Overview

In the summer of 1930, William Beebe (1877-1962) and Otis Barton climbed into a cramped steel sphere attached by cable to a crane and were lowered over the side of a ship to a depth of over 1,000 feet (305 m)—at that time, the deepest dive ever made. Later dives brought them to a record depth of over 3,000 feet (914 m) a few years later. Beebe's vivid descriptions of the exotic life he saw sparked public interest, and, over the years, more deep-sea vessels were built, including free-moving vessels such as Trieste and Alvin. These vessels, and others that have explored the ocean depths, have returned enormous amounts of information to the surface, completely changing our view of life at great depths in the sea.

Background

The earliest record we have of any sort of underwater...