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The Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame is home to more than 300 members, and on Wednesday it will welcome its first surfer.

News 12’s Kevin Maher was in Babylon with more on Charlie Bunger’s legacy.

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Suffolk Sports Hall of Fame to induct surfer Charlie Bunger

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Welcome back the Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame is home to more than 300 athletes, coaches, broadcasters and authors. Tomorrow night, that group will welcome its first surfer. Yeah, News 12. Sports director Kevin Maher has the story to Long Island surfers. Who was your dad? He was, he was a pioneer. I mean, he really started started surfing on long island, like the waves that pound are shore's Charlie Bunger and his name has been a constant at our beaches for 60 years. On Wednesday. He'll be the first surfer ever inducted into the Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame. Everything about him was surfing, that was his life and it was a life, Charlie never imagined. He grew up on Gilgo beach without a dad and without a lot of money. So he taught himself how to surf and built his own board when he finished it up after he got all the materials he just wrote, bunker down the bottom of it in big letters because that's his last name and he didn't know what else to put on it. And then it just kind of snowballed into that. He just kept building boards and building boards. That humble beginning led to a huge demand. Thanks to those bunger boards, a west Coast sport became an east coast rebellion. But charlie's thinking never changed, build them great because it's a bunger, that's something he always taught the Children is, you know, your name means it means everything. That's why charlie's son Tommy still builds hundreds of custom bunger boards every year, just like his dad taught him in the same West Babylon shop, his dad used his thing was all about just doing it by hand and the, and the quality that you get from doing it all your own and overseeing the whole operation. The bunger logo has also never changed. It was just made by a random kid and now it's become the symbol of a backyard brand loved around the world. After he passed away, we started an instagram page called the spirit of charlie munger and people tag us with pictures of bunker stuff, bunker t shirts, bunker surfboards from all around the world. You know, he was very humble about it like I said, but he really loved the fact that he could be, you know in California or hawaii or whatever and see somebody wearing one of his t shirts that love can also be seen inside the bunker family surf shop in Babylon where charlie's trophy from the east coast surfing Hall of Fame is on display. So is the golden planer he got from the surfboard builders Hall of Fame and now he'll get an overdue Hall of Fame spot in the county where it all started. He had the, the, you know, the premonition to, to say, you know, we live on Long Island, it's an island was surrounded by water. The south shore of long island gets, gets amazing waves and this is something that, that, you know, I'm gonna roll with until you know, until it stops me and that's what he did In Babylon Kevin Maher News 12. An amazing story right there. Well, the Suffolk Sports Hall of Fame induction ceremony is tomorrow in wading River. Other inductees include stony brook university baseball coach, mat sink and karate, kid actor, ralph Macho.

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