Jacques Cousteau

25:14When it is shown to a room full of admirals in Toulon, they immediately recognize the military potential of the Aqualung and place an order for ten of them.

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26:12Red Bull Summer All Day Play. Red Bull gives you wings. Visit redbull.com slash brightsummer ahead to learn more. See you this summer. In May 1945, the war in Europe finally comes to an end. But the celebrations don't last long for Cousteau Because shortly afterwards he receives news That his brother, Pack, has been arrested as a Nazi collaborator Pierre was born four years earlier than Jacques But the big divergence came during the war Because Pack effectively became a German collaborator And he supported the Nazis Wrote a lot of propagandist stuff for them And after the war, Pack was actually condemned to death As a collaborator But I think Cousteau had some influence and managed to get that death sentence commuted to life imprisonment.

27:03And Pack in the end stayed 10-12 years in prison and then was released. And I suspect that they had very little to do with each other after that point. So you couldn't have had a greater contrast between the two wars that the two brothers fought.

27:24The brothers largely remain estranged until Pax's death a decade or so later, in 1958. Meanwhile, not long after the war, the French Navy creates what it calls the Underwater Research Group, to teach sailors to dive. Talier, as the most senior officer, is the commander, and Cousteau is his deputy. Largely left to their own devices, the group is tasked with clearing French harbors of mines, and sunken wrecks. Yet there is still time for filmmaking and for satisfying their growing curiosity about the underwater world. The men egg each other on, attempting to break new records despite the known risks.

28:02In terms of the medical effects of being deep, that had actually been discovered back in Victorian times particularly when they were building tunnels under rivers. You often used to have to pressurize the tunnel while you were building it to stop water seeping in from the outside. And they knew that if workmen worked for a day down under pressure, then they just brought them up. The workers would often complain of stiffness in their joints and things like that. And that effectively is what you call getting the bends, which is where you work under pressure, nitrogen dissolves into your blood, into your joints, and when you come up, you have to come up slowly to let that excess gas escape from you.

28:43So to some extent, Gusteau was working with long-established medical principles. But when you go into keeping people underwater for a long time, and how deep can you dive, then they were definitely pushing on. In 1947, attempting a new depth record, the team loses one of their own. A diver called Maurice Fagg reaches 385 feet, but loses consciousness underwater. It is the Aqualung's first fatality. Yet despite the tragedy, demand for Cousteau's invention continues to grow. Before long, the Aqualung is being sold not only across Europe, but also in the United States and Canada. With publicity building, Cousteau hires his father as a business agent.

29:30When Cousteau Sr. helps set up a screening of his son's short films, a magazine editor makes inquiries about the Frenchman who can breathe underwater. water. The resulting seven page feature in Life magazine, featuring the divers dramatic photos of sharks, reaches more than 10 million readers. A week later, Cousteau accepts an offer from Universal Studios of$11 ,000 for his first four documentaries. But for that, he needs a vessel of his own, and soon the perfect solution is found. The wooden hulled Calypso began its life during the Second World War as a British minesweeper. He didn't buy it himself.

30:10It was a billionaire from the Guinness family who actually leased it to him for one euro for a year. And then at the end of it, he acquired it completely for himself. And he fitted it out as the perfect expedition diving vessel. He modified bits of the structure, but he made it a place where he could roam the world with his team of divers. He went from Antarctica to Tasmania to the Mississippi River. The Cousteaus remortgage their house to help renovate the Calypso, and Simone sells her jewelry to raise more funds. Cousteau refits the vessel for exploration, adding a bulbous bow with eight viewing windows for filming underwater.

30:57He takes three years' leave from the Navy and assembles a team of divers, including Dumas. On the evening before they depart, the crew gather around the small galley table for dinner. Their captain, Cousteau, makes a toast to their new adventure, closing with his motto, Il faut aller voir. We must go and see for ourselves. On November 24, 1951, the Calypso sets out on its first expedition to the Red Sea, the narrow stretch of water between northeastern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Cousteau cheerfully describes it as a nice hot bathtub full of sharks. In its warm waters, the crew encounter dazzling coral reefs and identify previously unknown species.

31:44The following year, he discovers a 2 ,000-year-old Greek shipwreck off the coast of Marseille, from which he recovers ancient ceramics. He also now establishes the French Office of Undersea Technology in Toulon, a center dedicated to inventing and improving diving equipment and underwater technology. With the help of Dumas, he also begins writing about his adventures. The resulting book, The Silent World, becomes a New York Times bestseller. The Silent World really was the book that launched Jacques into the public sphere, into public recognition. When that was published in 1953, it was an international bestseller.

32:23It sold millions of copies and became a phenomenon, and it really lifted Cousteau into the realms. The success of The Silent World allows the Calypso's voyages to become more ambitious. The crew ventures into the Persian Gulf, where some of the time is spent surveying the seabed for oil companies. It is demanding work, but pays for what will become the first full-length underwater film in colour. The film showcases the treasures of the ocean Porpoises leaping through the waves And Jojo, a large group of fish who loves to be fed scraps But it also captures the camaraderie of the men As they play cards and share bottles of wine Nicknamed the Shepherdess, Simone is adored by the crew And the Cousteau's sons join their parents on their holidays from boarding school In 1956, the resulting film, also titled The Silent World, wins the Palme d 'Or The highest prize at the Cannes Film Festival As well as the Oscar for Best Documentary But the film, which includes footage of the crew blowing up coral reefs and harpooning fish Is not without its critics Christo was a visionary, but he also had his moments of controversy The Silent World as a scene in it which is really quite disturbing now, where the calypso is ploughing through the ocean and it comes across a pod of sperm whales.

33:51Unfortunately, totally by accident, they hit one of the calf sperm whales and that sperm whale was injured. And shortly after, some sharks came in. They were attracted by the blood coming from the sperm whale and they ended up killing the sperm whale baby. And at that point, the Cousteau team decided that the sharks were the killers and there are shots of them hauling these sharks on board Calypso and just basically clubbing them to death. Despite the controversies, the film propels Cousteau to worldwide fame. With an innate sense of charm and style, he is a natural in front of the camera. The French people bring elegance and élan to what they do.

34:36They do things in a different way. He was a wonderful showman, he was a wonderful visionary, but it had a real knack of knowing what the public wanted. In the late 1950s, Cousteau takes on the directorship of Monaco's Oceanographic Museum and helps develop a revolutionary underwater vehicle nicknamed the Diving Saucer for its resemblance to the classic UFO shape. But soon, his busy mind turns to greater challenges. He begins to imagine a world where humans can live underwater and sets out to make it a reality. There were two big frontiers through the 60s. That was going to space with NASA and that was going underwater.

35:19And while the moon mission was the big aim for NASA, Cousteau was the visionary who took things into the underwater realm. In 1962, he spoke about this being the dawn of what he called Homo Aquaticus. And he actually envisioned people living under the sea, partly as humans, but there was also experiments into, for example, they flooded the lungs of mice with super oxygenated water and found that these mice could live underwater no problem. So Khrushchev, I think, had this idea of let's look at a different form of humans, a different way of human beings actually living underwater.

36:02The first step in this ambitious journey is a project called Corn Shelf One. It is a watertight capsule the size of a large bedroom, which sits at around 33 feet below the surface of the coast of Marseille. The aquanauts, as they are known, are under daily medical supervision, and with air pumped in, they enter and exit through a hole in the floor, known as the moon pool. The air pressure inside the chamber prevents the water from flooding in. And it was just a very simple cylinder which was put into the water in the Mediterranean down to a depth of 10 meters and two people lived in it for a week So he decided to take that to the next stage and he designed Corn Shelf 2 which was a much bigger thing that was really like a village underneath the sea In the Red Sea of the coast of Sudan Corn Shelf 2 features two separate residences At 100 feet, the deep cabin is home to just two aquanauts for a week.

37:06The bigger habitat, close to the surface at 33 feet, is called Starfish House. Taking its name from its shape, it is a two-story structure with everything from air conditioning to sun lamps to a garage for the diving saucer. There, five aquanauts live and work for a month. Air is pumped from the Italian cargo ship Rizaldo, though the smaller Calypso ferries supplies from the shore. And visitors from the Rizaldo can pop to the underwater village for a visit.

37:44It is July 1963, a swelteringly hot day. Off the coast of Sudan, Simone Cousteau stands on the deck of Rizaldo preparing to dive. She shifts her weight under the cylinder on her back. After getting a final once-over from a crew member, with her fins in one hand, she begins to descend the ladder on the side of the ship. When the water reaches her chest, she rinses out her mask, pulls it on, and fits her mouthpiece, taking a testing breath. Then, slipping on her fins, she surrenders to the cool water.

38:21Immediately the noises of the world above disappear, replaced by just the steady rhythm of her own breathing through the aqualun. Kicking away, she begins her descent. The Red Sea opens in astonishing clarity. The reef below rises to meet her, a garden in motion, with coral growing in multiple shapes and forms. Every inch is vivid with life. Antheas flicker past in clouds of orange, and a pair of brilliant butterfly fish glide by. Below her, the continental shelf dips away into deeper blue. She exhales and lets herself sink a little more, the pressure tightening briefly around her ears before releasing as she equalizes.

39:08She swims on, glancing at her compass. Not far now. At last, she glimpses the vivid yellow of Starfish House, an airtight capsule standing on stilt-like legs on the seabed, bubbles streaming from its air supply. Letting herself into the cage-like structure at the basement, Simone climbs a ladder through the circular moon pool, where water gives way to air. There, as she hauls herself onto the platform, her movements grow heavier with a return of gravity. A half-dressed diver greets her and steps in to help, unbuckling her tank and easing the weight from her shoulders. After rolling down her wetsuit, she heads next door to the living area.

39:56There she finds the men sitting around a small table, with cigarettes in their hands, wearing only shorts to keep cool. After exchanging greetings and pausing to tickle their green parrot under the beak, she pinches a smoke from one of them. and slips through to the kitchen. Through a small window, movement catches her eye. A trigger fish hovers just outside, watching them. The cook tells her he's trained it to come to the moon pool for food. When they wander over, it's already there waiting for them. They drop a few scraps into the water and watch it snap them up. Simone laughs. Calling through to the men, she asks them to send a message up to the Rizaldo that she'll stay the night in one of the visitor berths.

40:44After all, why would she choose the surface over this magical underwater paradise?

40:59With footage taken from his extraordinary habitats, Cousteau makes a documentary called World Without Sun. It airs just before Christmas in 1964 and wins him his second Oscar. By now, the oil companies are eager to learn how much deeper humans can live. So, a year later, Corn Shelf 3 is launched. A spherical structure over 300 feet deep, it is anchored just off the coast of France. Though the six men have comfortable lodgings, they are breathing a mixture 98 % helium and 2 % oxygen, which affects their voices to such a degree that conversation is rendered almost impossible. Their senses of taste and smell are also dulled.

41:47Though the experiment provides valuable insights into deep-sea living, it is costly and complex. In April 1966, CBS airs a one-hour TV special on Corn Shelf 3, which is narrated by the film star Orson Welles. But a producer on the documentary decides there's more mileage in Cousteau's adventures, and not long after, ABC Television acquires the first series of The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau for$4.2 million. The first episode, Sharks, premieres in 1968, and features footage of one of Cousteau's divers riding a 60-foot whale shark. Though the series is a hit, Captain Cousteau and his crew of gung-ho adventurers sometimes take things a little too far.

42:35He did one or two things which must have been debatable even at the time. I remember one of the episodes of the undersea world of Jacques Cousteau where he took two young fur seal pups from, I think, a rookery in South Africa and took them on door to the Calypso with this idea of seeing how they would adapt to being with humans, which is a mad idea and it never worked. They just kept biting people and they had to be kept in cages all the time. And I think eventually they were let loose in another part of the world where, to be honest, their chances of survival were tiny. Now that's the sort of thing that, you know, even at the time there must have been people thought this is a mad idea, Shaq, you know, it'll make a storyline through one of your programmes but let's not go there.

43:17On the other hand, it was transmitted at the time and it's more an indication of the sort of ethics of filmmaking at the time, which have moved on since then. So it's that whole question of judging someone by the historical standards of the day, let's say. The popular television show runs for eight years, ending in 1976, by which time the tall, thin Frenchman in his trademark knitted red hat, together with his plucky crew, is known all over the world.

44:22We'll be right back. June 30th. Terms at aka.ms slash college PC. Zootopia 2 has come home to Disney+. Let's go! Get ready for a new case. We're gonna crack this case and prove we're the greatest partners of all time! New friends. You are... Gary the Snake. And your last name? The Snake. Dream team. In new habitats. Zootopia has a secret reptile population. You can watch the record-breaking phenomenon at home. You're clearly working it. Zootopia 2. Now available on Disney Plus Rated PG. In the late 60s and early 70s, Cousteau and his divers begin to notice a deterioration in the world's oceans.

45:04I think it's easy to forget just how pristine the Mediterranean was when Cousteau was born, and between the wars, before it all began to get industrialized around the edge and things. So Cousteau was very aware of the riches in the Mediterranean, And then he was one of the first people to go and explore places like the Red Sea and further abroad. So he saw the oceans as a lovely period in history. And if you can draw a parallel between Cousteau and David Attenborough, for example, anyone who has seen the world the way that they have since the mid-50s to today, you cannot help but become aware of the human influence on the oceans.

45:45In 1973, Cousteau founds a non-profit organization, the Cousteau Society, to protect the oceans and restore marine habitats. With offices in New York and Los Angeles and the French branch L 'Equipe Cousteau in Paris, it offers membership to the general public. Jacques serves as chairman, with his son Philippe as vice-president. Philippe, from early on, was definitely going to be Cousteau's heir and successor. and the pair of them were very, very close. Although they did have some heated arguments, Philippe became more involved with the making of the films. The undersea world of Jacques Cousteau became more of a character in them.

46:27It is in part Philippe's influence that helps Cousteau develop a stronger focus on the environment. Together he and his father speak to governments and the general public about the urgent need to reduce pollution and protect the planet. Cousteau's life is now one of a busy international star Though he is not always strong at managing his finances His charismatic personality enables him to continue attracting funding for his work I think he had a wicked sense of fun A wicked sense of humour And he wasn't knowingly cruel to anyone He just liked to be the centre of things He knew that filmically he had to be the centre of things was because that was what people expected.

47:11Sometimes he might just be on set or be on vacation for one or two days, then he's off again to some conference talking about things. And so those who knew him well on the ship, they maybe had a wise smile to themselves, well, here comes the star helicoptering him for a couple of days. But that's what happens on many, many films today. In 1977, he receives an environmental prize from the United Nations in recognition of his contributions to conservation. But two years later, tragedy strikes.

47:45While his wife is pregnant with their second child, Philippe crashes, landing his seaplane on the Tagus River in Portugal. Though the others on board survive, Philippe's body is swept away by the water and is not found for three days. Utterly heartbroken, Cousteau can't bring himself to identify his son's body, and he sends Philippe's older brother Jean-Michel to do it. Philippe is buried at sea, 25 miles off the Portuguese coast. Afterwards, Cousteau speaks to reporters about the importance of finding someone to continue his work. But he never talks about his beloved son in public again. Finding a way through his grief, he returns to exploration, filming in the Amazon and the Mississippi and retracing the roots of great explorers such as Christopher Columbus.

48:38Simone retreats to her beloved Calypso, spending long periods alone as the couple live increasingly separate lives. But Jacques begins a lengthy affair with a woman named Francine Triplé, a young flight attendant he met during his travels. The relationship deepens, and he has a secret second family with her. In 1990, shortly after being diagnosed with an aggressive cancer, Simone passes away Her ashes are scattered over the Sea of Monaco But Cousteau does not leave it long before marrying Francine A move which creates an irreparable rift with his surviving son

49:19Yet despite the fractures in his personal life Cousteau's passion for protecting the oceans does not fade, even in his 80s When companies begin discussing plans to mine Antarctica for oil and minerals, Cousteau begins a worldwide campaign to stop them. He meets with political leaders and collects more than a million signatures on an international petition. To raise awareness, he makes a film, Lilliput in Antarctica, traveling to the icy continent with six children from different countries. His efforts contribute to the establishment of a lasting ban on mining on the continent, and its designation as a place of scientific research.

50:02Continuing with his mission, he advocates for every child's right to inherit an uncontaminated planet, and eventually the wording of his Bill of Rights for Future Generations is approved by the UNESCO General Conference. It is Cousteau's final triumph.

50:20As if foreshadowing his decline, the Calypso sinks in 1996 in Singapore in a collision with a barge. One of his team manages to salvage the wrecked boat to bring her home. But before she reaches France, Cousteau suffers a heart attack and dies on June the 25th, 1997, at the age of 87 in Paris. By the end of his life, he has been awarded every honor his home country can bestow. At his funeral at the Cathedral of Notre Dame, President Jacques Chirac leads a thousand mourners, calling Cousteau an enchanter who represented the defense of nature, modern adventure, and the dreamy part at the heart of all of us.

51:05Jacques Cousteau reshaped humanity's relationship with the sea. Through his pioneering films, inventions, and expeditions, he brought the hidden world of the oceans into public view. As a leading voice for marine conservation, he helped to protect the fragile environment he had spent his life exploring. Though his early work was marked by some controversial decisions, and his later years by his complicated personal life, Cousteau's enduring achievement was to make the oceans not just a place of discovery, but a cause worth defending. He embodies adventure under the sea and he is still the name that comes to mind when so many people talk about where they got their inspiration from the sea.

51:49Jacques Cousteau will come up and it's because his films are still out there on the internet, his books are still out there and available and because his principles are stronger than ever about the need to look after the oceans.

52:11Next time on Short History, we'll bring you a short history of punk. Punk plays a pretty long game, I think, in terms of the impact that, if we're talking in the British context, sex pistols have, just in terms of inspiring a whole generation of musicians to come up with really constantly evolving and interesting and exciting forms of music and musical presentation. It opened up a space for lots of people who previously probably wouldn't have had the opportunity to do creative things and to do creative things in ways that fundamentally changed the culture of Britain and the world. That's next time.

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