Dan Yaccarino - The Fantastic Undersea Life of Jacques Cousteau

Copyright 2009 by Dan Yaccarino

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Dragonfly Books, an imprint of Random House Childrens Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Childrens Books, New York, in 2009.

Dragonfly Books with the colophon is a registered trademark of Random House, Inc.

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The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition of this work as follows:

Yaccarino, Dan.

The fantastic undersea life of Jacques Cousteau / by Dan Yaccarino.

p. cm.

eISBN: 978-0-375-98755-7

[1. Cousteau, Jacques YvesJuvenile literature. 2. OceanographersFranceBiographyJuvenile literature.]

I. Title. GC30.C68Y33 2009 551.46092dc22 [B] 2008004581

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The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.
Jacques-Yves Cousteau

Jacques Cousteau loved the sea. He spent his whole life exploring it. The ocean was the most incredible place hed ever seen, and he wanted to share its beauty with the world.

Man has only to sink beneath the surface and he is free. Buoyed by water, he can fly.

Growing up in France, little Jacques was a weak and sickly boy. Doctors encouraged him to swim to build up his strength. He discovered that he loved the water.

Jacques also loved to tinker and build all sorts of gadgets.

He saved his money and bought a camera to make his own movies, then took it apart to see how it worked.

When he was a young man, Jacques was badly hurt in a car accident. Doctors told him he would have to wear arm braces for the rest of his life, but he refused to accept this. Just as he had done before, he turned to the sea for strength and swam every day in the Mediterranean.

A friend gave him a pair of goggles so that he could see underwater. Those goggles changed his life forever.

Sometimes we are lucky enough to know that our lives have been changed. It happened to me that summers day when my eyes opened to the world beneath the surface of the sea.

Cousteau wanted to stay underwater longer to see even more. The diving suits of his day were heavy and bulky. They didnt allow much freedom of movement, and an air hose tethered the diver to a boat.

Always I rebelled against the limitations imposed by a single breath of air.

So Jacques set about tinkering, fashioning snorkels from things like inner tubes and garden hoses. But they werent good enough.

Cousteau and his engineer friend Emile Gagnan created a breathing apparatus they called the Aqua-Lung. It was the first machine that would let a diver breathe underwater for long periods of time.

I flew without wings.

Now Cousteau was free to truly explore. A silent world opened up to him.

Cousteau wanted to share the amazing beauty of the sea with the world, so he created an airtight cover for his camera.

He made lights to illuminate the seas mysteries, and found ways to film underwater.

It fascinated me to do something that seemed impossible.

Cousteau bought a boat and turned it into his very own floating research lab and film studio. He sailed his beloved Calypso all over the world.

What is a scientist after all? It is a curious man looking through a keyhole, the keyhole of nature, trying to know whats going on.

Cousteau discovered many treasures in the Mediterranean Sea. And it was there that he shot The Silent World, the first full-length, full-color underwater film ever made. It took the world by storm!

The best way to observe a fish is to become a fish.

Cousteaus film gave people their first glimpse of the amazing universe under the waves. Everyone loved what they saw as much as Jacques did, and they wanted to see more.