Post by DavidRitchieWilson on Aug 31, 2006 8:35:29 GMT -8
Just thought I would share some web gleanings about a couple of historical suits, one made by Dunlop and one made for Lillywhites, the London sporting goods store.
Dunlop Aquafort Suits
How one of these suits turned up in the late 1990s
lists.drogon.net/scuba-uk-ndg/archive/scuba-uk/1997/q1/msg00820.html
A diver wearing one of these suits (note the fish icon on the second diver from the left)
www.sharksclub.it/storia/billalecwaltdavid.jpg
A yellow wetsuit in the Aquafort range (see pages 23 and 25)
www.londondiver.com/history/magazine/LondonDiver.2.7.pdf#search=%22aquafort%20suit%22
Lillywhite Suits
My first-edition, 1957 copy of Peter Small's "Your Guide to Underwater Adventure" is a useful authority on many items of diving gear of the 1950s, more particularly because he was one of the few UK-based diving writers prepared to name brand names. On the Lillywhites suit he writes:
Lillywhites diving suit is slightly lighter and "tighter", being designed to take light woollens under it. Also rubber on stockinette, it costs £16 for the full suit, and £14 6s without the hood and bootees (i.e. with neck and ankle seals).
Among the mid-1950s pictures of a photographer called Peter Purdy in a collection hosted by Getty Images, I came across online photographs of a young woman apparently wearing a Lillywhites suit:
tinyurl.com/pm7yk
Wind down to the bottom two rows - the images are entitled "Frogwoman" and "Wetsuit".
What intrigues me about all this is that there are indeed images and descriptions of old gear out there, but uncoordinated. Perhaps what is saddest of all is that companies that made or sold the gear don't have any records online about the equipment.
Dunlop Aquafort Suits
How one of these suits turned up in the late 1990s
lists.drogon.net/scuba-uk-ndg/archive/scuba-uk/1997/q1/msg00820.html
A diver wearing one of these suits (note the fish icon on the second diver from the left)
www.sharksclub.it/storia/billalecwaltdavid.jpg
A yellow wetsuit in the Aquafort range (see pages 23 and 25)
www.londondiver.com/history/magazine/LondonDiver.2.7.pdf#search=%22aquafort%20suit%22
Lillywhite Suits
My first-edition, 1957 copy of Peter Small's "Your Guide to Underwater Adventure" is a useful authority on many items of diving gear of the 1950s, more particularly because he was one of the few UK-based diving writers prepared to name brand names. On the Lillywhites suit he writes:
Lillywhites diving suit is slightly lighter and "tighter", being designed to take light woollens under it. Also rubber on stockinette, it costs £16 for the full suit, and £14 6s without the hood and bootees (i.e. with neck and ankle seals).
Among the mid-1950s pictures of a photographer called Peter Purdy in a collection hosted by Getty Images, I came across online photographs of a young woman apparently wearing a Lillywhites suit:
tinyurl.com/pm7yk
Wind down to the bottom two rows - the images are entitled "Frogwoman" and "Wetsuit".
What intrigues me about all this is that there are indeed images and descriptions of old gear out there, but uncoordinated. Perhaps what is saddest of all is that companies that made or sold the gear don't have any records online about the equipment.
