Sport Shop team and did summer freestyle demos around town at the public libraries. It was Mike Ohm, Dave Bush, Dave Gale, Jeff Kasson, Tom Wagonbrenner, Rick Wendt, Larry Herrot, George Myler, Bobby Reevo, myself and others.
We all got hauled around all summer long by one of the shop owner's three daughters, Suzi, Heidi and Wendy Wertz. The girls were in their late teens and early twenties and were beautiful! Those were some great times back in the late '70s. From 1976 to 1979, the Columbus / Le Sport / Worthington / Arlington crew skated banks, ditches, ramps and an occasional pool here and there. In August of 1978, Mike Ohm, Keith Eastmead, Eric Melfe and myself went up to The Endless Summer Skatepark Team Invitational in Roseville, Michigan and entered a contest under the Eastland Schwinn Team. That's when we met Mike Blauvelt, Bill Fergusson, Kit Shigur, Shawn Scott, Mike Woodruff, Tom McShane, Chris Yandall and the Roach Boyz. We had a great time, placed well (see Skateboarder magazine Volume 5, Number 6, January 1979, pages 99-100), and started a friendly up North / down South thing with the Michigan boys.
In the winter of 1978-79, rumors began to fly about a new skatepark in Columbus that was going to be built by the same guys who did Cherry Hill! We had skated Cherry Hill one time and thought we'd gone to heaven. My Dad took me to a zoning meeting, where the developers were trying to obtain the variances needed to operate a skatepark out of the building on Sinclair Road where Apple was built. I worked on shaping the bowls for about two weeks that summer with Pete Kunz and Eric Melfe. It was my moped Melfi was riding in the egg bowl near the lip. Melfe had been driving cars for years—he drove us up to Michigan and the Lancaster, Ohio skatepark in his silver Camaro.
Were you there on Apple's opening day?
I don't remember being there on opening day or not. I'll bet I was, but have no recollection of it. I think we skated Apple some before it opened. We did one night after returning from the Detroit Skateboard USA Skatepark contest. It was before the final coat of 'crete was sprayed on and it was SUPER ROUGH—no coping or tile either. I was on my Brad Bowman "Superman" board in the L-bowl and the first manager, Mike Musgrave, was chasing me around—he was so pissed. It was fun and my first memory of skating Apple. Ray Allen was with us and managed to calm him down.
How often did you go to Apple?
I have read on this site that I played team sports in high school and didn't skate Apple very often—neither is true. It's funny how we remember the past. I was going to do this interview a year ago when I first saw the site, but after reading other people's version of the past, I felt I really needed to do some research to try to put things in perspective. If I would have done this a year ago, I would have told you that I was the undisputed king of Apple and skated every day to the very end. That wasn't really exactly the case.
All of us had house accounts and would skate, eat, play Asteroids, watch pornos on a film projector and skate more. We owned the place and spent more time there than at school. On most school nights, it would be us, Pete Kunz, Blaze Nesser and some college guys from Ohio State. The Worthington crew consisted of Mike Ohm, Dave Bush, Charlie, Andy and John Shivley, Whitney Calpin, Wayne Lyons, the Kip brothers, Greg Mack and Chris Phillips. They were there an awful lot also. Marty Jimenez lived in Columbus for a while before Apple and Cincinnati during Apple. Marty moved to Columbus from California and was quite advanced. He was really smooth and flexible and had major style. MANY nights it would be just Casey, Sean, Lee and Andrew Davis, Robbie and I, and we would play skate tag. One guy was it and would try to tag the others. Sounds queer, but that's how we learned how to do high-speed frontside roll-ins into the deep end of the egg—it was better than getting tagged.
I lived at Apple those first ten months and was Apple's best local. I was a contest skater and learned all the new tricks and inverts from the time period. I won a lot of contests at Apple when I was in the 13-15 age category. One time, I beat Jamie Godfrey (Cherry Hill local) from the Powell team, but I think he should have won—I was the local boy and the judges gave me the win. It was funny because Jamie said he wanted to skate to Van Halen so I played "Jamie's Crying" and we all laughed. Shawn Scott from Cleveland and I often battled it out in the egg and halfpipe contests. He was really skinny and super quiet, but was super-consistent and had all the tricks.
When I said I was Apple's best local, I meant contest LOCAL. Shawn Scott from Cleveland, Brett Martin from Dayton, Bill Fergusson from Detroit, Bobby Reeves and Steve "Oz" Ottosen from Wisconsin were as good or better skaters than I was. As far as Columbus local contest skaters, I think I had the most desire to win that first year.
Mike Ohm and Charlie Shivley were the gnarliest local riders. Ohm could grind the two-thirds pipe frontside, blindfolded after a six-pack. Nobody else really ground that thing frontside. I did once. Most never really thought about it. Charlie was really wreckless like Jay Adams. Every park has that one guy like Charlie who didn't have a big bag of tricks, but he sure could make the simple stuff look rad!
The first year of Apple was one of the best times of my whole life! Every week another pro showed up. Ray Bones was the first and he was really cool. Then Cab and McGill, Eddie Elguera and the Variflex crew, Duane Peters, Steve Olson, Fred Blood, Brad Bowman, Bert LaMar and Dave Andrecht visited all within nine months! When Olson, Bowman, Fred Blood and LaMar were there, we had some super sessions with just the four of us and a huge crowd. We all went back to my house afterward and my mom made them a homemade spaghetti dinner. My friends at the Junior High didn't believe me when I told them.
David Andrecht was, by far, the nicest to me out of all the pros and really encouraged me. He was my contact at Sims and when I skated with him, I was at my best. I saw him for the first time since 1979 at La Costa 2001 when I was racing in the giant slalom finals against Steve Olson. I got 2nd place, but gave it my all when I knew Andrecht was there. He brought out the best in me. The weekends would be jammed with out-of-towners from Cleveland, Cincinnati, Dayton, Pittsburg, Detroit and Lexington. We Apple locals stayed in our own little local pack and snaked a lot of people. We were high on life, skating, hormones and sometimes weed. The older guys puffed and drank all the time, but my friends and I were in junior high and didn't party too often.
Which areas of the park were your favorite?
Like almost everyone, the L-bowl and half / two-thirds pipe were my favorite. They were SOOOOOOOOOO perfect that it was totally effortless to skate them. The transitions and surface were as silky smooth as a teenage cheerleader's butt cheeks—simply perfect. I still dream at night about the halfpipe twenty years later.
Apple's pools were pretty good, but not great. When we were shaping the pools—the keyhole, egg bowl and kidney—we discovered that the water table in the area was really high. Consequently, we had to make the pools one to two feet SHALLOWER than planned. We had already started shaping them from the top and the egg and kidney had about a foot and a half to two feet of vert. We were forced to shape out these really quick trannies to go from vert to flat so we wouldn't dig too low. This was Apple's worst feature—quick trannies with lots of vert. Most of the pros made the most of it, but Steve Olson didn't skate the pools too much when he came to Apple.
Apple's coping was pretty big and jolted your board pretty good. The coping also had a really big lip at first, making it almost impossible to roll-in. Soon after the park opened, concrete was put over the top of the coping to make it flush. Look at the photos and you can see what I mean. The pools had a much rougher finish than the L-bowl and halfpipe and would grind your skin pretty good when your pads slid off. Apple's pools were not even close to Cherry Hill's pools in terms of transitions and concrete finish quality, but we skated the hell out of them like we owned them.
Please comment on any pros that visited Apple.
David Andrecht—The Raver was one of the best and coolest skaters to visit Apple. He had no attitude, just a love for skating and his fans. He ripped the biggest, fastest airs and the longest rock 'n' roll slides I had ever seen. He seemed bionic and could skate Apple's pools like they were perfect. Dave got me on the Sims amateur team and took care of me. I rode his board the last year of Apple and gave it to my college roommate when his car broke down.
Brad Bowman—I just remember his super-smooth style and those long, long stand-up grinds in all the pools. His early release frontside airs and ollies were just fantastic. He was one of the best and in his prime when he came to Apple.
Bert Lamar—The dude weighed about 60-75 pounds and was fifteen years old. He was lighter than air and would float any kind of air he desired in the egg bowl. Really super-cocky—he spit about every six or eight seconds—but you couldn't blame him. He was a god.
Eddie Elguera—Eddie was maybe the most athletic skater I ever saw. He carried so much speed. He could frontside / backside / fakie ollie about two feet out of anything at the park. Eddie rode the two-thirds pipe like it was a mini-ramp. Seriously. He rock 'n' rolled it, axle stalled it and caught air on it. Eddie had every type of invert down—frontside, regular, Andrechts, Elguerials and more. Eddie was the top contest skater when he came to Apple and gave me his board when he left. He was very cool.
Duane Peters—That was also when Ted Terrebonne came to do the Wally Hollyday interview for Skateboarder magazine. I missed that one on a family vacation, so there were thus no photos of me in that article. I dont want to talk about that one.
The Variflex Team—Eric Grisham, Steve Hirsch and Allen Losi all came to the park with a coach, who I think was Losi's dad. It seemed weird because they were so clean-cut and wore these team outfits. It was lame, but they were all very nice and skated great. But, I think they came right after Steve Olson and that was a tough act to follow.
Steve Olson—If Apple skatepark ever had a hero, it was Olson. He came a couple times and hung out with Dave Bush, Mike Ohm, Charlie and the boys. He was the Skateboarder magazine Reader's Poll Rider of the Year and a total rock star. Steve was super-quiet then and let his skating do the talking. He taught us so many slide variations and ways to utilize every inch of the park. Steve is a very "surfy" skater and didn't have the tricks that LaMar, Caballero and Elguera had, but you couldn't take your eyes off him. I think he left the biggest mark on Apple's skaters. The dude was a living legend at sixteen years old. I skated against Olson throughout all of 2002 in the FCR (Fat City Racing) skateboarding slalom tour and he's still got more style than anyone. He is still the skater's choice for style and loves to race and skate vert.
What was the raddest thing you saw happen at Apple?
Some of the pro sessions in the egg bowl and halfpipe. Eddie Elguera in the two-thirds pipe really stands out in my mind. I saw Steve Olson frontside grind down the SIDE of the two-thirds when he carved a kickturn too wide and ran out of wall. Bert Lamar seemed to fly around that park so effortlessly it seemed like a dream. We are talking about the best of the best during the Golden Age of skateparks. They were all young and in their prime. It was really something special and we were so lucky to have those moments.
Describe some vivid memories of Apple.
I just remember the different phases of Apple based on the park managers. First there was Michael Musgrave, a Vietnam vet who was fragile—he didn't last long. Next, I think, was Ronn Dudley. He was cool, but tried to be tough with us and we didn't respect him since he didn't skate. I think Ronn threw lots of contests and invited many of the pros. Next was Mike Grau. He was Roskopp's friend from Cincinnati and a nice guy. He lived at the park and ran it good.
Then came the Kevin Tate phase. Kevin was this cool dude from Detroit and I think he lived in California before that. Kevin always had something going with the park and tried the hardest to keep it alive at the end. He was there during the heyday and arranged many pro visits. He would take great photos and videos. On certain days, he would hold photo sessions and spend hours kneeling on the coping of the egg going for the shot. I bought some photos from him, which are my only ones from Apple. Kevin lives in Hawaii and now owns a restaurant.
Only once. Like I said, we were young and didn't drink or smoke too much. We mostly skated Apple after school and from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on weekends. We always had parties and girlfriends back in our nieghborhood to attend. I think Apple had two lives—daytime and nightime. The older guys partied hard and wouldn't show up till around 1:00 or 2:00 in the afternoon and stay till closing. Apple never really closed, though, because there was always a cool manager living in the place and they would skate, party, drink, listen to punk and just have fun all night long. We were mostly there just to skate, because we had a social life back in our suburb.
How did you hear Apple was going to close?
It had been rumored that the park was not doing good and you could tell by the attendance. The owner took out a second mortgage on his house for cash flow. We knew that but NEVER really thought it would close for real. It was so beautiful and permanent-looking and feeling. I thought it would be open for years. But, change was in the air. Less skaters were entering the local contests, the pros stopped coming and it really was empty the last few months. I don't remember if we had much warning when it finally closed, or if I was even there during the last days. I think I was moving on and shrugged it off as, "Oh well, it was cool for a while, but time to move on."
I think, in reality, my whole life and identity were taken away at that point. All I had ever been was a skater. That's when the drug experimentation phase of my life began. Luckily, four years later, I moved to Colorado for college and started the then very new sport of snowboarding. I met Joe Johnson, a Vision team pro, and built a halfpipe in my backyard. During that period, I skated with Joe, Kevin Staab and Tony Hawk a few times. It really took a few years to realize what Apple and skateboarding meant to me. Those were some of the sweetest days of my life and I would love to dig up that halfpipe again.
Please add any memories you have of Apple.
I just remember skating with the boys. We had all been skating together for five years around Columbus and Apple was our finale. Mike Ohm, Dave Bush, The Shivleys, The Kipps, Wayne Lyons, Greg Mack, Pete Kunz, Jeff Kasson, Marty Jimenez, Sean Patrick, Andrew and Lee Davis, Robbie Jones, Casey Marzetti, Kevin Tate, Jay Brentlinger, Blaze Nessor, Beaner (the park sweeper), Ronn Dudley, Mike Grau, Whitney Calpin, Chris Phillips, Rob Roskopp, Brett Martin and many others. That's what I remember.
For the longest time, I felt like Apple was ripped out from under me when I wasn't looking. The hard truth is that I turned my back on Apple—and skating in general—for a few months and it was suddenly over. It was easier to swallow that way. There is no way in hell I was going to watch them tear Apple apart. I was floating down a river called "D-Nile", pretending not to be disappointed. Every teenager takes for granted what they have and we were no different. Youth is wasted on the young. At least we've got a rebate in the new millennium with all the new parks. Life is good again.
Where do you live now?
After eight years of at snowboarding and college in Colorado, I moved back to Ohio and have a beautiful wife, Robin. I own a real estate appraisal company (just me and a secretary) and skateboard and snowboard at least once or twice a week. I was into paragliding for about seven years, but it's too gnarly. In the winter of 2001, I sold a Fibreflex on eBay and the buyer dared me to enter the World Skateboard Slalom Championships. I did and got 17th place on twenty-five year-old equipment. I came home, purchased some modern race boards and went to La Costa in October of 2001. Who was there but the man himself, Steve Olson—Apple's teen idol. We laughed about Apple and Steve getting busted smoking a joint in the owner Gene Goldberg's bathroom during supper one night. Olson got 1st and I got 2nd at La Costa.
Anything else?
Memories are a funny thing. I've thought about Apple a lot over the past year, trying to sort out the details. I am sure I messed some things up. I went to ninety Grateful Dead concerts throughout the '80s and '90s, so cut me some slack if I forgot to mention your name. Maybe we all remember skating better than we really did, but we were in our prime during the Apple era. I peaked in the summer of 1980 at fifteen years old. I have kept in shape over the years, and even though I am bald and graying, I've still got what I left Apple with—the same style, the same tricks and all the memories.
There is a clover bowl at the Dublin, Ohio skatepark that has a nine or ten foot deep end with coping. It's a little bigger and deeper than Apple's keyhole was. If anyone wants to skate it, give me a call—I am in the book. I have been skating with Brett Martin a couple times this year. He was Apple's best during the last six months and went on to be an Ohio legend. He still catches huge air on twelve foot halfpipes at age forty!
That's my story, and I'm stickin' to it.
Thirty-eight and feelin' great,
Kenny Mollica
(aka Mondo, Mollicat, Mole Daddy, The Doctor, Canyon Ken, Nature Boy, the Beast from the East)