After returning home from service in the
US Navy during World War II, he became the first resident of
Maine to purchase an
aqualung, designed by
Jacques Cousteau. Waterman graduated from
Dartmouth College, where he studied with Robert Frost, in 1946 with a degree in English. He began his SCUBA diving career in the Bahamas where he owned and operated a diving charter business from 1954 until 1958. His big break came in 1965 when he filmed a year-long family trip to
Tahiti.
National Geographic purchased the rights to the work and showed it on television. He was a producer and photographer on the 1971 film
Blue Water, White Death which was the first cinematic filming of the great white shark. Waterman was the subject of a
Discovery Channel biographical special titled
The Man Who Loves Sharks. Working with his son, he won the first father and son Emmy for the
National Geographic Explorer production
Dancing With Stingrays. His television credits include
The American Sportsman (1965),
The Bermuda Depths (1978), and
The Explorers (1973) and film credits include
The Deep (1977) and
Jaws of Death (1977). Waterman won five
Emmy Awards for his work on underwater films and TV programs. He also wrote essays for
Ocean Realm magazine. In 2013, Waterman took his last dive in the
Cayman Islands at the age of 90. ==See also==