Posts – Page 4 – Northwest Diving History Association

Virginia Mason Hyperbaric Lab

August 30, 2015/Organizations, Uncategorized/by diveguy

The laboratory was started in the fall of 1967 by Dr. Merril Spencer, the Director of the research center. The laboratory was started as a result of private research on decompression sickness done by Spence Campbell and aired on KOMO TV as a special documentary by KOMO’s anchor, Bill Brubaker. Dr. Spencer saw the story and offered Spence the opportunity […]

Jim Willoughby

August 29, 2015/Pioneers, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Jim Willoughby is one of the most popular and prolific diving leaders in the North Pacific Region. He is a true diving pioneer and highly respected mentor to many sport and professional divers. Of course, he is also a master storyteller. 1949 at age 19, at the Central California coastal community, Carmel-by-the-Sea, Jim began his diving adventure with homemade diving […]

Tom Hemphill

August 29, 2015/Pioneers, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Tom Hemphill was attracted to the water and the underwater world as a very young boy. His father was a research biologist at Hanford, Washington where he conducted studies of the animals that lived near and in the Columbia River around the nuclear reactor reservation. His Dad was also an avid tropical fish breeder at home and Tom grew up […]

SCUBA Takes Over Snag Diving on the Columbia River

August 29, 2015/History, Uncategorized/by diveguy

A Historical Diving Article written by Tory the Diver. Commercial gillnet fishing on the Columbia River for salmon has quite a long history. Around the turn of the 20th century, many Scandinavian immigrants settled in Oregon and Washington on both sides of the lower Columbia River near the Pacific Ocean. Many salmon fish canneries opened on the shorelines of the […]

Aqua-Neer Dive Club

August 29, 2015/Clubs, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Camas, Washington: 1954 – 1979 By Tom Hemphill Ed Palamounter, a former Navy UDT diver (Frogman) in WWII, founded the Aqua-Neer Dive Club in the early 1950s. Ed was enthusiastic about diving and he was a master teacher. Ed had no desire to make a living from diving. He simply wanted to share his skills and knowledge with anyone that […]

1963 World-Wide Roster of Underwater Clubs

August 29, 2015/Clubs, Uncategorized/by diveguy

The 1963 issue of Skin Diver Magazine lists over 1100 diving clubs and organizations. Click here to view the roster

“Will You Turn Me on, Mr. Willoughby?”

August 26, 2015/Sea Stories, Uncategorized/by diveguy

As a diving instructor, I have met many wonderful people; some casual acquaintances and some life-long friends. Over the years a number of unforgettable people have given me the pleasure of teaching them to scuba dive. I recall one incident in particular that actually left me speechless and believe me, that didn’t happen very often. It was the first night […]

A Chilling Ten Minutes

August 26, 2015/Sea Stories, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Some time ago, I received a phone call from the National Enquirer. Just so that you don’t get it confused with National Geographic, the National Enquirer is a publication like the ones you find at the checkout counter of your local grocery store. They were told that I had an extensive collection of photos of the Giant Pacific Octopus, the […]

Nikonos Calypso Dive Camera

August 26, 2015/Cameras, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Nikonos Calypso Nikonos Calypso is the name of a series of 35mm format cameras specifically designed for underwater photography launched by Nikon in 1963. The early Nikonos cameras were improvements of the Calypso camera, which was an original design by Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Belgian engineer Jean de Wouters . It was produced in France by La Spirotechnique (currently Aqua Lung) until the design was acquired by Nikon to become the Nikonos. The Nikonos system was immensely popular […]

Take Me To Your Leader

August 25, 2015/Sea Stories, Uncategorized/by diveguy

Jim Recalls: “You have to remember, there were very few divers in those days. Sooner or later you would meet other divers on the beach. Eventually, five of us got together and formed a small diving club. You might think that the name of the club is Mickey Mouse. Believe me, to dive back then, with the available equipment and […]