John "Kid Beaver" M., universally known simply as "Beaver," is a skate legend where I grew up. As a Team Radster veteran whose family had owned Albuquerque's Blue Sky skate park back in the '70s, John was from New Mexico skate royalty. He showed up down south in 1985 or so along with a bevy of northern locsters to extend their kingdom's realm and, in so doing, transformed the area skate scene by taking our generation of young riders under their benevolent wing and "rasing us" into the New Mexico skate family the proper way.
Beaver's impact on us was profound because his ripping stoked us out. He schralped ditches, ramps, pools, hills, even what passed for street skating back then. John brought with him a larger than life aura--he was a spirited, legendary hell raiser--and, as he cruised along the ditch bank, chest puffed out, Budweiser in hand, he appeared to us impressionable youngens like some sort of skate god sent to bestow radness on our previously isolated skateboarding community. John was known to call you out: "Too manly for you, huh?" But he always backed up his shit talk: He had the best stand up grinds, the most tweaked out lay back airs and the most textbook, toe-hanger backside bonelesses; he was always the first to roll in; and often did so (and I say this with no disrespect to John) under the influence of a variety of substances--licit and otherwise--that would have left a lesser man comatosed.
Beaver taught us a lot about skateboarding and doing it the right way. Whereas we'd previously looked--as kids did back in the early '80s--to the magazines and whatever videos we could find for guidance, John taught us to scoff at such skate industry shenanigans and make our own scene happen. He utilized an entire dialect geared toward skate edification to get his main ideas across to us. Through John, we learned that we should always "run amok," whether skating or otherwise; that you should never act like a "cur" or be a "kook" (Beaver was the first person I ever heard say the latter word); and even imparted wisdom through phrases I've yet to decipher fully (was it "unbow down" or "humble down?") yet got their points across perfectly: pay respect to your skate elders and pay your dues. Beaver took offense when anyone skated so as to be competitive, and would bestow his highest praise through simply commenting that your skating was "bold." In the densely Catholic, Blue Law New Mexico of the 1980s, we also learned from Beaver that "the brew always tastes better on Sunday." And by God it fucking did.
Beaver taught us a lot about partying as well. We'd go down to Juárez on Sunday afternoons and get fucking annihilated. As a fifteen year old, that shit was rad. He'd take us to parties and direct us to "split up" and (you guessed it) "run amok." He got me into my first bar, hooked me up with my first gravity bong, suggested I try my first hit of acid, and gave me my first rail. He gave me my first crack hit. But beyond those firsts he never really pushed any of that shit on me. He turned me on to the Hellcats and used to copy all his raddest music for me. We'd cruise up to Albuquerque to party and skate ditches with Tom and Kevin. In the early days of all that chaos, back in the late '80s, things were genuinely fun. Eventually, bands like Johnny Hot Hit and the Sizzling Rocks started showing up, the fun got wrung out, the cliche happened as it does, and skating didn't seem to matter as much anymore.
John experienced serious problems. He hit his head down hilling and the brain swelling, along with continued, serious drug abuse, caused him to have difficulty reasoning. He suffered at work, had problems with debt, burned some bridges, moved to Colorado and Texas, and seemed to take trouble with him. Eventually, he had brain surgery which he described afterward as being akin to giving the stem of a bong a "poke" that seemed to turn things around for him. He moved to Maine and has lived well, sober, for several years. He ran a 5K race recently. He rides snowmobiles and I'm sure he rips that shit.
I asked John about a decade ago whether he'd ever skate again and he flat out told me "no." Understood. Beaver gave all he had to skating while he did it, and he's still a part of skating any time anyone in New Mexico steps on a ride, whether
they realize it or not. I don't have any heroes, but, if I had to choose one, he'd be up there. He embodied skateboarding in his approach to it: he literally ran amok on an epic scale, skating and raising hell like no other. He never held back, which is a major reason why he knows that it's probably best for him to stay away from skating and everything he knows goes along with it. For those skateboarders who epitomize the essence of the thing, separating skating from the skate "scene" just can't happen.
Beaver lived it and thus doesn't have anything to prove. But, simply put,
John couldn't possibly keep doing it and live much longer. Unfortunately for skateboarding, Kid Beaver is dead and gone, a casualty of war, a fallen soldier the likes of whom, perhaps, is needed in this war now more so than ever. But John lives on, and that's a hell of a lot more important.
