Surf and Rescue

“A valuable and absorbing biography, starring a forgotten founder of California beach culture.” –Library Journal, starred review “It’s terrific to have such substantial research collected in a single volume with many falsehoods corrected. The fascinating part is that, despite the research that Moser has amassed, after so many years of low-flying fame, Freeth himself remains a smooth enigma.” –Los Angeles Review of Books “Moser’s book will bring renewed attention to Freeth, whose contributions to surf and beach culture in California have typically been overshadowed by those of his fellow Hawaiian waterman and protege Duke Kahanamoku.” –San Francisco Chronicle ​”It is difficult to think of the California lifestyle today without appreciating the legacies left by George Freeth. We can thank Patrick Moser for bringing this somewhat enigmatic figure to life in his excellent new book.” –Southern California Quarterly “Surf and Rescue is an informative, engaging, and fascinating account of the way one man forever changed the world for the better.” –Kelp Journal “That this nothing-if-not authoritative treatise on the understudied George Freeth is shockingly well researched comes as little surprise. That is what Patrick Moser is known for. Yet as rigorous as Surf and Rescue might be, the clarity of the language and the knowledge of topic–surfing–lifts this book into sheer page-turner territory.”–Scott Hulet, The Surfer’s Journal “Moser’s book offers a well-written biography of Freeth that will be exciting and engaging to those deeply invested in the history of surfing and lifeguarding.” –H-Net Reviews “Patrick Moser is an excellent historian, surf or otherwise, and with Surf and Rescue we get Moser at his very best: clear-eyed and knowledgeable, a detail man who can nimbly pull back to present the big picture. George Freeth is an undeservedly forgotten figure in American cultural history, and Patrick Moser is the right person to bring him forward.”–Matt Warshaw, author of The History of Surfing

Patrick Moser is a professor of French at Drury University and editor of Pacific Passages: An Anthology of Surf Writing.