Historical Figure
Jacques Cousteau
1910–1997
French oceanographer and author (1910–1997)
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Biography
Jacques-Yves Cousteau, was a French naval officer, oceanographer, filmmaker and author. He co-invented the first successful open-circuit self-contained underwater breathing apparatus (SCUBA), called the Aqua-Lung, which assisted him in producing some of the first underwater documentaries.
In Their Own Words (5)
If we go on the way we have, the fault is our greed — if we are not willing — we will disappear from the face of the globe, to be replaced by the insect.
Interview (17 July 1971)} , 1971
The sea is the universal sewer.
Declaring the sea to be "where all kinds of pollution wind up", to the US House Committee on Science and Astronautics (28 January 1971) , 1971
I said that the oceans were sick but they're not going to die. There is no death possible in the oceans — there will always be life — but they're getting sicker every year.
Interview (March 1996)} , 1996
We must plant the sea and herd its animals … using the sea as farmers instead of hunters. That is what civilization is all about — farming replacing hunting.
Interview (17 July 1971); Cited in: Elizabeth Brubaker et al. (2008) Breath of Fresh Air, p. 180 , 2008
Man, of all the animals, is probably the only one to regard himself as a great delicacy.
Octopus and Squid: The Soft Intelligence (1973) , 1973
Timeline
The story of Jacques Cousteau, told in moments.
Co-invents the Aqua-Lung with engineer Emile Gagnan while France is under Nazi occupation. The device lets divers breathe underwater without a tether to the surface. He tests it in the Marne River. It works.
Releases The Silent World. The documentary wins the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Audiences see coral reefs and deep-sea creatures for the first time in color. The ocean stops being an abstraction.
His television series The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau reaches 30 million viewers. He captains the Calypso, a converted minesweeper, across every ocean. He wears a red wool cap. Children across three continents want to be marine biologists.
Dies in Paris at 87. His son Philippe had died in a seaplane crash in 1979 on the Tagus River. His first wife Simone spent 30 years aboard the Calypso and died of cancer two years before him. He'd married his mistress, with whom he'd had two children, six months after Simone's death.
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