Thank you for the kind compliments Doc...but I had some good mentors and assistance along the way and a formal education only goes so far. First of all, three years under the lash and below the tubes as a muck diver on the Virgalona for Capt Moe Molinar is worth a degree or two just by itself. There one will learn how to set up a blow boat and dig a pattern and follow a trail. I recommend it if he is still out there. If you can survive that you can probably work anywhere.
Secondly, John de Bry, although he probably would not like to admit that he spawned a treasure hunter, taught me how to make my first base map and how to survey a site. First it was with the old three armed protractor and a sextant shooting off those old red squares up on the beach and later by GPS and computer after the technology changed. He also taught me how to properly search the bottom, follows trails, identify artifacts and to flip every rock.
Thirdly, for site management skills I have to thank Jim Miller for qualifying me as a field archaeologist an allowing me to manage Jupiter Wreck for three years. Fourth, Conservation skills and techniques were learned via Lou Ullian of Real Eight fame and Doug Armstrong whose book (now available for sale from him on CD) is far more practical and useful for anyone wanting to learn marine artifact conservation than any expensive university course one could attend. Doug innovated many successful conservation techniques which are simply not taught in any college.
Fifth, to the miracle of the mag I owe my initial introduction to its capabilities and use from riding with and watching karl Lazeri at work. Sixth, Formal historical research and writing skills, thanks to the Graduate History Dept at UCF although added to that are a few practical tips about archival resources from BM along with the reading of a few of his books. Fluent French and good Spanish derived from working and living abroad and attending a Swiss school for 12 years which was all courtesy my wise old father, RIP, and now useful for interrogating the local fishermen to see if they ever snagged anything in those gill nets they drag everywhere or for reading those old maps and documents from the archives which sometimes drop clues to lost fortunes. Thank you BM for the foreign reading material.
Last but not least one really has not completed one's education or paid one's dues at the school of life in this business until one has wandered around the amoeba circuit in a place like Haiti for a year or two while living in thatched mud and dabble huts and only daring to drink out of coconuts and sucking the marrow out of rooster bones to stay alive while hiking trackless shores and snorkeling off the beach or rocks to look for clues of what you seek. In that regard I guess I have to thank ISPAN (Institute du Patrimonial National) of Haiti and old Gilbert Valme' of ISPAN, wherever he is hiding, for getting Papa Aristide to sign me a search permit and a stay out jail free letter to roam around the haunts of Morgan and Isle a Vache for two years and thus enabling me to garner a wonderful cultural experience beyond what any text book could provide. I suppose I also have to thank old Rob Mc Clung and his nocturnal search techniques for my being here in Ecuador, too. If it was not for his diving in the dark in some one else's lease and actually discovering the resting place of the Capitana, Dave Horner in turn would never have sent me down here back in 1997 to set up the resulting conservation lab and to watch out for his interest. That in turn, of course, introduced me to Ecuador and a group of individuals living here without whose own skills, connections and abilities, nothing going on today would have been possible.
So I am grateful to a lot of different people and for a lot of different reasons. I thank them all for adding to my experience and ability. A monument also needs to be erected to the unknown investors. JR