ROBERT GARDNER -- The Verdict

One day shortly after World War II, I was sitting in the guard tower

at Little Corona beach talking to lifeguard Bob Moore, who later became a

lifeguard captain.

It was a quiet day, and we were the only people on the beach -- until

we spotted a couple of men coming down the hill with a contraption, a

sort of primitive diving bell.

It consisted of an old-fashioned water heater tank, cut off about four

feet from the top. It had holes cut in the side so it would fit over a

person’s shoulders and a piece of glass was inserted in the wall of the

heater to look through. A rubber hose ran from the top to a primitive

compressor that was hand operated, much like handcarts the railroads once

used.

“Someone’s been reading Popular Mechanics,” Bob said.

“This I’ve got to see,” I said.

“I have a feeling we’re going to do more than watch,” Bob replied.

We left the tower and walked over to the two backyard scientists. They

were happy to explain.

One man would put the water heater over his head; the other man would

pump air into the cylinder to keep the water down around the shoulders,

leaving the man in the water heater plenty of air to breathe.

The logic was inescapable.

So that he wouldn’t float away, the diver put on a pair of canvas

boots. Several pounds of lead weights were attached to each boot. He

laced up the boots and carefully tied each with a granny knot.

“Those will keep him down,” I said.

“Permanently,” observed Bob. He had a habit of always looking at the

gloomy side of things.

The diver put the gadget over his head. His buddy began to pump, and

the diver staggered toward the water in those boots, looking like

Frankenstein’s monster with a hangover.

There was no surf, so instead of promptly getting knocked down, he

slogged out to sea, letting out line while his friend worked away at the

compressor.

Bob and I didn’t have to say anything. A disaster was obviously in the

making. We followed the diver, swam past him and looked in the glass

plate. The diver smiled cheerfully at us and kept walking.

The water rose in the former heater. It came to his shoulders ... to

his neck ... to his chin ... to his mouth ... to his nose. Then it went

over his nose and up to his eyes.

His buddy was pumping away manfully, but something was wrong with

their theory. Instead of stopping at the shoulders, the water had reached

the wannabe diver’s eyes, which presented a small but vital problem:

breathing.

The diver was experiencing one of life’s verities. One does not

breathe well with both nose and mouth under water.

The poor guy’s mouth kept opening and closing just like a fish in a

bowl. His eyes began to bug out.

“He’s drowning,” I said.

“I know it,” Bob added, “but I have never seen anyone drown right

before my eyes, eyeball to eyeball. This is very interesting.”

Fortunately, Bob’s humane instincts overcame his scientific curiosity.

He pushed the guy over backward, removed the water tank and the two of us

lifted him off the ocean bottom and dragged him back to the beach.

It wasn’t easy. Those boots weighed a ton.

After the guy gagged out some saltwater, Bob suggested they take their

contrivance home and test it in the bathtub.

They left, and we never saw them again. I don’t know to this day

whether they perfected their machine or drowned at another beach.

* ROBERT GARDNER is a Corona del Mar resident and a former judge. His

column runs Tuesdays.