THE COMPLEAT GOGGLER Guy Gilpatric. First edition 1938. Dodd, Mead and Company. Second edition 1957, in conjunction with Skin Diver Magazine. Hardcover, dust jacket, 182 pages, mono prints. The dust jacket, left, is from the 1957 edition. It is identical to the original edition except for the brief text above the author's name.  The 1938 cover text is: The new sport which combines fishing, hunting and submarine sightseeing.  Note: A copy of this edition went for 1805 English pounds = approx $300 US dollars = approx $550 Australian dollars on eBay, March 2003. The 1957 cover text is: A new edition of the Skindiving Classic with an appreciative foreword by James Dugan  and up-to-date information on latest techniques and equipment. Note: A copy of this edition was passed in on eBay with a reserve of $50 US dollars, March 2003, but later porivately sold. [ps]

John Guy Gilpatric was born in 1896, and died by his own hand in 1950 after shooting his beloved but terminally ill wife. So ended not so much a career but the life - a full extraordinary life - of a man who sought adventure and living. Gilpatric grew up in New York. He became famous at sixteen when he flew  to new heights with a record breaking solo effort of 4,665 feet. He became a test pilot until at 21 he joined the American Expeditionary Forces and went to war in France, surviving eighteen months in the Air Service.

Two years after the end of the Great War, he was back in France. Living on the French Riviera. His earnings from the adventures of Mr Glencannon helped pay his way, but by now he was interested in other aspects of the sea. In 1929 he took to the Mediterranean with a spear and determination, returning with food and exhilaration. Wearing misaligned airmen's goggles gummed up to keep out the water, a nose-clip and, surprisingly, ear plugs, he plunged into the Mediterranean in search of the largest merou, a cod-like species. Mr Glencannon took a back seat, much to the displeasure of the Saturday Evening Post editor, whilst Gilpatric wrote  articles on "goggle fishing". He encouraged many to follow his lead, none more enthusiastic than a young Austrian called Hans Hass. In 1938, Gilpatric wrote his classic The Compleat Goggler, or to give it its full title - 

The Compleat Goggler - Being the First and Only Exhaustive Treatise on the Art of Goggle Fishing - That Noble and Excellent Sport Perfected and Popularised by Guy Gilpatric in the Mediterranean Sea - Though Long Practiced Elsewhere by Other Benighted Savages; Setting Forth the Proper manner of Making the Goggles, Spears and Other Needful Gadgets Together with Descriptions of Many Marvels Witnessed Upon the Bottom of the Sea And Fully Exposing the Author's Cunning Methods of Swimming, Diving & Spearing Fish and Octopi.

There you have it. 

The original work was published in 1938 and was a collection of short stories that had appeared in the Saturday Evening Post, a very popular magazine of that era, during the years 1934, 1935, 1937,& 1938. There are very very few orgininal copies remaining and seldom appear in the open market. There seems to be no idication as to how many copies of this original edition exist. I know that there are (at least) two copies in the USA, and on ein New Zealand. 

In the early 1950s, Chuck Blakeslee, the founder and then owner of Skin Diver Magazine and a noted avid bibliophile, entered into a relationship with the orginal publisher, Dodd Mead & Company, who were still in business at that time, to use the orginial plates to reprint the book under the SDM banner in 1957. A foreword by James Dugan was added. Only a few books were sold, so they were converted into a marketing inducement - purchase a subscription to SDM and receive a copy of the CG. Even then there were few takers. Finally SDM was sold and the entire remaining stock was handled by Petersen 'with Extreme Prejudice'. 

I understand that only 1200 copies of the 1957 edition were printed, and that half of these were dumped - thrown away. The figure of 1200 is not verified. The reprint was made from the original plates. It is believed that the copies remaining when SDM was sold to Petersens were never sold and were probably dumped in the Long Beach City trash. 
(Additional info courtesy Sam Miler).

It would therefore appear that the 1957 may indeed be rarer than the 1938 edition in terms of remaining copies in circulation. 

Trevor Norton in his excellent Stars Beneath the Sea writes "The Compleat Goggler is a slick, slangy roller coaster ride, ‘an epic written as a vaudeville sketch'." Indeed it is. I found it difficult to overcome the  glibness and strange metaphors and similes. It is as if the author is having fun at the expense of the reader.  But not to worry. It is written from the heart. 

I must admit to certain sadness when I read of so many fish being killed in the name of sport, but The Compleat Goggler provides an impression that the author has compassion for the food that he kills. He certainly developed an understanding of the ways of the various fish species. The hunting of the huge merou unflatteringly named Bonehead is not a classic in the sense of Melville's Moby Dick, but it does have its moments of compassion. 

And like so many early books on the animals of the sea, the octopus comes in  for more than its share of derision - "... he is a rude swashbuckling lout with a nasty disposition, prodigious strength and defective, if any, mentality". Not so Mr Gilpatric, but if that is your observation at the time then so be it. "His eyes, which are extremely keen, are malevolent, gold-rimmed and lumpily-protruding, being mounted in what naval architects would describe as sponsons. His mouth, a small hole located on the underside of him exactly where a mouth has no business to be, is provided with a sharp hooked beak like a parrot's. ... it is the only really hard substance in all his squashy, slimy make-up". I'd take offence at that if I was an octopus. Why must they be regarded as grotesque simply because they are different to most other marine animals. I tend to like them even if Mr Gilpatric doesn't. But Gilpatric takes several pages to quote other ‘authorities' on these ‘horrible creatures'. "If a diver is attacked by one of these creatures it is only by superhuman efforts that he can free himself from its terrible grasp". Gilpatric hunts one down over several chapters, giving it the unimaginative name of Five Fathom Kid, but turns him loose. Compassion? Perhaps. 

Several chapters are taken up with descriptions of the basic equipment - goggles, spears, guns, and their manufacture - and swimming and diving technique. One chapter covers ‘Fish', indicating the habits of such and how best to catch them. Of sharks he has no fear, but he is again weary of the octopus. 

The natural development of "goggle fishing" into the various forms of self-contained breathing apparatus and surface supplied equipment is covered moderately  in the chapter somewhat fancifully titled ‘Gadgets'. For those interested in the development of our sport, this is a most interesting chapter. Could it be that an English librarian living in France ‘invented' the first ‘breathing tube' - the snorkel.

Commander Le Prieur. The far left photo shows Le Prieur  with his self- contained equipment.

The lead belt makes its appearance, as do the various surface supplied and self-contained helmets of Beebe, Siebe Gorman and Commander Le Prieur. Indeed, there is actually a photograph of the Le Prieur apparatus, and the Fernez Diving Respirator, whatever that may have been. Underwater cameras rate less than two hundred words. Of course, as this is about the compleat goggler, there is a need to round off the book with what to do with the catch. The recipes, such as Octopus a la Nicoise,  are not inspiring.

In 1939, with war imminent in Europe, Gilpatric returned to the USA and was drafted into the intelligence service. After the war he settled in California with his wife Louise. Mr Glencannon returned to the scene. A film, Action in the North Atlantic, saw Humphry Bogart in the lead; but it was Gilpatric who was nominated for an Oscar. In 1950, Jacques Cousteau brought the first aqualungs to the USA. Gilpatric had not the chance to try one out, for without his beloved Louise, there was no future - no life.

Readability: an easy but at times irritable ‘American folksy' style. 
Classic rating: I'd give it a eight out of ten. It does indeed appear to be the first book on modern spear fishing, and as such deserves a place as a diving classic. Being somewhat autobiographical, it gives a suitable impression of the life of the early spearos. 
Availability: I have never seen a copy of the original edition which I would regard as being very rare. Even the 1957 edition is scarce. I have only managed to find one copy in twenty years and have several friends  desperate to get their hands on one - even my copy!!!