The Board of Directors of the Historical Diving Society (HDS) USA is pleased to announce that Steve and Kristine Barsky are the recipients of the 2008 HDS E.R. Cross Award. E.R. Cross was an influential commercial diver and an instrumental part of the forming of the HDS in America. His career encompassed all aspects of diving. His background was in U.S.N. diving and he came to international prominence by his operation of the Sparling School of Deep Sea Diving during the late 1940s and early 1950s. He authored several technical and diving safety books and wrote the Technifacts/Crosstalk column in Skin Diver Magazine, which ran for 36 years. His service to diving has been recognized by every major industry award and the HDS keeps his memory alive through the annual presentation of the E.R. Cross Award. He was an active member of the HDS Advisory Board, and passed away in 2000.
In making the announcement the Board noted the Barskys' long association with the Society and their lengthy record of volunteer support. In addition to their volunteer work, Kristine was a former Recording Secretary for the Society and Steve was a two-term Director and also an editor.
The Barskys have a combined 81 years experience in diving and their involvement with the Society dates back to 1992, the year of its founding. All at the Society congratulate Steve and Kristine on this very well earned award.
Kristine Barsky is a senior marine biologist and diver with the California Department of Fish and Game. She holds a bachelor's degree in biology from Humboldt State University with a minor in botany. An avid diver since, 1972, Kristine's diving experience includes dives along the entire California coast, Australia, the Bahamas, Honduras, Mexico, Hawaii, Chuuk, and Palau amassing over 4,500 dives. Kristine worked on the Department of Fish and Game's abalone project for eight years, logging over 250 dives annually. She is an experienced dry suit diver, has used most full-face masks, is certified with the Drager Semi-Closed Circuit rebreather, and is a NAUl assistant instructor. Her advice is regularly sought by other biologists and divers in the Department due to her years of experience in the field and with the organization. Kristine is currently the Department's senior marine invertebrate specialist, dealing with the management of lobsters, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, spot prawn, and variety of other species.
Kristine has served on the Board of Directors of the Historical Diving Society USA as well as the American Academy of Underwater Sciences. If Kristine looks familiar, it's probably because you've seen her photo many times. As an underwater model, Kristine's image has appeared in numerous diving catalogs, books, and ads, including those for Aqua Lung, Diving Unlimited International, Force Fins, Viking, Poseidon, and Zeagle Systems. Kristine has authored numerous scientific reports that have appeared in peer-reviewed journals and has presented papers at many scientific conferences. As an avid photographer and video camera person she has been the producer for six video projects including California Marine Life Identification and Drysuit Diving in Depth. She also co-authored the books Careers in Diving, and California Lobster Diving.
Steve Barsky started diving in 1965 in Los Angeles County, and became a scuba instructor in 1970. His first employment in the industry was with a dive store in Los Angeles and he went on to work for almost 10 years in the retail dive store environment. Steve attended the University of California at Santa Barbara, where he earned a Masters Degree in 1976 in Human Factors Engineering. This has greatly helped in his thorough understanding of diving equipment design and use.
His master's thesis was one of the first to deal with the use of underwater video systems in commercial diving. His work was a pioneering effort at the time (1976) and was used by the Navy in developing applications for underwater video systems. His background includes being a commercial diver, working in the offshore oil industry in the North Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and South America. He worked as both an air diving supervisor and a mixed gas saturation diver, making working dives down to 580 feet. In 1978, Steve joined the staff of the Florida PADI College in Jacksonville, Florida. As Training Director, he was responsible for open water training and screening applicants for admission into the College. This program was one of the first private extended scuba instructor training programs in the country, after which all current programs of this type are modeled.
Steve was marketing manager for Viking America, Inc., and served in a similar position at Diving Systems International, working very closely with Bev Morgan, and Society co-founder Skip Dunham. He has served on the Board of Directors of the HDS, Friends of Channel Islands National Park, and is currently on the board of Ship to Reefs International. An accomplished and prolific writer, Steve's work has been published in The Journal of Diving History, H20ps, Sea Technology, Underwater USA, Skindiver, Offshore Magazine, Emergency, Fire Engineering, Dive Training Magazine, Searchlines, Sources, Undersea Biomedical Reports, Santa Barbara Magazine, Selling Scuba, Scuba Times, UnderWater Magazine, and many other publications. He is the author or lead author on 18 different diving texts, including books for Dive Rescue, SSI, NAUI, and SDI. Steve has taught numerous workshops on contaminated water diving, dry suits, small boat diving, and other diving topics.
In 1989 Steve formed Marine Marketing and Consulting, providing market research, marketing plans, consulting, newsletter, promotional articles, technical manuals, and other services for the diving and ocean industry. He has consulted to Drager, Aqua Lung/U.S. Divers Co., Inc, Zeagle Systems, Inc., Diving Unlimited Intnl., Diving Systems Intnl., DAN, NAUI, Trelleborg-Viking, and numerous other companies. He also investigates diving accidents and serves as an expert witness in dive accident litigation.
In 1999,Steve and Kristine formed Hammerhead Press to publish high quality diving books. Hammerhead Press (www.hammerheadpress.com) is a subsidiary of the Carcharodon Corporation. In 2001, they formed Hammerhead Video to produce underwater films.
For more information on the Historical Diving Society USA, visit their web site at www.hds.org.