Review
20,000 Jobs Under The Sea is an essential book for anyone involved in commercial or professional diving. In fact, it is a good book for anyone involved in or interested in diving of any kind. This excellent book explains diving history and fills in gaps that I have wondered about for many years. Like his work during his long commercial diving career, Torrance Parker has done an outstanding job on the book. The research, photographs, and printing are first class. If you value diving history this is a 'must have' book. -- Bev Morgan. Chairman, Diving Systems International. Supplier of diving helmets to the U. S. Navy
20,000 Jobs Under the Sea is spectacular! Your use of the custom artwork to illustrate various stories, techniques and gear makes it possible for the lay person to understand the history, development and adventure of commercial diving. -- Don Walsh, pilot of bathyscaphe Trieste on world record deep-ocean dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench --- a descent of nearly seven miles
This book is no less than the long-awaited definitive work on the early history of diving in the USA. It is authoritatively written by Torrance R. Parker, himself one of the most accomplished divers in the world today. -- John Bevan, Chairman, Historical Diving Society
This is a fantastic book. I am recommending to Phillips management that they secure one or more copies for their libraries and offshore officers. -- W. A. "Bob" Roberts. Retired Executive Vice President of the Phillips Petroleum Company
20,000 Jobs Under the Sea is spectacular! Your use of the custom artwork to illustrate various stories, techniques and gear makes it possible for the lay person to understand the history, development and adventure of commercial diving. -- Don Walsh, pilot of bathyscaphe Trieste on world record deep-ocean dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench --- a descent of nearly seven miles
This book is no less than the long-awaited definitive work on the early history of diving in the USA. It is authoritatively written by Torrance R. Parker, himself one of the most accomplished divers in the world today. -- John Bevan, Chairman, Historical Diving Society
This is a fantastic book. I am recommending to Phillips management that they secure one or more copies for their libraries and offshore officers. -- W. A. "Bob" Roberts. Retired Executive Vice President of the Phillips Petroleum Company
From the Publisher
Commercial diving is often glamorized in fiction, movies, and television. Divers are depicted as hairy-chested men, rugged individuals doing extremely dangerous work, and so on. To some degree this reputation is deserved, but it does not accurately represent the true and full story of the diving profession. Few books have been written that tell the real story of the men and jobs that helped build America's ports, harbors, dams, and other underwater structures. Whether a person lives in St. Louis or San Francisco, chances are that a commercial diver has helped make his or her life better by helping construct a power dam, reservoir, or dock facility for cargo ships. The author of this book, 20,000 Jobs Under the Sea, was a commercial diver for nearly a half century and can tell this story from the inside out. In addition, because of his work with other divers, he was able to get access to their stories and photographs in a way that would have been difficult for an outsider.
Torrance Parker focuses his book on the history of commercial diving in southern California since the late 1800s. However, the book is in fact a profile of how commercial diving helped coastal development everywhere man has moved to establish centers of trade and commerce.
