Don Lastra

Don Lastra's roller derby career began as a skater. He learned dance skating in 1953 in Ocean Park, California, and continued through his US Army service (1956–1960) at Camp Gordon, Georgia and Camp Drake, Tokyo, where he played baseball and roller hockey and taught beginner skating to local children. Upon returning home, he taught skating in Redondo Beach and Santa Monica for Hall of Famer Charlie 'Spec' Saunders, and in 1961 he was accepted by the Manhattan Beach Police Department, where he served until his 1991 retirement.

Lastra began officiating roller derby in the late 1960s, originally filling in when scheduled referees did not appear. In the early 1970s he refereed games for the Jet League, which Saunders ran as a curtain-raiser to the pro game; in 1972 a call from Ralph Valladares made him a regular pro referee. He worked through the end of Roller Games and Rock and Roller Games. In 1995 he refereed for Bert Wall (HOF 1960) and a promoter listed in the Derby Memoirs source as 'Mr. DeCarlo'.

In 1998, Lastra trained eight new referees in Orlando, Florida for the launch of Roller Jam on TNN, and was named Chief Referee for the league's opening games. His tenure as Chief Referee ended after a single game, when he attempted to break up a fight involving Mark D'Amato and Tim Washington and suffered a broken left wrist in three places. He returned to officiating after eight weeks. Lastra is not currently a National Roller Derby Hall of Fame inductee, though his career — captured in his own words in the Derby Memoirs archive — represents an unbroken thread of officiating across five decades of the sport.