so... What got you into diving, vintage or othrwise?

[Eric Sedletzky]

staying up late, getting ready for the holidays, and feeling a bit reflective.

I just put some of my Son's books away, and noticed he had one I had given him from my collection, stashed in his clubhouse (corner of bedroom, behind a chair, under an extra comforter, with the stuffed animals guarding the door), it's from the 70's I believe, was published by National Geographic, and is called "underwater adventures" or something like that.

I flipped through it to find one of my favorite pictures, thought on it for a moment, and have decided that particular photo is pretty much responsible for grabbing my imagination and hooking the 12yearold me on the idea of diving in the sea many years ago. It's not the pot-o-gold, mind you, but the feel of the moment that seems to be captured there on the rocks.

Anyway, I have single-hosed it since I was a kid, and now this last year that I have been getting a double hose rig together, I am drawn back to this photo. May have to blow the thing up and make a poster for the den/manroom.

Thought I'd share, so here it is. (don't sue me NG!)

I thought it might be kinda fun to hear what inspired some of the rest of you to put on a tank and take a splash, as a kid or as an adult.
Could be a pretty good thread...

8

Man, those are some great pictures!
It's really art when you see a photo like that and it evokes a feeling and moves you somehow.

I'm kind of a late comer into the diving world.
I've only been involved for about 13 years.
I started freediving for abalone off the Northern California coast after seeing guys coming out of the water with limits of abalone. I used to shore fish then got a rubber raft to fish from then got a wetsuit for safety while in my raft, then decided I could piece together enough gear to ab dive, and so on till I was certified.

Now I have been working my way into vintage diving from modern minimalist diving and it has become an obsession. I feel sometimes like I'm all alone in my pursuits in my area.
Many of the people that I have dove with in the past have gone the route of DIR which personally makes me nauseous for many reasons.
I have chosen to go the exact opposite direction which has caused quite a reaction.
I can tell the other side disapproves and thinks that what I am doing is reckless, and that the "old archaic" way of diving is dangerous and irresponsible. They are polite to my face, but I know what they are thinking. At club dives they are very quiet and they watch with contempt.
I don't care. The discovery of vintage diving has opened up a whole new world for me. I aquired a 1960 DA Aquamaster and restored it to better than brand new condition. I also have a late 1950's Healthways double hose regulator that a friend gave me, which is also restored to operating condition.
I have been making strap harnesses for a few older tanks I have to use with my double hoses.
I love history and diving this old gear really inspires me.

I was not around "back in the day" so this is the closest I can get to understanding and feeling what it was like.

Old photos and reruns of Sea Hunt are like vitamins to me.

 

[vintagediver]

Man, those are some great pictures!
It's really art when you see a photo like that and it evokes a feeling and moves you somehow.

It really moves me when I see the bucket of gold that they brought up. Wouldn't that be fun?

 

[VooDooGasMan]

Treasures in the Sea

Living on lake Superior in 1972 I got a national geographic society, books for young explorers I was Interested in finding ships that were in the lake, So at age seven I would go in the cold water all day, I found so many things on the point where we lived. My dreams of finding a ship and being able to dive down and get my treasures was all I ever wanted to do as soon as the Ice melted, every year. I got a book for christmas when I was five, underwater archaeology, tresures beneath the sea, by Roy Pinney. roy was the camera guy on wild kingdom, when I was a kid this show was todays discovery channel, so to speak.

This book of roys, in the back you could buy treasure, sunken ship maps, so I got all the maps for the great lakes through the years, and it took years to read roys book myself. I learned to dive from divers that I met at the boat launch, told them of my maps they teased me. one time they were going buy my house and they came close enough to talk with my parents they tied there boat to our mooring bouy, and I went and got them in the dingy, once on shore the beer drinking started and they had fish dinner, with us, showed them my maps and I was accepted to go on there wreck diving adventures. We lied about how deep they would take me to my parents, for they all liked the wrecks we found with my maps. And the beer and fish dinners after diving, after a few years I went diving my self, for I wanted to dive every day. The book the divers gave me to learn how to dive is, The Skin Divers Bible, by Owen Lee.

Ok now I might chap a few But I still to this day put my scuba unit on this way even yesterday, And I do not care if there is help or not, this is the way a skin diver does it period. The book is still better and easier to learn skin diving than anything published after, 1963 copyright, my book is 1968, I never need to ask anyone anything for it was all in there for me to learn.

Comming to washington state in 1996, I had a reason to get certified for diving all over, and to learn from all the dive shops on there local diving, funny thing , not once was I asked to see my cert card, except charters in BC. So in 1998, I got certified, so I could get air all over the state and british columbia, for my destiny was to see and play with the giant octopus, as My Treasures in the Sea book had this picture in it and all the sea life. Now I dive all the time and for some reason, have no other real intrest in any thing else, For Skindiving is a way of life for me.

Happy Diving

 

[David Wilson]

I learned to swim relatively late in life, probably around 1958 when I was 11 years old. At that time I attended a North East of England school which was fortunate enough to have its own swimming pool. I didn't respond too well to the teaching of swimming at school, mainly because each lesson seemed to be about practising perfect swimming strokes to the n'th degree and racing one another up and down the pool, neither of which I was good at. I was academically inclined and didn't mind having my brain muscles exercised by the school curriculum, but I was much less prepared to put in the same effort in physical education, particularly team sports. I simply couldn't see the point of kicking a ball about a muddy field on a cold winter's day.

Although I took my time learning to swim, I enjoyed it far more because it was an individual sport and it had a practical point to it, the avoidance of drowning if I had ever found myself "in the drink". I ended up teaching myself to swim, having decided that a mask, snorkel and pair of fins would give the motivation to master the skill. My school opened its swimming pool on Saturday mornings for every student who just wanted to be in the water, splashing, floating and playing around with big rubber inner tubes and in the case of those, like me, fortunate enough to have basic snorkelling gear, diving to the bottom of the pool with our masks, snorkels and fins, marvelling at our dexterity in the world of water. I learned to to swim on my own during those recreational sessions, having learnt little or nothing during formal swimming teaching.

During the 1950s and 1960s, public swimming pools happily permitted youngsters to snorkel alongside adults doing lengths and breadths of the pool. There was no demarcation between serious swimmers who wanted to do their "sets" and the teenagers swimming about in their snorkelling gear. On a visit to Germany in 1963, I was taken to a swimming pool in a nearby town and recall the glass cabinets in the pool lobby exhibiting colourful Barakude fins, masks and snorkels which could be purchased in a nearby sporting goods store and used during normal pool sessions. I was hooked and in 1965, when I was visiting Salzburg on a language course, I bought a pair of fins, proudly using the German I'd learnt, for use in an outdoor pool.

I went up to university in 1966 and joined its subaqua club. I did the basic training - everybody had to qualify in snorkelling skills first, including underwater mask clearing and gear donning. The challenges of studying two foreign languages to a very high level prevented me from progressing further to scuba, which at that time would have involved double-hose diving. However, when I spent three months brushing up my spoken German in 1968 in a university in Southern Germany, I took my fins, mask and snorkel with me. They were put to use in the town's open air pool. In the 1970s, I snorkelled in the Greek, French, Italian and Spanish Mediterranean alongside people of all, nationalities. It was the golden age of vintage snorkelling in Europe. When I went to the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) to study the country and to try and research the way they taught English and French there, I took my snorkelling gear with me and enjoyed swimming with it in a swimming lake in East Berlin.

The golden age of snorkelling, so far as I'm concerned, ended in the later 1970s and early 1980s. First, diving equipment manufacturers started making masks out of silicone and fins out of plastic. I couldn't see the point, considering that rubber-skirted masks and all-rubber full-foot fins had served me perfectly well at least since my earliest teens. The other barrier raised to snorkelling at that time was the banning of snorkelling gear use in public pools. This meant that young snorkellers had no longer any opportunity to try out and practise snorkelling in the safety of an indoor pool before testing their skills in open water. Health and safety legislation, passed no doubt by benevolent lawmakers in the interests of reducing accidents, resulted in the converse of what they envisaged. Young snorkellers either gave up their pastime or risked their lives by snorkelling in the sea, heedless of weather and sea conditions.

I was very fortunate to have had the opportunity to learn to snorkel when I did, first in the safety of an indoor pool. It stood me in good stead when snorkelling became a hobby during my student years and my early employment as a teacher. I used to visit the United States each summer to see my brother, who is now a naturalised American citizen, and I got to snorkel in the lakes of the "City of Lakes", Minneapolis where he lived, and in places such as the La Jolla Cove in Southern California. In the new millennium, I had a diagnosis of prostate cancer and underwent surgery to remove the organ, followed by radiotherapy. Almost 5 years after the operation, I still have a very good prognosis. Having been in what I thought was reasonable health my entire life, however, I suddenly glimpsed my own mortality and resolved to keep snorkelling for the sake of physical exercise. I began snorkelling from a sandy North Sea beach in the North East of England, 8 miles from where I live, keeping warm using a Hydroglove two-piece drysuit, which nicely matches my other old-fashioned snorkelling accessories. For as much of the year as possible, I try and snorkel in the early mornings when the only audience is a handful of dogwalkers. I look forward to my snorkelling trips and feel very disappointed whenever I have to return home because the sea is too violent to be safe. Fortunately, that's the exception rather than the rule. Now I'm semi-retired, I hope to be able to increase the number of times I go snorkelling. It keeps me fit and alert and also seems to keep my weight in check.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Living on lake Superior in 1972 I got a national geographic society, books for young explorers View attachment 68504 I was Interested in finding ships that were in the lake, So at age seven I would go in the cold water all day, I found so many things on the point where we lived. My dreams of finding a ship and being able to dive down and get my treasures View attachment 68491 was all I ever wanted to do as soon as the Ice melted, every year. I got a book for christmas when I was five, underwater archaeology, tresures beneath the sea, by Roy Pinney. roy was the camera guy on wild kingdom, when I was a kid this show was todays discovery channel, so to speak.

This book of roys, in the back you could buy treasure, sunken ship maps, so I got all the maps for the great lakes through the years, and it took years to read roys book myself. I learned to dive from divers that I met at the boat launch, told them of my maps they teased me. one time they were going buy my house and they came close enough to talk with my parents they tied there boat to our mooring bouy, and I went and got them in the dingy, once on shore the beer drinking started and they had fish dinner, with us, showed them my maps and I was accepted to go on there wreck diving adventures. We lied about how deep they would take me to my parents, for they all liked the wrecks we found with my maps. And the beer and fish dinners after diving, after a few years I went diving my self, for I wanted to dive every day. The book the divers gave me to learn how to dive is, The Skin Divers Bible, by Owen Lee.

Ok now I might chap a few But I still to this day put my scuba unit on this way View attachment 68493 even yesterday, And I do not care if there is help or not, this is the way a skin diver does it period. The book is still better and easier to learn skin diving than anything published after, 1963 copyright, my book is 1968, I never need to ask anyone anything for it was all in there for me to learn.

Comming to washington state in 1996, I had a reason to get certified for diving all over, and to learn from all the dive shops on there local diving, funny thing , not once was I asked to see my cert card, except charters in BC. So in 1998, I got certified, so I could get air all over the state and british columbia, for my destiny was to see and play with the giant octopus, as My Treasures in the Sea book had this picture View attachment 68492 in it and all the sea life. Now I dive all the time and for some reason, have no other real intrest in any thing else, For Skindiving is a way of life for me.

Happy Diving

I especially like the last photo of the guy and the GPO.
The look in his eye says it all.

 

[Peter_C]

Many of the people that I have dove with in the past have gone the route of DIR which personally makes me nauseous for many reasons.
I have chosen to go the exact opposite direction which has caused quite a reaction.
I can tell the other side disapproves and thinks that what I am doing is reckless, and that the "old archaic" way of diving is dangerous and irresponsible. They are polite to my face, but I know what they are thinking. At club dives they are very quiet and they watch with contempt.
I don't care.

Not sure who you are referring too. I have never heard anyone say anything, other than cool, check out the vintage gear. Remember in Albion when you got your hands on that reg how everyone wanted to check it out? Did you notice at the last club dive how everyone was checking it out again? Bruce and I were talking about vintage gear yesterday on the boat ride back to the ramp. I know I totally get the BC less diving and think that the diving with less can be challenging (Weighting must be perfect), but gives you extra speed and mobility, especially for hunting.

NO wait you are totally crazy! LOL

So when do you want to take the inflatable and go dive Lobos? I will bring my drysuit, two thermal layers, doubles, can light, and scooter, then we can perform some air shares I am serious too, lets take a weekday and go.

The photo with the pot of gold and the pride in their eyes definitely has the passion that we all want to get out of diving. We were treasure hunting yesterday at the lake for simple things like anchors and sunglasses, wearing similar grins as in the picture.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Not sure who you are referring too. I have never heard anyone say anything, other than cool, check out the vintage gear. Remember in Albion when you got your hands on that reg how everyone wanted to check it out? Did you notice at the last club dive how everyone was checking it out again? Bruce and I were talking about vintage gear yesterday on the boat ride back to the ramp. I know I totally get the BC less diving and think that the diving with less can be challenging (Weighting must be perfect), but gives you extra speed and mobility, especially for hunting.

NO wait you are totally crazy! LOL

So when do you want to take the inflatable and go dive Lobos? I will bring my drysuit, two thermal layers, doubles, can light, and scooter, then we can perform some air shares I am serious too, lets take a weekday and go.

The photo with the pot of gold and the pride in their eyes definitely has the passion that we all want to get out of diving. We were treasure hunting yesterday at the lake for simple things like anchors and sunglasses, wearing similar grins as in the picture.

Peter,

One thing I don't want you to do is take my whole issue with DIR personally.
I like you, and like to hang out with you at club dives and all the other functions where we meet up. I also like all the other members of the club, and if I didn't I wouldn't be there.

My feelings about the whole indoctrination and brainwashing that goes on stems way back to the original shock and awe campaign that they ran 10 years ago on the west coast.
What may work well in Florida caves and on deep wreck penetrations on the east coast, in my opinion, doesn't necessarily mean it's the end all for California diving, or any other world wide diving for that matter.
Many of them say "Oh it's different now". well I've run across threads in other forums in the DIR section (BTW, they don't allow any non DIR's to post??? (Can dish it out but can't take it?). I see that the attitude is alive and well. I've read posts from people I thought might be cool to meet up with and maybe do some diving with?, no way!, according to their protocols it 'ain't gonna happen.

My issue is not with the people or the personalities, it's with the kool-aid.
It does make me nauseous.
I'm afraid the attitude is going to take over and soon there after people I know and dive with at club dives are going to think that unless somebody has all the bling they are "not one of us" and therefore are unsafe or whatever, put answer here_____________.

I don't know if the whole death grip on DIR it's a response to crappy PADI or other watered down instruction from the beginning or what, or maybe it's a fad.
I've been there and done that, you forget I've done the whole long hose thing with the drysuit, the slung bottles, etc. There are many great things about the configuration and protocols, in fact when I dive regular I still use much of the features simply because they make sense.
It's the mental conversion and the move to the lightly taken "dark side" that scares me. It can become very close minded and intolerant if not looked at and kept track of. It's easy for one to take thyne self and a particuloar style way too seriously.

I'm a pretty good reader of body language which sometimes can be way more the indicator of truth that words or comments.
Maybe I'm imagining the whole thing, I sure hope so.

I guess if the whole group goes on the kool-aid at some point I'll have to move on. My stomach won't be able to take it.

Again,
Nuthin' personal.

E

 

[VooDooGasMan]

Yes zky, his fascination was whole heartly there. I have filled my destiny many times and I feed my local octos, dungi crabs when I see there home. I do a night dive every so often so to play with them out of there caves. I have a huge wall that has thousands of tiny caves, at night they are out and about all over. I am the only diver they see, I observe and hand them dungis. I am not a dir, or utd, or navy seal, navy diver, I am a diver that has several set's of doubles, single tanks, and scuba kits. My doubles gives me enough time to spend with my octo freinds as they are between 90' and 140' so I like to spend a half an hour at that depth. Not to say I do not like to go deep, Cause I love to explore to the deep depths also. Here where I live there is so much down there, to keep me curious. Yea I do not let anyone try to intimidate my way of diving, cause I do many ways, to keep me not actively bored. I told a dive buddy a couple days ago I was going to send my Royal Aquamaster for new hose and rebuild, and start doing some vintage dives again, I have my set of al 50' hard back, A us divers barrel manifold is what I would put on it this time, not that I would go deep, just to hunt with and use my old balco thunder 90 rubber band gun, And no bouyancy compensator. I have monkey dove in the past few years, so I have had the great pleasure of having a naked scuba unit on while diving. These are the reasons of keeping diving fun.

Happy Diving

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I just love those photos, I gotta say again. I've been coming back and back to this thread to look at the pictures.

The age of film is sadly gone. I'll bet those photos were taken with Kodachrome 64 or 25.
I love the grain structure and the muted subttle coloration. Like an fine painting with passages of impasto and an almost pointisist approach, textures can add to mood and film does this.
Modern digital photography is ultra crisp and clean and can be manipulated later, it's almost too clean and can lack mystery and drama (to me anyway).

But something about film like an old tube stereo amplifier that produces some really sweet sounds, it just has a look about it that I miss.

The composition in that Octopuss photo is fantastic. The photographer really captured it.
The body of the GPO frames the right side of the picture and the white plumose anemones frame the left side. The center of interest is the divers eye which is placed out of the center "box" of the picture which would be considered proper composition design. The tentacles lead the eye right to the center of interest with linear lead-ins and the one eye is lit with a priceless expression of "Oh my god! look at that thing!!" Total awe. The added grain structure and coloration gives the pic a mood and drama. If it was crystal clear and over colored it would not be the same.
Even though the octopuss is the biggest feature in the photo it is still a supporting actor. If it was just a pic of the octopuss it would just be a pic of a blob and mass of tentacles. The diver gives the octo perspective and the look gives the photo life.
The mask also allows the viewer to fully see the divers face and the high eyebrow. The physical gesture is perfect also. He looks like he's on the verge of spitting his reg out from excitement.

I couldn't have painted it better myself.

 

[gonphishing]

I've always had a appreciation for vintage. everything. they don't make things like they usto. lod cars, houses, art, music. and yes diving. while I have a mixed set of dive gear. some old some new. there is nothing cooler than old salts sporting vintage gear. nice to know the roots of where this sport came from. now days its all about the money. LDS selling you all kinds of crap. you dont need. just like everything else. it now not about diving than it is about being indoctrinated into beliefs. weather its DIR or basic training. I to se DIR as to ridged. and over the top. its like a contest. I know more than you. and this is the right way. and you should do this. and I wont do that. really takes the fun out of diving for me. last thing I want to do when diving is get into a pissing contest on whos gear configuration is best. its all good. this works just fine for me thanks. and Im a bit of a history buff. I find more worth is the past than the future. if you ask me. were all just consumers now. before it was about making your own suit. now we just buy them. ect... old school rocks!!!! lets have some fun and put together a vintage dive... why not?