Shipwrecks and other discoveries with Jerry Guyer
Leave the planning to us!
Research and discovery of the marine history including shipwrecks in the Milwaukee harbor area.
Way back in my high school years a classmate, Greg Goura, told me about his scuba diving training at Brookfield Academe. I called and signed up for classes the next day. Cost was $79.00 for a NAUI course with a $79.00 credit towards the purchase of your tank and regulator. Back in 1964 scuba training included a few laps of swimming and lifesaving followed by an introduction to the latest double hose regulator. No submersible pressure gages or buoyancy control vests in this class. You depended on your j valve tank and very close weighting to make a safe dive! Check out dives not a part of training either. My first dive was solo in the Wisconsin River during fast spring current with zero visibility- my diving adventure had begun. The next four years were spent at college with only a few dives in Northern Wisconsin Lakes. In 1969 I started teaching High School in Milwaukee and assisting with the YMCA Scuba classes, Instructor Claire Gendron was running a 13 week Scuba Course at the Downtown YMCA. I also took an ice diving class from Dr Dick Boyd in Madison Wisconsin at Scuba Lab. By 1977 I was ready for my YMCA instructor course up in Green Bay Wisconsin. In 1979 my wife Sandy and I bought a dive store in Milwaukee- Pirates Cove Diving Inc. During the summer of 1980 we rented a cabin cruiser called the "Sea Weed" for shipwreck charters.
In 1981 Gil Kazmerick, one of our diving customers came to me with a plan to buy a large steel boat and run shipwreck diving charters. He had found a boat in Port Washington in pieces out back of a boat storage yard. We formed a partnership and started working to rebuild the old "Bert S" a commercial fishing boat used by Smith Brothers Fish Restaurant. After many days of cleaning, sand blasting, painting, and rebuilding we had our new boat ready for the transport to the water in downtown Port Washington. The launch went well and we fueled up for the trip to Milwaukee and our new dock in the KK River. Gil and I arrived in Milwaukee about midnight and our first docking ended with a big splash as Gil went for an unplanned swim in the river. As I shouted to him to stop playing around he replied with something I am not going to print here! Our new charter boat was called the "GJ Venture" and we did run many charters for the next 4 years. We also found out the US Coast Guard had many rules about running charters on Lake Michigan. Time to do a lot of studying and going for the Captains License from the US Coast Guard. Gil and I had many adventures on the " GJ Venture" with charters every weekend and extra diving ourselves during the week.
In January 1985 I bought out Gils half of the boat and I started looking for another boat. On March 16, 1985 I traded in the "GJ Venture" to Butch Klopp in Port Washington Wisconsin and I bought his boat the "Hallelujah". After a few months getting the new boat ready and changing its name to the "Len-Der" I ran the first charter April 13, with 5 divers and Mike Weinmann crew.
I named my new boat after a good friend and diver Lenard Derse who died of cancer shortly after I got the boat.
