Puget Sound Voices: scuba pioneer
Vern Morgas remembers the early days of scuba diving in Puget Sound.

Prior to the 1940s, if you wanted to explore the waters beneath Puget Sound, you might have used a Jules Verne-style diving suit, complete with giant helmet and air tubes. Either that or you held your breath.
All that changed when Jacques Cousteau co-developed the Aqua-Lung and ushered in the age of modern scuba. Divers began exploring marine waters worldwide, and it wasn't long before a few intrepid souls began venturing into Puget Sound. Vern Morgas of Shelton, Washington is 87 years old and was one of the very first.
He did it without much fanfare. His recollection was that the water was a little murky in Hammersley Inlet where he made his first dives in the early 1950s, but that the spearfishing was good. “I didn’t think of it as being a pioneer,” he says. “To me, it was just so much fun.”
Listen to audio recordings
"First dives"
"They were shooting at Orcas"