What's the History of Tikis and Realtion to Rodding?

Carve yer own....

You should really do some research....Customs have been spelled with a K for a LONG time....haha

 

NJ has always been a Tiki free zone. and I've been here a long time.

The shrunken head mirror hanger thing was around in the 60's here. Not real big. And the dice never showed up til the retro ones in the late 80's got here.

But White Castle boxes on the floor have been constant. LOL.

 

I have 3 of those "car chics" somewhere out in the shop. One blonde & 2 brunettes.
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An old almquist catalogue with a tiki shift knob in the bottom left

 

One of my other hobbies is candle making and rodders always go for 8balls,spark plugs and the most popular are the Tikis!!

 

I grew up with dozens if smaller tikis around the house in the sixties, but I never associated them with car culture. They were just a part of the environment. My wife tossed out the remaining remnants twenty years ago and it caused no anguish. now I wish I still had a few.

 

Weez is correct in saying that modern day tiki culture can and has become something of a tag along onto the coat tales of modern day hot rodding. Fake foam tiki heads and out of place charactertures have become something of a bother. In context, i'm sure there are ways to find it or make use of tikis appropriately without over doing it. However, tiki/polynesian culture was something of a movement even before the 50's and 60's popular tiki dives and restaurants. It was a type of vacation, escape, or even an adventure for those who attended these venues. Places like Don the Beachcomber,Hawaii 1930's. Aku Aku in Las Vegas at teh Star Dust, Kon Tiki Ports in Chicago and New York, Mai Kai in Florida. You name it, there was a tiki spot in every major city across the map ranging from the 1930's to the 60's before the culture died out. Yes, House parties were ways to mix up the regular cocktail intake into something much more exotic and fun. What you see now is not quite a revival but remnants of what was.......





detroit


Florida


Lifestyle

 

And bodys in the trunk

 

Umm Chin Tiki was on Cass Ave in Dowtown Detroit and was open until 1980 and then sealed up like a vault until the eminem movie 8 mile was filmed there. There was rumor of a re-opening , the original owner died, kid sold it, Mike Illitch bought it , bulldozed it and now it's parking until he gets hi new Hockey arena. RIP CHIN TIKI!!!!!

 

I'd like to see that! I've never seen one before. Mike Ness has a cheetah head in the back window of his '54 chev. Do the eyes blink with the turn signals? Definitely weird stuff. John

 

Even though we live in New York my car club, The Tiki Kings, make a lifestyle of the whole tiki culture.

 

I'm younger (43) but I'm thinking Tiki is to hot rodding like poodle skirts and chocolate malts... popular culture from that era. I remember tiki stuff back then as it faded away.

 

I'll dig em out Sunday & post pics. The eyes were not set up to work with the blinkers. They were in a big lot of "stuff" I brought home years ago from a closed down store in Niagara Falls.

 

Must have started when Mooneyes put them in the 2008 catalog. Ha Ha

Seriously though it must be a "West Coast" Surfer thing. As kids swimming in the neighborhood pools several of them had the Large Tikis sitting around the bar. We would use them to hang our towels on.
That would put it in the mid 60's.
Seen them a bunch in buddies Surfer Vans. That would be in the 70's.
When I say Surfer Vans, I mean actual vans we would throw our boogie boards,surfboards, charcoal grills, food and dry clothes in the back.

At the time, we didn't even think about it. It was as common as peace sign stickers and Gabriel Highjacker Rabbit stickers in the back windows. Oh, and hanging love beads between the fronts seats and the cargo part of the van.

Never seen them on Hot Rods back then. So long story short, I don't think it has anything to do with Hot Rods.

 

Just like 90% of the other stuff we see on here and in the mags...

 

i remember when I first noticed it with the surf sound and films around the early 60,s. When we cruised town in the 50,s, if a pop song came on or somethin loud or popular you could hear the song from all the cruisers tuned to the same station at the intersections up an down the street, much like what you hear in 'American Graffitti' and I can remember one time everybody yelled 'Tequila' at an intersection. So when you saw those movies with the palm trees by the ocean in Ca,. they had tiki torches etc. burning, and the other tiki objects followed. At least in my town it was like that. My avatar shows my cruiser in those days, it didnt have a radio!

 

This guy thinks it has something to do with hot rods...

 

I grew up as a kid near bellflower blvd through the 70's. I remember seeing custom cars cruising the streets as I was cruising my bicycle, through the same parts of town were apartment complexes with high pitched Polynesian type roofs and tiki's out in front of them. The house I grew up in had that same type of architecture. Maybe it is more of a West Coast connection of the two, but as I got older and researched, I noticed Florida has a lot of the same type of connection. So with no formal training, only memories from days gone by, I now carve these(For those that like them).And I give most of the credit to the era I grew up in. A little later than the 50's, but never the less, still associated. Also out of all the shows that I do, Car shows are without doubt my best shows.

 

Don't get me wrong guys. I'm not against them, I just was wondering about the history as tikis weren't big in my area.

 

Edit! detroit is what i ment, still had Kon Tiki in my head when I said chicago. My fault *hangs head*


RIP Chin Tiki!

 

My Tiki jobs pay for my car stuff..... that is what it has evolved into for me.

Oh BTW I am a TRADITIONAL tiki carver



Two of three 9 foot monsters down at LA Live.

 

i think tiki was just part of island culture(old religion) that became part of pop culture(mainland) and eventually found its way into hot rodding for some people.
why do some people have hula girls on the dash or fuzzy dice on the mirror?

i think its just decoration an extension of personal taste, and some people tend to take some themes to the extreme.

 

How about blue dots? Was that an East Coast thing or popular on the West Coast as well? Where did that start?

How about coon tails? Or was that just a hillbilly thing like fish stickers? Ha! Ha!

 

I'm a big fan of Tiki's and such, so much that i let my buddy tattoo them on me, with his twist though. Feel free to shit on these if you want but i think he did a great job and i am proud to have them on me.

 

As a kid I lived in Oahu from 56-62. Tiki were everwhere of course, but the historical ones look cooler than the wierdo-ones you see now, me thinks. My guess is Tiki and pop culture goes back first to surfers who brought it back to California, but don't forget all the post WWII military, and the subsequent WW2 / Korean War and Elvis Presley movies. Tiki bars were a big fad in an alcohol enriched post war America, so any new wrinkle or fad to make getting loaded more fun was always encouraged. Hula hoops and grass skirts seemed to go hand in hand, too, for some reason. The motion? The alcohol? Gary

 

Indeed.

Same with rockabilly etc.

 

Tiki Lifestyle is all about chillin, relaxin, and kickin back. There are some super Tiki Bars all up and down the Cali coast, and the trend seems to be growing in the last few years.....and don't forget Tiki Torches, they make great interior lights!

 

Especially inevitable in SOCAL.