 | 1953Rusty is born on June 13, 1953 and spends the first 12 years of his life in inland San Diego. |
 | 1966Rusty moves to La Jolla and discovers surfing while body surfing at the Shores Beach. He then walks to a little spot called Blacks, not too far from his home. It becomes his and a few select others' favorite spot. |
 | 1969/70Rusty shapes his first board that winter. |
 | 1971Graduates La Jolla High in June and attends the University of California San Diego that same fall. That October, the World Contest is held in San Diego and Rusty meets a young Australian pro named Peter Townend. He's inspired to create his first label for his shapes. He decides on Starlight Surfboards. His work is influenced by Dick Brewer, Mike Diffenderfer and especially Endless Summer co-star Mike Hynson. |
 | 1972That summer Rusty begins shaping and riding for G&S Surfboards and decides to take a break from college life at UCSD and focus on surfing and shaping. His decision allows him to travel, shape G&S team boards and appear in ads and editorials in two up-and-coming surf magazines called Surfer and Surfing. |
 | 1973While working and learning alongside legendary shapers Skip Frye and Mike Eaton at G&S, Rusty experiments with Kevlar/epoxy as board-building alternatives. |
 | 1974He travels to Australia for the first time that spring and hangs with Townend and his mate Rabbit Bartholomew. Rab, who is the newly crowned Queensland Jr. Champ, likes Rusty's work and buys a board from him. |
 | 1975Rusty comes back from Australia stoked on the progression of his shaping skills and decides to split from G&S and begin his own, new label. He decides on Music! Surfboards. While working on his own and freelance shaping for other labels, he figures he should get back into school, so he returns to UCSD and pursues an Art degree. |
 | 1977-1978San Diego's Canyon Glassing, who does all of the glassing for his Music! Boards, hires Rusty to shape Canyon Surfboards. The Music! Label ceases. Randy Laine and his little brother Wes join the Canyon team. Wes quickly blazes into the Top 16 and puts Canyon on the map. |
 | 1979The first Stubbies Trials is held at Blacks Beach and Canyon rider Richard Kenvin takes down many of California's top riders, including Dave Parmenter, Dan Flecky, Matt and Sam George. That spring, Rusty travels to Hawaii to shape with Bill Barnfield. Rusty's popularity spreads and he is invited to judge several IPS/ASP and California events including the Pipe Masters and the last two Duke events. Rusty's buddy PT, who had since been crowned surfing's first World Champion in '76, begins getting boards from him along with another hot Australian surfer by the name of Ian Cairns. That same year Laguna Niguel, California's 18-year-old and leading surfboard blank producer Clark Foam works with Rusty on designing and building dozens of master plugs for mass production. They could be recognized by the "R" stamped on the raw blank. |
  | 1981The Canyon team is becoming more successful and continues to take on more talent, including South African phenomenon Shaun Tomson. |
 | 1982Rusty continues experimenting with materials. Canyon includes custom eps/epoxy boards in their production. |
 | 1983Shaper and pro surfer Dave Parmenter joins Canyon and commences to win six straight Californina events on his first board shaped by Rusty. More pros begin taking notice of Rusty's work. He then goes to West Oz to shape "Rusty" models for Santosha Surfboards. Later that year, Australian ripper Mitch Thorson gets the cover of Surfing Magazine on one of Rusty's shapes. |
 | 1984A fiery goofyfoot niknamed "Occy" becomes Pro Junior champion and begins taking competitive surfing by storm. Soon after, he is riding Rusty's boards. Rusty decides to include his own logo along with the Canyon label on all of his shapes. By the end of '84 more than half of the Top 16 is getting boards from Rusty. |
 | 1985In July, Huntington Beach's Op Pro sees a fierce rivalry mature between Occy and young Californian Tom Curren--and beneath the surface a quiet, respectful rivalry develops out of the famed Occy/Curren duels, one between their shapers Rusty and Al Merrick. That year Occy finally takes out Curren to capture his first Op Pro victory. The publicity helps Rusty's popularity soar and he decides to leave Canyon and start his own surfboard company. Old friend and Surfing Magazine advertising director Peter Townend helps Rusty develop his new logo. PT suggests simply "Rusty" and the R-dot is born. |
 | 1986Rusty incorporates tee-shirts into his new business and they sell like hotcakes along with his already acclaimed surfboards. |
 | 1987Rusty apparel is introduced at the January Surf Expo and the R-dot quickly becomes a well-known logo in the surf world. |
 | 1988Innovation continues to flourish from Rusty's hands as he experiments with 4lb. eps/carbon/epoxy boards for his team. Meanwhile, the brand grows and expands globally. |
 | 1989Another forward-thinking surfboard shaper by the name of Randy French works with Rusty on designing and shaping eps/sandwiched prototypes—French works over the next few years with this concept, eventually introducing Tuflite technology and Surftech surfboards in 1992. |
      | 1990'sNew School leaders like Todd Chesser, Kalani Robb, Shane Beschen, Dino Andino, Matt Archbold, Pat O’Connell, Taylor Knox, Chris Ward and the Weatherly brothers all become Rusty team riders and icons for a new, mainstream era in surfing. They are dubbed the ‘New School’. In that time Rusty becomes one of the first surf companies to extend into skate, snow and wakeboarding, supporting such athletes as Tony Hawk and Willy Santos. While staying busy building his company into a global brand, Rusty continues shaping around four boards a day for a long list of pros and others. |
 | 1999-2000Rusty introduces the C-5 Challenge and the Anything But 3 contest. Rusty’s C-5 design and the contests are a further testament of his commitment to the evolution surfing. |
 | 2001Rusty has its first World Champ: 22-year-old CJ Hobgood from Satellite Beach, Florida—who had been drafted as a Super Grom by Rusty early on in his NSSA/ESA amateur days at the age of 14. |
 | 2005-PresentOn December 5 of ’05, Clark Foam closes its doors on the surfboard industry forever, initiating one of the most tragic days in the history of the sport. Rusty along with hundreds of other global surfboard builders take quite a hit but find optimism in what will surely be coming years full of innovation. |
