Has anyone met one of the diving greats such as Gary Gentile?

[egg007]

I was wandering if anyone had met one of the great living lengend divers such as Gary Gentile?
What makes them so great and based on your meeting what was your impression of them?

 

[Walter]

Who's Gary Gentile?

I've met several folks considered famous within the very small world of diving. I think they are all aware being famous in diving circles isn't exactly the same as being famous. They've all been normal folks.

WWW™

 

[bradymsu]

I had the opportunity to take a course from Gary Taylor in the Florida springs this past week. Gary is a diving legend and a member of the IANTD Board of Advisors. He is the author of a number of technical publications and the founder of the Deep Diving Foundation. He is one of the dozen or so most prominent cave divers currently still with us. He developed the high altitude diving tables and is currently researching cutting edge gas mixes for technical diving among other projects.

I wasn't sure what to expect in meeting him but came away very impressed. Despite his years of experience, he was very friendly, open, and helpful to me as a comparably new diver.

In my humble opinion the true diving greats earn their reputations based on years of experience in diving and teaching rather than self-promotion. They make themselves available to other divers without projecting a lot of attitude and always approach new ideas or challenges to their style with an open mind. They are above any political agenda in diving. They teach because they love to teach rather than to furthur an instructor rating. As well as being teachers, they also continue to be students. They realize they will never have all the answers.

Is anyone else on the board familiar with Gary Taylor? What is your opinion of him? I am planning on taking additional instruction with him.

 

[egg007]

Gary is arguably the most famous/leading wreck diver. He was a pioneer on the Andreas Dorias and has written several books on wreck diving. He also has a famous personality.
Check these random links on Gary
http://www.deepexplorers.com/seeker/crew.html

http://www.deepexplorers.com/destinations/andrea_doria_china.html

http://christinayoung.com/pages/diving/seeker/carolina00a.htm


http://www.newsday.com/doria/doria3b.htm

 

[dsquid]

Gary Gentile is well known to the NY/NJ diving community (and beyond). He's written several books on Wreck Diving, and wreck research (among many other topics.) Along with Dan Berg, probably the two most published NE wreck authors.

See http://www.ggentile.com/ For more info on Mr. Gentile
and http://www.aquaexplorers.com/ for more info on Dan Berg

Interestingly, I was chatting with the divemaster on a boat I was on on Saturday, and he mentioned that he had met Gary. We were discussing wreck identification, which explains why it came up. We were diving an underdocumented wreck - the "Sea Hag aka Reliable" - Loran 26822.1, 43296.9)

BTW, the ship you keep misspelling is called the "Andrea Doria", not "Andrea Dorias".

 

[Green_Manelishi]

"greats" is a subjective term, however, here is a list (in
no particular order) of persons I've been personally introduced to or "dove with":

Jarrod Jablonski (wkpp, gue)
Terrence Tysall (cambrian foundation)
Dan Crowell (seeker)

 

[greg somers]

Gary Who? I guess the word "arguably" is the right word.
I'm sure he's pretty good if he's done the 'Doria'.Fame is relative though.We have a local guy called Wade Doak who with Kelly Tarlton brought up the Rothschild jewels off the 'Eligmanite' at the Three Kings Islands.Wade and his wife are full time at producing underwater documentaries shown under the 'Wild South' logo and shown on the National Geographic channel.They are locally known by divers but probably not by the rest of the world who likely have their own regional celebreties.
Cheers All ears,
There can be only one,
The Gasman.

 

[dsquid]

Yes the word "Great" or "celebrity" is subjective, based on the type of diving you do and where you are. And the east coast wreck diving community is far less of a "clique" now than it used to be.

Gentile is mentioned in several of the recent Doria books, but that only scratches the surface really. It's hard not to run into the name if you have any real interest in the subject.

 

[Natasha]

A friend of mine dives the Doria every year. And he has known Gary for years. They both have china they brought up from the Doria. (yes, it was allowed back then)
I haven't met Gary, but have heard many good things about him.
The only "famous" diver I have met, was Jean- Michael Cousteau. I had my picture taken with him, at DEMA, this year. I had about 5 minutes to chat with him. He was quite witty in that short time.
I told him I also had a picture taken with Muhammad Ali, and I was going to put his picture right next to it.
He turned to me and said, "I had my picture taken with him too"! We both laughed.
That's it, my claim fame.
I guess you're all going to ask me to scan these pics. Ok I will. When my husband gets home from work I'll ask him to help me. I'm better at diving then computer stuff!
:sunny:

 

[BetterLateThannever]

Well, as for me, the only "great" diver I would have liked to have met was Mike Nelson. Without a doubt the greatest.

See for yourself: http://www.mnsi.net/~bjackson/ :loopy: