How Did You Find Your First Scuba Class?

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I used to hang around the shop in Laguna Beach and look through the windows at the scuba equipment after skin diving all day during the summer. One day Rick Nelson walked in with a big bag of hamburgers and an empty set of dive tanks.

He and the guys came out in a couple minutes and asked if I had eaten anything? I was kind of hired there and then to clean up, put tools away and wash off dive gear.

In turn I got a little work lifting furniture and setting up office space for the editor of Skin Diver magazine (Ken Seebold) six who was among the first to do some of the deeper stuff at Truk with Al Tilman and Sylvia Earle and came back with pictures.

Couple summers later the shop got me entered in the Los Angeles County Skin Diver Program. I got certified as a Skin diver over the summer and the following February I was allowed to enter the NAUI program as a prospect. I passed eventually but it was very difficult for a little kid of 14.

That was 1972 and I can still do every dive I did at 25 :). (mostly)

We used to do stuff that was unthinkable by today's standards but we were pretty used to living in a different era. Before convenience.
 
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I went downstairs in 1968. My dad was the state director for Ga, Tn and Ky for the YMCA scuba program. Back then, Ken Brock was the director who would later direct NAUI.
 
I went downstairs in 1968. My dad was the state director for Ga, Tn and Ky for the YMCA scuba program. Back then, Ken Brock was the director who would later direct NAUI.
Wow! How many scuba divers owe your Dad for getting started diving? I'm guessing there are some right here on Scubaboard.
 
I did a Bubblemaker experience in a pool when I was 9... The bug stayed dormant for years, till I decided to learn diving and signed up on Scubaboard. A year later I got my gue rec1 card from a local instructor =)
 
I used to hang around the shop in Laguna Beach and look through the windows at the scuba equipment after skin diving all day during the summer. One day Rick Nelson walked in with a big bag of hamburgers and an empty set of dive tanks.

He and the guys came out in a couple minutes and asked if I had eaten anything? I was kind of hired there and then to clean up, put tools away and wash off dive gear.

In turn I got a little work lifting furniture and setting up office space for the editor of Skin Diver magazine (Ken Seebold) six who was among the first to do some of the deeper stuff at Truk with Al Tilman and Sylvia Earle and came back with pictures.

Couple summers later the shop got me entered in the Los Angeles County Skin Diver Program. I got certified as a Skin diver over the summer and the following February I was allowed to enter the NAUI program as a prospect. I passed eventually but it was very difficult for a little kid of 14.

That was 1972 and I can still do every dive I did at 25 :). (mostly)

We used to do stuff that was unthinkable by today's standards but we were pretty used to living in a different era. Before convenience.
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George Austin
Some times memory plays tricks on us

The dive shop in Laguna beach was the Laguna Sea Sports owned by Al and Sally Santmeyer.

It was true Rick and his older brother David were very active and very visible in the diving Orange County diving scene. Very nice young men who had so much fame at an early age and passed so soon.

Ken Seybold (Note spelling) was associated with Skin Diver Magazine (SDM) as the photographer editor, almost an "honorary title.". He owned Bay Travel way up in Corona Del Mar about 10 miles north of Laguna Beach. SDM at that time was located in 5959 Hollywood Blvd in Hollywood, California

Ken and Paul Tzimoulis, the editor of SDM were very close friends. They began traveling together and were the pioneers of dive travel. ( I certainly don't know why they chose Truk Island, but at this late date I SUSPOSE it was because Ken was an ex USN flyboy and had been brain washed about USN victories of WW11- Truk was a major shoot out victory for US)

Ken and Pal were the first to dive Truk Island and as previously stated were the true pioneers of "dive travel" which gave rise to the once a year "vacation diver."

Perhaps you recall when they discovered the Japanese Submarine I -169 with all the bodies entombed within the submarine - and they published an SDM article complete with pictures on the discovery ? BIG international incident-- Japanese government accused them of disturbing the final resting place of the Japanese sailors..

Al Tillman was busy with organizing NAUI and the UW Explorers club at that juncture in diving history
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I suspect that you mean Al Giddings who was "closely associated" with Sylvia Earle. Recall her 1000 + dive in the JIM suit ? Al remarked "Your on your own Kiddo" and away she dropped'

I knew them all, dove with them ...All are gone now Al & Sally, Rick, David, Ken, Paul, and AL...only Sylvia and Al Giddings remain, Sylvia recently divorced her latest husband. Al has retired to Montana and is directing his energies toward Classic automobiles..

I thank you for your post and historical memories , history must be preserved but it must be preserved correctly, therefore I added a few embellishments

Sam Miller, 111
La co UW Instructor 11
NAUI instructor 27
PADI instructor - 241 or 2241
 
Thank you, Sam - much appreciated- Giddings, yes. I was growing up in Corona del Mar just off McArthur Blvd and thought thought Mr. Seybold was the photo editor as he was poring over glossy 8X10's from Truk on a day I was brought in to move some furniture around - I thought the Bay Travel company was about at the foot of McArthur Blvd on PCH
 
Sally Santmeyer

Do you know where and how Sally is doing these days at all? She was most generous to me with advice and help when I opened my dive center/store in NY in 1994 but I have lost contact with her.
 
1994 is almost a quarter of a century ago- lots of changes can transpire in that length of time

We, she Al and I were social friends as well as professional diving friends. After Al's passing we chatted often then she sold the store and the conversations were less frequent - except for RSTC

She would be aging , probably approaching 90 so I believe she is diving on that big reef in the sky...

SDM
 

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