This story aired in the February 26, 2025 episode of Crosscurrents.
If you’re in San Francisco’s Western Addition on a Saturday night and you hear church bells ringing, you should know that it’s time to get rolling at the Church of 8 Wheels.
The church-turned-roller rink was created in the early ‘70s by David Miles Jr., known in the skating community as the "Godfather of Skate." Now, the entire Miles family is helping to keep skating culture alive in the Bay.
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Story Transcript:
REPORTER: It’s Saturday night and I’m inside the lobby of the church with the Miles family. A friend up in the church tower above us is about to ring the bells. It’s like waiting for a tip-off for a big game.
TIFFANY MILES: One minute, one minute!
REPORTER: Melanie Miles is standing atop the steps to the entrance of the church. She’s ready to greet the patrons looking to have a funky good time.
MELANIE MILES: Sign the waiver. You're gonna get scanned on the left hand side.
REPORTER: Tiffany Miles, the younger sister, is found in the lobby ready to match patrons with the right skates for the night.
TIFFANY: Just one rental? Okay. $5. What size? There's no half size. You wanna do 11? 11 Mens? Okay. The skates will be on the left side, on the table. Thank you.
REPORTER: When you think of a church, you may imagine lines of pews, stained glass windows and lit candles. At the Church of 8 Wheels, the few pews are pushed up against the walls and lasers light up the ceiling.
I can spot various people of all walks of life at the rink. There’s a group of friends on an outing, teasing each other about how well they can skate. (A lot of people think they can skate until they try it.) I see a group of elementary aged youth celebrating a birthday, laughing and for a few, skating for the first time. David Miles Jr. or the "Godfather of Skate” as he’s known, kicks off the party.
DAVID "GODFATHER" MILES JR: Make some noise out there everybody!
REPORTER: And behind the DJ booth, on most nights, you’ll find the youngest of the Godfather’s kids, David Miles III, or just “Miles” as he’s known.
DAVID MILES III: When I'm transitioning a song, I usually just try to think about, if I'm going in a particular genre, what songs go really well together.
REPORTER: Full disclosure, I’ve known Miles and his family since 2004, our freshman year of high school. Back then I had no idea he was a skater.
MILES: That was the era I thought I was too cool for everything.
REPORTER: But it turns out, skating was secretly his whole life. Let’s take it further back to when Miles was a little kid.
MILES: My dad was adamant about having myself and my sisters on skates before we were two years old, just out in the park.
REPORTER: Golden Gate Park. That's where this skating family’s story starts.
REPORTER: Miles tells me, the Godfather was raised in Kansas City. In the early 1970s, his mother had moved out to San Francisco and wrote a letter to her son, describing how amazing the city was.
MILES: So he bought a one-way ticket off on a Greyhound bus and came out here. And you know, the very first thing that he mentions when he got off the bus that he saw was people skating outside.
MILES: He just thought like he just landed in heaven. He's in paradise.
MILES: And I think the very next day, he picked up a pair of skates and he went over to the skating place on 6th Avenue.
REPORTER: And he never looked back. The Godfather finally found the place where he belonged. He found a community he could grow with.
MILES: It didn't matter where you were from or what you were doing, what you looked like, how much money you had. It was, “Hey, you like to skate? Let's skate together.”
REPORTER: And together they formed the Skate Patrol, a group that would roll through Golden Gate Park. They were helpers, healers and peacekeepers on wheels. The Godfather and the Skate Patrol kept the good vibes rolling with events such as the Friday Night Skate, a 12-mile loop around the city, and Skate Against Violence, a skating journey from San Francisco to Los Angeles.
REPORTER: On patrol in Golden Gate Park one day, the Godfather met a woman named Rose.
MILES: He was enamored at first sight, told all of his friends, “Hey, ain't nobody talking to her.”
MILES: He went by, did his trick in front of her and stuff, and You know, when he went up to her and asked for a number, she said no.
REPORTER: Even the Godfather wasn’t immune to rejection! But Rose eventually gave him a chance. The Godfather and Rose got married. They had three kids. First came Melanie, then Tiffany, and last but not least, Miles.
REPORTER: The kids learned to skate and the family started entering and winning national skating competitions.
MILES: I would say it was the first time that made me excited to want to learn how to do the steps, to want to get back home and just kind of put my skates on and stare down on my feet and just move them and see, okay, what happens when I do this?
REPORTER: The Godfather wanted to figure out a way for the family to keep skating together. So he started turning Rolligion into a business.
REPORTER: Enter: mom Rose Miles. Even though she doesn’t skate much, she’s the one pushing the family to new heights.
MILES: It wasn't so much about her having the skates on her feet, it was more about, she's all about her business.
MILES: What my mom had told my dad was, “Hey, if you think you can make a living doing the skating stuff, the kids are provided for, we got a roof over our heads. Do what you need to do, we're gonna figure it out."
REPORTER: Spoiler alert: they did figure it out. With the help of Rose’s business smarts, the Godfather started to partner up with physical education programs at Roosevelt middle school to host skating lessons, instilling the values of Rolligion to new skaters at a young age.
REPORTER: The program spread to more schools. They even held sessions at our school — where Miles, Tiffany and I went!
REPORTER: The Godfather and Rose kept their ventures at a steady pace. More than a decade later, they got their shot to claim a space as their own.
REPORTER: The Sacred Heart Church on Fillmore had been closed for about a decade due to not being able to afford a seismic repair bill.
REPORTER: In 2014, The Godfather reached an agreement to host a skate session once a week. Once a week turned into multiple sessions. With some elbow grease and a whole lot of love, Rolligion, much like the Godfather coming to SF in the 70s, found its home.
REPORTER: Back at the skate rental desk, sister Tiffany says, as a kid, she didn’t imagine growing up to be running a skate church.
TIFFANY: I definitely wouldn't have guessed that this is the kind of life that I would have had. It's one of the most exciting jobs and lives that you can have in the world and it is full of happiness.
REPORTER: 2024 marked the 10th year of the Church of 8 Wheels. As the Godfather gets older, Miles wonders whether retirement is even an option for his dad.
"is he always going to be carrying these speakers? Well, maybe that's where I kind of come in to kind of help out" -David Miles III
MILES: Like, is he always going to be carrying these speakers? Well, maybe that's where I kind of come in to kind of help out with that stuff, as far as setting up the events and everything. But I think that he'll definitely find a way to, if he's been skating since the 70s.
REPORTER: Miles says there’s now another generation involved. His sister Melanie has a daughter who is 10 years old. She skates and helps out at the church. This is what keeps the Godfather going.
MILES: Your kids have a passion for it. Your granddaughter has a passion for it. He'll never stop thinking about it, doing it or nothing like that. He'll always want to try to contribute and add on to skating.
REPORTER: Toward the end of the night, I was able to catch Melanie once more atop the steps. As the eldest, I wondered if she had a different perspective on the future of Rolligion.
MELANIE: I think that they will do this until the wheels fall off. And even so, the wheels will never fall off because we have a whole new generation.
REPORTER: As the night winds down, the skaters tonight get one more lap around the rink and one more reminder to keep the wheels moving.
THE “GODFATHER”: Thanks for coming. Thanks for sharing what we love to do. As we say each time, folks, please stay safe and keep rolling. We'll see you next time at the Church of Eight Wheels.
