Andreas Buchwald Rechnitzer was born in on
Escondido, California, on November 30, 1924. During
World War II he graduated from the
United States Naval Reserve Midshipmen's School at
Fort Schuyler, New York, in 1945, and was commissioned as an
ensign in the
US Naval Reserve. He returned to college after the war and earned a
Bachelor of Science degree from
Michigan State University in 1947 and a
Master of Science from the
University of California at Los Angeles in 1951. He wrote his 1955
Doctor of Philosophy thesis on
A serological approach to the systematics of the viviparous sea-perches, family Embiotocidae under the supervision of
Carl Hubbs at the
Scripps Institution of Oceanography. With Hubbs he discovered the
striped yellow fish that served as the logo of
Birch Aquarium. In 1950, while still a graduate student, Rechnitzer and Conrad (Connie) Limbaugh devised the first
SCUBA diving training program for ocean scientists, although the term SCUBA had not yet been coined. After graduating from Scripps, Rechnitzer became the Deep Submergence Research Program Coordinator and Oceanographer at the Naval Electronics Laboratory in
San Diego. In this role he was instrumental in persuading the US Navy to purchase the
bathyscape Trieste, from Swiss physicist
Auguste Piccard. In the
Trieste he made a descent to , a record at the time. He was the scientist in charge of
Project Nekton in 1960, during which the
Triete entered the
Challenger Deep, the deepest surveyed point in the world's oceans, and dived to . For this he received the
Navy Distinguished Civilian Service Award from President
Dwight D. Eisenhower. He then went to
Rockwell International, where he was in charge of the development of the Beaver IV submersible. He is the only person to have won the NOGI award three times. He was made an honorary citizen of the city of
San Diego and an honorary life member of the
National Geographic Society. He was the Diego Chamber of Commerce's Outstanding Man of the Year in 1960 and 1961. ==Death==