| The Dive Show at Excel this year was well attended
by both the public and HDS Members. The theme this year was Sponge
Diving and we had quite a good selection of Mediterranean Sponges
to show. Our sponge diving display also included a lot of Photographs
of sponge diving through the ages, from the sponge diving island
of Kalymnos, Greece, and ranged from the early Long Pole sponge
fishermen to the more modern Surface Supply divers of today, and
included Standard and Furnez equipment.
A very attractive part of the display was the Skandalopetra or
Bell
Stone donated to the Historical Diving Society for the show by The
Hoteliers Association of Kalymnos which arrived at our address just
two days before we left for the show. The remainder of our display
was our usual show of brass and copper, Single and Twin Hose Regulators
and Aging Dive Computers.
There were also three Book Signings on our stand:
(1) Tony Groom signing his book ‘Diver’
(2) Peter Earle and his book ‘Treasure Hunt’, and
(3) our very own Reg Vallintine signing his new book ‘ Deep in the
Blue’.
These signings helped to raise the number of people on our stand
and increase our sales from the Shop.
Una and I would like to thank all who helped to make this a very
successful display including, Nikolas Reissis and The Hoteliers
Association of Kalymnos, The Municipal Tourist Organisation of Kalymnos,
Members who assisted at the show, and also supplied some of the
original photographs, brass and copper etc, and of course our three
‘book signers’. Thank you all. John and Una Smillie
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