Todd Chesser(1968-1997)

Big wave surfer Todd Chesser was born on February 16, 1968 in Florida. Todd moved with his amateur surfing champion mother Jeannie to Hawaii at age three in the wake of his surfer father being killed in an automobile accident. Todd was a graduate of Kalani High School in Honolulu, Hawaii. Although Chesser finished fourth in the final rating for the 1990 Professional Surfing Association of America tour, he nonetheless lacked the temperament for competition and decided to focus instead on a career as both a big wave rider and a globe-trotting photo professional. A popular and well regarded surfer on Hawaii's North Shore, Todd also wrote articles for Surfer magazine. Chesser died at the tragically young age of 28 on February 13, 1997 at the surfing spot Alligator Rock between Waimea Bay and Chun's Reef in Hawaii after he got caught in a massive wave and subsequently drowned in the ocean. He was engaged to be married at the time of his death.