Scuba Diving Certification, what was it like in 1960?
Scuba Diving Certification, what was it like in 1960?
The most accurate answer to that is there was no national association teaching Scuba.
By now, if you have been reading some of my blogs, you have learned that I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio and started diving in Lake Erie in 1956.. I purchased a regulator, tank, weight belt and depth gauge at a local sporting goods store and had to seek out someone who could teach me the basics and fortunately there was a small dive club in the area that did just that once I joined.
For the next four years I dived the lake building more experience and confidence with each dive. In the beginning, I would dive every Saturday and Sunday, weather permitting, and eventually reduced this routine concentrating on specific local areas as well as traveling East and West along the lake to explore other locations.
During this time, I was offered a part-time position by a local sporting goods store in their dive equipment section. A short time after that I was contacted by a local YMCA asking if I would teach a class in scuba diving due to members beginning to request training. My reward would be a membership to the Y which I never had the time to take advantage of.
Because the Y did not have a ready-made course, it became necessary for me to determine just how to go about training others in what I had to learn by a certain amount of trial and error..........fortunately not too much error because I was still alive.
Starting from scratch, one of the first things I felt new students should be was at home in the water. After all, why would anyone want to enter into a sport where you can go underwater when you're not confident on the surface.
For this reason, I felt it necessary to split the course into two main sections, one being skin diving and the other scuba diving. In this manner I could evaluate the potential scuba diver, while in the skin diving section, by their performance with mask, fins and snorkel. After all this was the basis for Scuba.
Just a little more of a history lesson, back in the early 60's the word Scuba was not really a word but an abbreviation that signified Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. Later on, the advertising world changed it to Scuba probably due to more people and manufacturers getting used to recognizing the sport under this name.
Getting back to the training game, it was necessary for me to type up a number of hand-outs as well as tests for the potential students. All I had at that time was my portable typewriter I used through college along with my so-so typing skills.
In order to advertise that a course was going to be offered by the local YMCA, we contacted the local Cleveland newspaper and let them know which resulted in a couple of articles in the sports writer's column giving the public notification.
This advertising benefit started the phone inquiries at the Y so it became necessary to type up another flyer to not only assist the operator in supplying answers but also used as a handout for those who would come in personally. Keep in mind there was no internet then.
What may have caught your eye was the average cost of dive equipment as well as the course itself.
Another item you may have noticed, in the newspaper article, was that the start date for the class of January 31. This is because I had one stipulation when I agreed to teach which was that I would only teach in the winter because I would be diving in the Summer.
The next form to be generated was the Sign-up one that was filled out by the potential student either in advance or on the first night of the course.
Now the YMCA and I settled on a minimum age for taking this course at 17, partly due to some of the other courses they offered and also a limit where I felt comfortable of their attention span and being able to handle the weight of the equipment.
Not wanting to soft peddle the course, I handed out my next bit of information which was the pool portion of what they will be expected to do throughout the course. Surprisingly I did not have a mass exodus of students resulting from the distribution of this information. An average class consisted of between 10 and 15 students.
You may wonder why the course was given at night as well as the overall length of 12 weeks. The evening classes satisfied not only the ability of the students, as well as myself, to attend if they had day jobs. The other reason was that enough time had to be allotted for not only classroom sessions but pool portions as well.
As you can tell by the skin diving pool sessions, it was pretty basic but as I mentioned earlier, it gave me a firsthand knowledge of what I would have to work on with each individual to prepare them for Scuba.
Shortly after the beginning of the course, while we were engaged in the skin diving portion, I would bring in my scuba gear to allow those students, interested in the scuba portion as well as the skin diving sign-ups, to experience what it was like to breath underwater in the shallow end of the pool.
The other reason for introducing them to the equipment was that they would have to purchase it prior to the start of the scuba session. There were no dive shops in existent at that time for them to rent the necessary equipment so purchase was the only way to go.
In order to expose them to the various types of equipment on the market, I sent a request to a large wholesale house in New England for their catalogs in order that the students could have an overview of all the various regulators, tanks, depth gauges etc. that were on the market because the local sporting goods stores only handled one or two brands.
We would discuss the pros and cons of various items and then place and order with the wholesaler who would ship the equipment to their address.
Another hand-out dealt with the Rules for Safe Skin and Scuba Diving. Once again, I was attempting to prepare the Scuba divers as well as possibly encouraging the skin divers to continue into Scuba.
At this point I want to emphasize that these handouts were topics that were fully discussed during my lectures in the classroom sessions.
Just a few things to emphasize in this handout. One is the recommendation to always dive with a buddy. Another was to use weight belts that have a safety release. The early weight belts had no locking buckle, only a straight strap on one end that fit into what was known as a "D" ring. This was a double ring where you threaded the free end through and doubled it back where it could be pulled and the belt released. This same system was also used on the tank harness.
Strap & D Rings Strap through both rings
Strap between both rings Pulled tight with Safety
Finally, please notice the statement "never rise faster than your smallest bubbles". This was the forerunner to the safety stop which was recommended much later.
Once the students had progressed past the mask, fins and snorkel portion of the class, it was time to broaden their knowledge of how to take care of their additional equipment and what to expect under the surface.
Seeing Lake Erie was the closest body of open water, as well as local quarries, they had to be included as some of the locations that might be of interest. For this reason, I put together a short blurb on dry and wet suits and how to care for them.
Keep in mind while inspecting this handout that there were no dry suits similar to what we have access to in today's market. They were constructed of a thin rubber material similar to a bicycle inner tube. Because of this they were prone to cuts.
On the other hand, most of the wet and dry suits had no nylon lining so they had to be powered inside to allow them to be slipped into easily. Then following a dive removal was a bit of a chore.
In addition to the suit information, I also handed out a Marine Environment sheet with the first part covering what happens in the lake during the Summer and Winter in the Northern climate. In addition, a short consideration of ocean awareness followed.
At this point the lectures began to get more heavily into the equipment used in scuba and how to use and care for it.
Some sections to elaborate on are,
3. Protection of the valve was more important back then due to them having the shut off portion directly on top which made it more vulnerable to damage.
6. Not having the sophisticated BCD's of today, the tank harness only consisted of a series of straps that had to be fastened by what is known as a "D" ring connection. It was first threaded through the crotch strap loop and then threaded through the D ring in such a manner so quick release was possible in an emergency. The same system was shown earlier only the weight belt had a heavier strap and D ring.
The other safety lesson, not mentioned here, was to always wear the weight belt over the tank straps to allow the diver to drop their weights in an emergency situation.
8. The five-year rule for tank testing was in effect from the beginning following the rules of all similar pressure tanks used in other professions such as welding. No yearly visual was in effect then.
Under regulator maintenance,
2. Mention of stretching out the hose and shaking was the norm seeing we were all using double hose regulators at that time.
Communications underwater was another topic covered in the course. In this area I brought some of the signals I had learned from the other members of the Cleveland club along with a few of my own.
Most of these I still use today and what I consider are the basic ones for diving. I have run into other divers that communicate with additional signals almost to the point of communicating with a deaf person. If you dive with the same person most of the time you will have no problem working out a communication system.
As the course went on, we covered the dangers of staying too long underwater, coming up too fast and breath holding.
Of course, we went over the no decompression tables and had a workshop on how to calculate multiple dives. I had a complete copy of the Navy Diving Manual due to my older brother being in the Navy and having access to this publication. It was a great source for material some of which I was not aware of.
Now, I have mentioned a time or two that we were located in the Northern part of Ohio on the border of Lake Erie. Even so, the students I was teaching would, at some time, get sick of diving in the Great Lakes and wander into one of the many oceans this planet has to offer. For that reason, even though I had not been in an ocean myself yet, I thought it my duty to gather information on this environment and deliver it to prepare them going from fresh to salt water.
All during the length of the course, it was probably the pool sessions that carried the most weight with me over the classroom sessions. After all, some people perform very well with recall on written tests but they can't hide their water capabilities.
Following is a very bad photo, one of the students took, when I was evaluating them in a pool session along with the rating form, I used to make notes on my observations.
OK, now for the final test questions that I thought would best evaluate what the students absorbed of the lectures and written handouts.
Page 1.
Page 2.
I'm sure some divers out there will immediately compare what is on these two pages to what you had to go through in order to gain your certification. Having worked at a dive shop, after retirement, I know some areas may be easier and some harder but it really doesn't matter as long as you learned to dive safely.
After I had taught this course for two years, the YMCA announced they were coming out with their own certification course and if I wanted to continue teaching it would be necessary for me to go through their instructor certification. In addition, it would cost me $50 to enter the class.
I told the Y that if they wanted me to continue teaching it would cost them $50 because I was not using the membership, they gave me and I was not getting paid for teaching. Needless to say, I took the course and taught for the next 5 years until my family life and work schedule dictated, I could no longer continue.
Once I had the official title it gave me the ability to award the passing students the official certification cards of the YMCA.
I was proud to have contributed to the advancement of the sport in what was the first organization to offer Scuba certification nationwide.
In later years my certification card, being made on a cardboard base, began to get dog eared and really rough looking. For this reason, I contacted the home office of the YMCA to inquire if they could issue me a new card.
When the woman that answered asked me when I was certified and I told her 1962 she came back with “our records don’t go back that far”. She then asked if I had a copy of my certificate I was given when I completed the course. I told her I did so she requested I send her a copy and she would issue a card based on that.
So here it is! Of course, they could not issue an active instructor card after so many years, due to the rules changed to require an instructor to re-certify after so many years. This didn’t bother me a bit seeing I now was in possession of a more durable card that verifies my accomplishment.
Unfortunately, the YMCA ended their Scuba teaching program in 1988 ending a 29-year career in teaching the sport.
I hope you have enjoyed a trip back in history of just how Scuba certification came to be and what it did to safely advance the sport to the extent it is today.
I was proud to be a part of introducing a number of students to a sport as well as giving them the proper training I had to learn by working with other divers who brought me along a safe path to the underwater world.
Note: If my readers have any diving subject they wish me to expand on, relate my experiences or offer my opinion on, please don’t hesitate to contact me at scubageorge2@gmail.com and I’ll try to do my best to answer you direct or construct a blog to cover the subject matter.
George