AV Geeks Lunch 12-9-2022

hi everybody this is Skip Alzheimer welcome to the AV Geeks lunchtime streaming show where we show old 16 millimeter films and talk about them so this is the last day at the film conference Amia and which is in Pittsburgh and so in honor of that in Pittsburgh that's where U.S steel is based so we're going to show some films about steel but also I'm going to talk to a couple more people who are uh people who have tuned in to our show over the last couple of years and some of the names you might remember some of them might be new but uh get them to kind of talk about what they do uh with moving image archiving but uh first this is a wonderful film it's not made by U.S steel I don't think it's called steel man's servant and I don't know if this was I don't have a date for this but I feel like I'm kind of scrolling through right now as I'm looking at it um Maybe This Is post-world War II or right around World War II but uh yeah phenomenal footage here beautiful beautiful footage so um let's go ahead and watch that and I'll be back thanks for watching enjoy from the good red Earth comes iron ore the basic element of Steel can you imagine what would happen if a great magnet suddenly wrenched All Steel from our daily life what would happen to our skyscrapers what would happen to our homes what would become of our great Bridges how could we travel how could we Farm how could we even communicate with one another what would become of all industry what indeed would become of all of us only in a nightmare could such a Calamity occur and so we begin the story of Steel with huge shovels ripping the raw red Iron Ore from its ancient beds Seventeen tons of the gulp is the capacity of this hungry giant eating the bank aboard a 34 000 pound load made possible by the strength and boundless capacity of Steel this is called the age of electricity is it not also the age of Steel it's an age of tremendous locomotive strength made possible and pressed into usefulness by Steel lightweight stronger railroad cars rolling over ribbons of Steel open pit mining is restricted to months when Frost is out of the ground but the year around we find the men of the underground mines like gnomes resting from nature or lying far beneath the earth's surface contributing to the steady stream of load-to-door cars flowing between the iron ranges of the Northwest and the northern harbors of the Great Lakes popping impatiently your boats in the Great Lakes speed await their loads under ore bins at the Docks they must go we must get this good red ore to the Mills so down comes the loading chutes like the mouths of a huge prehistoric monster the poor the ore into the belly of the waiting or boat [Applause] goes the gate and outpours a brown red stream of the earth which makes steel few things have less value than this raw iron ore as we see it now yet there are a few things of greater value and benefit to our modern civilization when the labor and intelligence of man is applied these carriers must work fast during late spring summer and early fall while the ice is out scores of ships in this large lake Fleet are constantly on the goal the loading completed they start in an endless stream for the Southern Lake ports to feed the hungry blast furnaces of the steel mills to the South foreign an all hands on deck there's no rest for an old transport two or three hours in Port and that's all as men Drive huge grab buckets like iron dragons which snatch great bites of the ore stored in mountains of red Earth all ready for the blast furnaces riding the cab of the clamshell bucket along the North Bridge as high as a six-story building we see the ore picked up from a trough behind the unloaders by another clam shell and carried across the storage yards traveling along a giant or Bridge just like the one we're on thousands upon thousands of tons of catalogs registered and practically pedigree door passed beneath us the ant has nothing on the steel business for enough or must be stored in summer that lasts to the winter when Lake carries a rice down steel Skyline looms before us a Skyline made up of blast furnaces tall Sentinels of the steel plant which changed the ore into molten iron and here the cycle of Steel making really begins with a first step in the making of iron an eight ton skip hoist dumps into the blast furnace a rich mineral stew of ore Limestone and Coke [Music] we're getting up speed now Down Below on the casting floor of the stage is set at intervals of six hours the charge smelt it down under intense heat is withdrawn and here comes the signal to tap ready for their end of the job these fellas stab an oxygen torch through the hole piercing a plug and play and here it comes a riding stream of molten iron 2600 degrees hot between 150 and 250 tons are tapped in a cast a hundred tons or so streamed down runways of sand graphite into the first of two huge labels then the gate is raised and the molten stream flows to a second later foreign a thermos bottle as big as a tank car lined with brick capable of holding molten iron at the highest possible temperature a lot goes on in the 20 minutes it takes to make a cast not so much in the six hours between cast then there's time to relax but now another sample must be taken from the Golden Screen a test specimen which will tell the steel maker the quality of his work he takes skill men to nurse these monsters men are know the whims of Iron Men who've been feeding the pulse and taking the temperature of liquid metal for a good many years it's possibly uncanny the way these fellas with a single glance at their samples recognize the caliber of the whole batch and they seem pretty happy with this one now we have molten iron the first step in the production of Steel this liquid iron goes for a while into huge storage tanks called mixes we'll come back to this iron soup a little later but first the Open Heart furnaces of Steel by far the greatest amount of Steel produced in the United States has made an Open Hearth furnaces such as these the ravenous Open Hearth is never on the dice it devours good scrap metal odds and ends of antique flippers and chunks of old rails axles that may yet roll again even chicken wire and up on the charging machine you see the operator handle a huge piece of Machinery so agile that it picks up an 8 000 pound charging box of scrap thrusts it into the furnace twists and turns and Rams and charges at the touch of a hand upon a switch [Music] foreign [Music] mixture a moment ago as the work goes on this molten metal is combined with a melted scrap first tie above the crane man watches the ladles film then guides giant hooks in to carry the ladle down the line to the furnace meanwhile an old hand of the game Waits by the open heart for the hot metal coming up from the mixer ready to direct the crane man's pouring of the pirate charge into the Blazing furnace about 50 tons of liquid iron are now added to the melted spread and the sheer beauty of this scene never fails to grip the thousands who visit these plants [Music] years ago the making of steel was the experienced guesswork of smart Old Timers but today their experience is backed up for the most accurate with scientific instruments this is steel in the making throughout every stage of Steel's Vivid Evolution repeated tests are taken the helper dips his test spoon spoon mind you into the soup and to the steel make it is just that soup and this sample poured into a test mold goes to the laboratory for analysis [Music] thank you these are the Craftsmen of Steel these and hundreds of thousands like them men born and raised the companionship of hot metal young men learning their trade old men grown gray in the University of Steel itself men who know all the moods and fancies and quips and quirks of molten metal who know how to tame and temper this flaming monster to the service of mankind by their watches and their blue filter glasses shall ye know them a Golden Glow on their faces they peer Into The Open Hearth to reap the future of this steel as a gypsy read your fortune in the tea leaves even as a great chef expertly adds just the right seasoning to his famous dishes so these expert Chefs of the Open Heart add the condiments That season Steel in this case a helping of feral manganese these boys certainly can handle their show they swing and follow through with all the power and Grace of the Champion golf they must hit a certain spot inside that furnace and that believe me is quite an art [Music] on the ranch or in a lumber camp this means come and get it or we'll throw it away it means grub but in these Mills it means poor Steel here are the cinder Snappers Jacks of all trades the ramming Rod ready they wait while men on the other side prepare the furnace for tapping another pinch of this and that from the bins and boxes according to the sure recipes of Steele's cookbook meanwhile the helper with an oxygen torch Burns through the clay which plugs the tapping hole they're raring to go these Cinder Snapper Lads but it takes time to uncork this flask just a moment now only a few more Ashes to get out of the way and then the go-ahead will come it's a welcome signal because the smash of ramming through heat of Steel is always a highlight in their day's work altogether there she goes it steals backbone of the world steel for axles Springs girders steel more bridges where ships automobiles magic and marbles from the earth from the labor and frames of men who serve their fellow men [Applause] [Music] it takes about 15 minutes to fill this Ladle slag the scum our flux of limestone floats on top of the steel finally overflowing into the slack Park bathed in a red flare the crane man handles with ease his heavy load of glowing metal this gigantic Ladle like a huge soup bowl 150 tons of liquid steel Flames licked through the scum of its surface a blood red touch from the seasoning cold foreign [Music] moves to its position at the pouring platform ready at the mere touch of the hand to discharge in the waiting in that moves and Maneuvers the heavy load to rest entering the nozzle the stopper is released and out gushes the steel to fill them one by one [Music] every little movement has a meaning of its own in steel tests for Quality such as these are very important they go to make steel one of the most scientifically controlled operations in all Industries meanwhile the fascinating work of pouring goes on here's a Young Apprentice in steel making taking a lesson from the older heads of the boring platform as with an optical parameter he measures the temperature of the molten steel and we are seeing just what he sees through the pyrometer steel at 2800 degrees hot thank you slowly cooling beautiful to look for the end got Sparkle and never vests in their mold when cool enough they will be stripped of their most unfashionable jackets another day without an accident it is now common for months to go by without a single man being injured so highly developed his modern safety practice one of the most thrilling operations the whole dramatic story of Steel making is the production of alloy Steel in the electric furnace inside this hottest of all furnaces huge electrodes suspended over the massive selected scrap slowly creeped down an electric Arc leaps from electrodes to scrap band produces one of the most spectacular sites ever filmed here is infernal [Music] foreign the scrap is melted and the electrodes purr over the molten steel now ready for the addition of Alloys finally the precious soup is cooked and out of The Cauldron pours another heat of stainless steel steel for kitchens for architectural trim for fine instruments and for Laboratories and hospitals for use wherever a glossy acid and rust resisting surface contributes to Modern industry and to modern living thank you Rising before you like a harvest moon is the hungry more of a Bessemer converter G factor in one of the greatest shows in steel closely watching this Rising monster are the men who run the show looking at life and steel from behind shatterproof glass 30 feet away from the trio Bessemer converters mounted on a high platform the operator's whistle was the signal which brought the hot iron from the mixer and started it pouring into the mouth of the Bessemer converter this iron whale of really hungry could swallow a score of Jonas and a gulf bar could find room in his red hot gullet for a good sized motorboat hey this Fourth of July when the bessemers go into action and here's your action Roman candles glancing the Blackness of the night happen the Gardeners of a railroad bridge marched past silhouetted by the licking flames of these beacons of Steel as many of you have often seen these huge torches flare up in the dark as symbols of Steel working for men you are seeing it as a steel maker season engaging the carbon content by the color of the flame when the flame displays The Telltale characteristics the conversion is complete and the bessemers are ready to pour the magic metal which first we saw as planor then soft and molten iron and now transform the steel for all the needs of man foreign [Music] a moment ago and now cool enough to shed their molds reaching down the human-like fingers of this Martian giant grasp and pry the most Mingus weighing between 20 and 40 000 pounds an impressive safe as the rich Crimson velvety glow emerges from beneath the rising molds steel has no competitor in Modern Life no possible substitute wherever you look you encounter examples of its service to man the nation's parade of going ingots is a barometer of economic conditions and is watched by many who seek to gauge business activity whereas the ingots go so goes industrial America [Music] the golden colors of fire go next to soaking pits for reheating where they literally soak in a bath of flame which evenly restores their temperature [Music] that was the signal to send one of these glowing ingots from the soaking pit it is 2200 degrees hot as you see it now and we begin to get an idea of the innumerable processes required to make fine steel and how economical the finished product is after all this labor and effort for after all this is a hairpin a thumbtack a monkey wrench a rail or a beam in infants through a mirror directly in front of him the operator sees the end bumping along the conveyor rollers like a car on a Corduroy Road unaware of the punishment to come as it will be squeezed pounded and pressed into one of the Thousand shapes which meet the demands of Industry the big idea here is to crack off the ski which is formed and to prepare the Ingot for the real rough stuff to come [Music] the Ingot is manipulated from the pope protected by heavy screening and shatterproof glass supported by the post partially hiding the engine the roller man glances at the tiles and brings the road down it's a squeezed play an inch or more time until the huge Ingot is flattened to a slab about five inches thick ready to be cut like cheese into shorter lengths for further rolling in the continuous Rolling Mill skill workers in pulpits set high up across the floor from each set of rules chart the course the slab must follow as the phone Dimensions adjustments stand and stand these continuous Mills cover so much ground that the traffic lights of a Miller is important as the red and green stuff and go lights the small town all clear the rolls are set and ready and here it comes the white hot slab of Steel sliding swiftly and smoothly toward the old powerful roads the first pass takes off the skate then a quarter turn on the turntable sends the slap sideways into the spreader to increase its width an extra push is needed here to force it through the rolls that's only the first step farther down the long line the width is checked and then the rapidly transforming slab of Steel races on beneath Showers of water and steam to enter the reversing Mill and back and forth and back and forth again it must pass and this reducing process we don't recommend to the ladies feeling thank you it's hard going for the slab but it's just another dial setting and a turning of a switch to the man of the levers he sits at a control board like the keyboard of an organ and casually watches the huge roles do their work getting longer and longer the plate races on to run the gauntlet of the finishing stands for giant stands in tandem each one squeezing the plate thinner and thinner from the beginning of this pictorial drum of Steel we have seen how machines have been called the aid of the men who make steel these machines of steel mills are ginai more powerful more incredible than Aladdin ever summoned by rubbing his wonderful lamp watch this servant work for man his master machines obedient to the mirrors touch some as delicate as the flutter but butterflies Wing some as powerful as an avalanche these same machines while producing amazingly low-cost steel have created many new command as many new markets thus providing for countless workers occupations which never existed before the most interesting of recent inventions the rocking shear was suggested by an ordinary rocking chair perfected in a wooden model which sheared chewing gum instead of Steel and now watch the result rocking power high pressure Shear cutting coal steel plate with Incredible ease and actives such is the story of Steel today steel plate for use in railroad cars steam ships Bridges and buildings well boys you're doing a swell job and we're getting a real thrill watching you before going on let's have a bottle of Pop together Greg Hardy [Music] moving on in the production of Steel we've come to the manufacture of sheikstein hot roll-like steel plate sheet steel is merely rolled thinner and thinner and then cleaned with acids it is cold rolled in coils to even lesser cases emerging on the other side of this machine as coal roll sheet for use in automobile fenders and bodies and stoves refrigerators and the many products oppressed steel further reduced and thin coated coal roll Steelers thousands of uses as tin plates here's where the girls come in as inspectors of the finished plate these shining Services must tempt the vanity of any daughter of Eve but surely not this girl oh well who are as human it must have been the oversized mirror that did it with that little touch of feminine vanity satisfied she goes back to her work and artists at her job these girls are Mighty useful employees in a template Mill and their schedule is arranged accordingly an hour on and 15 minutes off for coffee tea and rest here we are back again with hot Steam and there's a red hot rail coming through the first pass taking on his first big impression like everything else in steel this rail was rolled down from an Indian the rail bar takes more definite shape with each new pass through the road after the first pass it moves down to the end of the line across the conveyor table and up on The High Line in the middle to an intermediate pass and then across another conveyor table and down the line at the right to the finishing rolls for its final impression the finished rail over which the wheels of your friend May someday click [Music] steel cut steel the cold biting through the hot sawing a rail bar of more than 100 feet long in the standard lengths belong now there's still another most interesting episode in the fascinating grammar of steel production there's still another pictorial chapter in The Saga of Steel rolling giant beans how many people would ever guess that from this six foot Ingot a 36 inch I-beam almost as long as the city block could be rolled hot rolls Steam and Sizzle but an operator skillfully trips the switches controlling a pressure of many thousands of pounds back and forth under the dripping rolls the end it passes until it takes on a faint shape the semblance of an iodine suggestion of a girder that may support a bridgerous skyscraper it's all as easy as falling off a log or so it seems as this young man of steel handles the controls passing the huge form backward and forward reducing the gauge shaping the rough beam into an almost finished product and sending it along down the line on its way to the finishing stems [Applause] there comes the eye beam out of the finishing stand and we have actually seen how 150 feet of strong sturdy steel can be rolled from a six foot in The Columns and girders with which America builds its future the beam slides down the rollers coming to a stop at the saw to be trimmed and cut to length [Music] thank you [Music] there might be particular to get things right these steel men here are there taking a sample from the hot beam a test piece which will go on to the laboratory but right now they have another use for it the hot beam sample performs a dual role serving all sorts of fireless cooker Deluxe for Mike's private coffee pot it's too good a thing to keep to himself so big-hearted my calls powerful Pat to have a zipper of the old Java with him I accept with thanks but don't ever let the weight know you're this good or she'll be after pin and apron on you now let's scroll over the axle boards where immense hammers are pounding like piled rounds this machine does the heavy work but man's hand shapes the railroad axle packing an awful wallet this Hammer slams down on the helpless round beating it into shape [Music] foreign [Music] now the axle is forged from the other end as the giant hammer shapes the color see between the hammer blows the alert intense spaces of these men foreign [Music] touches railroad wheels are being turned out in another impressive operation of the modern steel plant the first thing which will capture eye will be a red Hot Wheel block as the steel man caught about to take its place between the two halves of a wheel mode and then his man and Machinery take advantage of the precise moment the blowing hot block is formed under 20 million pounds of pressure slowly very slowly pressed and flattened and shaped into a blank something close to a railroad wheel but not yet the real article and then with scarce and instance pause the plank is lifted from mold number one while mold number two slides slowly and easily to the left and relentlessly grips the victim between its powerful jaws and then comes the final shaping in the finishing mold under further terrific pressure if you thought the first one was a squeezer watch number two [Music] the throttle of Casey Jones Never controlled as much power as these lovers which now released the rough wheel and send it on to the caliper man only Perfection gets by this Chapel then upon emerging the wheel is ready for finishing perhaps convey you someday possibly soon on a journey of your heart's desire [Music] here's another chapter in The Tale of Steel coming out of a reheating furnace is a pair of billets 30-foot lengths of Steel about two inches Square they too were rolled down from an engine rolled in a Billet Mill much like a rail Mill the billets run the gamut of 16 sets of reducing rolls each roll reduces the diameter and hastens the rod with ever increasing speed toward its final reduction in a moment you'll see it begin to step out the snail turning into a scared rabbit its rate of speed through the rolls will jump from four to 45 miles an hour better than a racehorse as its length increases from 30 feet to almost three quarters of a mile these close shots show exactly what takes place slow at the start then faster in this intermediate pass and steal its speed increase if you watch closely you can see it Dart through these roads and at last there it comes whistling into the coiler To Be Tamed into a shapely coil of finished Rock [Applause] these marvelous Machines of steel pull their own tapping heavy wire from rodness we see here in these big dies but we're not through yet with this metallic candy pulling now the rapidly thinning wire goes to a huge drum which is a real Taffy puller and our wire gets tenuous and more tenuous the operator most accurately measures the gauge for a thousandth of an inch counts in the kind of accuracy that is standard in wire drawing the rest of the story of wiremaking is one reduction after another a hundred thirty thousandths of an inch at a time finer and finer the tough steel wire is drawn on the wire goes darting twisting weaving to and fro through as many as 11 guys and finally it comes out all bright and silvery almost as fine as silk and thread and so wire is made for countless demands for bed springs Nails fence Telephone and Telegraph lines more than 90 000 uses represented in our modern civilization production of python tubes is another important phase of Steel making the finest kind of tube is seamless starting as a hot round a reheated cylinder of solid steel is hustled along and rammed into the seamless piercing Mill by means of great pressure created by a whirling cone-shaped rolls forcing the malleable steel forward over a piercing point the round emerges on the other side as a seamless tube a hollow pipe of hot rolled steel it's remarkable how perfectly this round of golden hot steel is pierced expanded and finished to meet specification one of the most interesting operations to be found in any of these great steel mills and so mile after mile of seamless tube Finds Its place in the pipelines with service for heat fuel water and the other necessaries of Modern Life turn from the colorful dramatic side of the mill to the quiet of the Laboratories and to the scientists much of what you've seen would not have been possible without the research man constantly working into the future of Steel and devising new ways for it to serve its Master man here we see Steele's Anatomy photographed and study here's a piece of corten Steel getting the tensile test that dark covered piece the metal urges had just placed in the machine is being subjected to the severest possible tension see how remarkably a piece of Steel can be stretched almost like rubber 50 60 70 000 pounds of pull per square inch and more to find the breaking point it's amazing the steel can stand such punishment finally it does break under much greater strain than ever will be exactly in its actual use foreign with little furnaces such as these the scientists worked with patients studying experiment to develop stainless steel whose shining Service reflects the research and the effort devoted to its production this is the fascinating world of Steel many are those who walk its paths The Miner the engineer the crane man the melter the roller the scientists hundreds of thousands among the men of Steel more than 500 000 men are engaged in making steel over half of them in the companies of the United States still alone men are confident and confident in their work men who can return to their homes and firesides proud and happy in the knowledge of their contribution to society [Music] beyond the door of the Furnace we see nothing but hot gases and bubbling metal but the man who makes steel sees their streamline trains streaking smoothly across the continent great ships carrying the products of the farm and Factory to the four corners of the earth sailing the Seven Seas with the promise of world peace through world trade with Commerce and profit to all he sees concrete roads made from the slag of blast furnaces busy with cars and trucks of steep he sees beyond that bubbling steel the wirelands of modern telephone and telegraphic communication and the higher Towers carrying electric power to home in Indus he sees modern farming made possible by Steel machinery and fencing countless oil Derricks stretching their structures to the heavens gaunt Frameworks of Steel landmarks of another of America's great Industries big gun little things he sees the big little convenience is a modern cookery stainless steel utensils and kitchen sinks Hammers and little nails that play a big part are the melodious vibration of a finely drawn steel piano string he sees acid resisting cans for food preservation for a fine steel watch spring set in a steel chassis and he sees tall buildings of Steel rearing their proud heads almost Above the Clouds great Bridges spanning rivers and harbors bringing Commerce and its people closer and closer together all these and more the Man of Steel seeds new eras new standards of living as the world moves forward with the men who make steel [Music] hi everybody I'm with uh Nathan who is one of the people that watches the lunchtime streaming show and actually comments Nathan tell us who you are and what you do I'm Nathan Jones and by not hanging out in the comments I am the curator of television news archives at the Vanderbilt television news archive at Vanderbilt University in Nashville Tennessee great to say hello to everyone and I should say that the Vanderbilt archive is phenomenal it's uh recorded what since the 60s or 70s all the television news we have all of the Nightly News broadcasts to the three major networks so ABC CBS NBC going back to August of 1968 and then we record an hour of the highest rated Cable News Network show we've been doing that since the 90s and we record every time a current U.S president speaks on a right-leaning Network and a left-leaning network for comparison so look for Us online how diplomatic you are look for Us online at TV news.vanderbilt.edu um so what is it that a genre of film that you enjoy on our show on your show oh there's so many and I think it's the more esoteric things that you play like what you did with uh what was it Halloween where you had the clown church event it's just there is no such thing as two esoteric for your collection okay all right it's those things try to program something esoteric to show after this my gosh do I love a theme day okay so the church day oh you like that okay that was I'd love a theme all right sweet okay and then toe tapping's probably also been that Community involvement that you get us to engage in is I wish I could do right such cool Community involvement with my collections well you could figure out a way to do it I don't know well we don't have copyright so we can't that's right yeah we would get ban hammers all the time so the Bots the Bots would not like us alas well Nathan is it good to meet you in person and uh I will see you in the comments and I hope you have a good conference here in Pittsburgh at emea thanks skip thank you for the opportunity in hi and bye everyone thanks yeah beautiful always big fan of industrial footage so and we have a lot um essentially we've been scanning for uh Oregon archives which is based in um Pittsburgh and I was not able to get the founder or co-founder of Oregon on a camera because of his schedule but um we do have another film uh setup actually it's not even from him it's from someone in Houston and this is about oil rigs it's called steel reef and it is made by the American petroleum Institute and it's a uh what we call green washing so it basically shows you um how great uh oil rigs are um Platforms in the middle of the gulf and how great they are for um the fish and the all the things living in the sea so um this next film is called steel reefs enjoy [Music] the Gulf of Mexico is the richest most productive most exciting Marine area that borders North America marine life Fort Fisherman's dream a reservoir of fossil fuels an incomparable source of protein from the sea and a challenge to divers the gulf is the most there's always been a Priceless resource but the potential it is achieving today has been fostered and spurred by the coming of the steel reefs [Music] hello I'm Stan Waterman I'm a professional Skin Diver and underwater photographer I've been wetted to the Sea for 25 years my vocation and avocation 25 years of of wonderful experience I suppose the most exciting experience I've had was pursuing the great white shark we saw it around the world in making Blue Water white death the feature film we're off on another adventure this morning a different one sunrise on the bayous of Louisiana following up an invitation by Gulf Coast Diving friends who for years have urged me to come down and see a new Marine World that was developed under the production platforms offshore on the Gulf Coast a great network of artificial reefs an ecosystem following the entire food chain up to the great commercial schools of fishes I've never seen anything like it this year I accepted the invitation so the sun rising behind us and a day to fulfill our adventures we're on our way out to the gulf now [Music] it's a calm day on the gulf one of my diving friends catches 40 more winks as the eggs are scrambled for breakfast the crew boats pass us as if we're dragging anchor they rev up to 35 and 40 knots [Music] we soon find ourselves passing through the communities of drill Rigs and production platforms reassuring neighbors for small craft ranging far out into the open Gulf s are a part of the busy traffic pattern harvesting the most valuable crop of Marine crustacea in the world whole fleets of sport fishing boats will start out from the coast each morning on a calm day like this each one eventually picking the platform where he thinks the action will be and for action and Clear Water we're headed for the Deep platform standing in 140 feet of water foreign [Applause] I can see the stuff all over the pilings already Barnacles look like they're almost an inch thick yeah there's a green algae growing right at the surface and this is bird teddleton one of the finest skin divers on the Gulf Coast they shouldn't have about a one and one half inches of growth bro we're going to find big schools of fish down here drop right down on a lot of action I certainly hope so but you know the hurricane may have spoiled the marine life what is this hurricane business here Patricia Farmers told me was a great climate just about at this time in the middle of August cold Mother Nature all their plans by planning a hurricane across okay I'm used to it as a filmmaker yeah foreign [Music] the world of the steel Reef like no marine environment I have ever been in before great barracuda were our reception committee curious but not aggressive Legions of spadefish sweep by majestically [Music] as long as our movements are unhurried and easy we will be accepted without disturbance in this diverse Marine community [Music] there's beauty under these platforms a symmetrical Beauty the men swimming through the centralizers that once guided the drill shafts to the bottom [Music] when you're just halfway down one of the supporting members you're already 70 feet deep and the surface is a distant shimmering Mirage [Music] all of the Gulf Coast Divers are shell collectors amateur malacologists and they know just where to look for the valuable shells that they will add to their collections foreign [Music] [Music] why that water is warm yeah it's great if it's so warm why are you so blue well it's a little cool here's the prize the specie is spondylus americanas one in perfect condition can be worth as much as fifty dollars in the collector's Market we moved on to another block of rigs Stan this is an old gun but it's my old favorite never fails let me see what you're doing to that thing holy son look that that isn't going to take too much impact right well I don't Spearfish much anymore but it helps to bring back a delicacy for the wife at times all right are you all ready yeah all right okay let's go [Music] amberjack they're after amberjack today the biggest ones I've ever seen come in on these rigs the great pelagic Jacks come in from the Open Sea to feed on the fish that live under the platforms and man in turn preys on them the first stalks a big amberjack he takes aim fires a point-black range and misses he's gung-ho if not accurate at this particular moment this time he strikes hard and well the fish heads for the bottom they're powerful they'll drag a diver along with them if they can make it to the 85 or 90 foot level The Merc level they're in free because you dare not follow them into the zero visibility Burr grapples with the reserve on his tank and in doing so he goes head first into one of the Cross members on the rig the rig didn't move an inch [Music] you must watch your depth constantly you'll be in deep water before you know it and the excitement of the chase Burr does check this fish's descent brings him back towards the surface and now back to the boat this is a big one foreign [Music] the amberjack aren't the best eating of the jacks by any means but they're good eating and this fellow will be made up into steaks for three different families ashore the men of course are out to fill their larders but they're also after records and many of the species grow to record sizes here there's the face of a man developing a hernia burcox's speargun again it's a twinstrand our ballot a very standard gun for hunting he's after Barracuda this time and they also grow big under these platforms some of the biggest I've ever seen Cuda takes off like a shot you'll wind around the supporting members of the rig and every time he takes a turn Burr has to follow him and unwind him in the same direction incidentally the only time that I've heard of when a barracuda attacked a Spearfish and the only documented record was when a man struck one and wounded it and the Kuda turned and bit the devil out of him and he deserved it too Barracuda will usually leave you alone if you leave them alone but if you strike them then you've picked the fight then you can take your chances this is a big one too you'll go over 25 pounds easily and that's big as Cuda go they used to call Barracuda the Tigers Of The Sea their ferocity towards divers and swimmers much overrated as I mentioned before if you leave the Barracuda alone he'll leave you alone human beings are not the normal prey for our Cuda we move on to another block of platforms that have attracted commercial fishermen here's one of the Snapper boats part of a fleet of over 50 that arrived from the Florida coast each summer to work these Waters the Snapper fishery is an outgrowth of the development of oil rigs as artificial reefs along the Gulf Coast the oil rigs have been neither conducive nor prohibitive to the shrimp business shrimp continue to thrive on the mud sand bottom of the Gulf and a huge multi-million dollar shrimp business continues to thrive also here's the start of a shrimp cocktail for gourmet restaurants across the country it is Sport Fishing that has experienced a bonanza all year round before a platform has set its legs on the golf bottom for just half a year it has already attracted a vigorous and diverse Marine Eco system that includes many of the fish most prized by sport fishermen many species of jacks like this one coming out board they're all superb fighters on light tackle sea trout Barracuda Snapper and redfish remember it doesn't have to be a monster to be fun it looks like he's last sued this one shortly after the first platforms appeared along the coast the oceanic game Fish also began to appear the Magnificent dolphin rainbow lightning from the most colorful of all game Fish the Anglers great Challenge and prize the blue marlin in fact so many Marlon and sailfish entered the gulf that a major Bill fishing tournament prospers here every year now [Music] there's a magnificent white Marlin to fulfill any Angler's Dream [Applause] I met Dr Carl Oppenheimer Chief marine biologist at the University of Texas Dr Oppenheimer was examining the stomach contents of fish being brought aboard one of the party boats field exercise he usually enjoys with the chance to wet a line himself I filmed him at work and learned much from him yes this is a red is in the Gulf of Mexico they grow to fairly good size and this is a [Music] fairly decent sized adult we're taking the stomach out now to see if we can get some idea of the contents as to what it's been eating the seeds of these fish are attracted to any solid Reef type of structure like whether it be man-made or whether it be a naturally you don't mind my asking you these questions while you're working here I don't want to distract you and have the patient die on the operating table yeah we've seen great schools of these cruising around the the rigs when we've been diving what draws them to the uh to the rigs if they're open water fish well they're uh they're drawn just like almost any other animal in the sea is towards uh towards Solid Surfaces again um we've known this fact for quite a number of years but we don't know exactly the total sequence of why fishes are attracted to Solid Surfaces like platforms soil rigs that are becoming so abundant now in the Gulf of Mexico and old car bodies Japanese they're using concrete to artificial reefs and actually placing the reefs out in the ocean to increase uh to increase the productivity for the fishermen and this is being done here in the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific in the Atlantic up and however here's a fish that was just caught up on the bow one of the more common fish is white trout right when you get the trout out here too certainly do we catch white trout we catch speckled trout and this is one of the fish that are bound by the rigs in great numbers oh you've got everything out here there's too much we're very fortunate uh it's a beauty very good edible uh fish the edibility of it is very good it's a clean fish and it's a good sport fish on light tackle is this a big one or about this would be called a small one that's right sir you know this must be some of the most reliable and steady sport fishing you can find anywhere well I believe that's one of the few areas where we can say we catch fish every time we're practically guaranteed fish because you've got so many places to fish on the Louisiana coast you've got 1400 oil structures or maybe a few more than that and that's all uh man-made reefs I mean it's put there to get the oil out but without the rigs and the structures I wouldn't be in business we'd have to depend mostly on game fishing trolling for mauling and such as that whereas during this winter time you know when the water is too rough to go way out we can fish on all these close Rigs and you can see the variety of fish we catch I think you really hit them don't you and so they do later on another boat I spoke further with Dr Oppenheimer where does it start what comes first to these artificial structures to begin the whole process these structures provide a biologically attractive surface initially colonized by bacteria that act as a primary base for other attached life and then from this broth of living organisms in the surrounding sea water a sequence of unicellular algae protozoans and other larval microscopic organisms attach as a result dance moss-like colonies will develop consisting of such microscopic creatures as this larval bryozone in this delicate anemone the larval stages of starfish and sea urchins clams oysters and snails will then settle to share with these larval crabs and New Habitat these larval fish will also find protection and food to develop these animals and many more will find the new artificial reefs a suitable habitat and a new balanced ecosystem will result with the encrustation of every inch of the underwater platform structures a veritable pasture of plants and animals foreign Barnacles will sweep smaller planktonic food from the rich water with bristle Lacy feet and periodically enrich the surrounding water with a cloud of eggs and sperm as these sea urchins are doing [Music] all this growth results in the production of great amounts of food which in turn supports clouds of fish fry these millions of small fish will become food for larger fish which will provide Sport and food for man in his position at the top of the food chain a growing commercial fishery May Harvest those fish that reach maturity foreign occupy the Pinnacle of the Pyramid of the food chain with man a pyramid reaching all the way down from the first bacteria to settle on the new underwater structures we tied up to a crew boat for an overnight birth the Snapper is the best eating of the Gulf Coast fish and I was eager to try one dinner aboard the rig with the manager and the crane hoist operator provided the opportunity cook Rose to the challenge brilliantly make room here tell me how many times a day all year round three times a day you guys really live it up out here yeah I thought he looked good under water that's better now but this particular time I think I'd have to soon be at the top of the food chain I think the cook's watching us to see if any of this is going to be left and yeah he didn't have any intention of leaving it I don't believe there is where are you like that you like the fins don't you yeah I asked Brewer about the coming of new species to the Marine World under the platforms seeing changes such as a new tropical species migrating into the area you mean fish that that weren't that you didn't see here 10 years ago coming from where from from from distant Waters and yeah from the Caribbean a branch of the Gulf Stream branches off in the summer months and comes right directly toward the mouth of the Mississippi so whether they're introduced as adults or as Collegiate kids they're still showing up new ones each year last year we discovered the reef butterfly which is the least common of all the Bahamian butterflies the next morning we made our last dive together and it was by far the finest of our series [Music] the stingray much maligned not the villain he's made out to be an Eater of crabs of crustacea and mollusks you practically have to step on him to get him to use that poison Barb in his tail he almost knocks Burr off of his perch there on the stanchion we're struggling with one of his flash bulbs underwater photographers always struggled with flash bulbs like nashoryu Glides by with powerful rhythmic Strokes of his wing-like body coming up for a hug and a kiss here the friendly Stingray Jack crevel's caring's hippos the most beautiful of all the jacks these have come from Deep Water excited by the sound of our bubbles and our diving activity amberjack even larger than the ones that we had seen before [Music] The View was all in lines straight up and down as we move deeper along the water column each new area has its own spectrum of life at 70 75 80 feet I must turn on my lights this is the Twilight Zone and here in deep water we finally found the Snappers they'd been here all along but deep driven here by the hurricane and the gulf and storm time the lights pick up the burnished red of their scales the Queen Angelfish from Florida waters arrived on the steel reefs many years ago Burr cataloged them when they first came about 15 years past Triggerfish they graze on the encrusted material also came from the Florida reefs one by one the spectrum of life has grown Burr has cataloged it as he's seen the new additions the French angel fish po macanthus paru arrived about seven years back and then today seen for the first time and very exciting to Burr the gray angel fish Thomas cataloged noted for the first time and so the range of life grows uh [Music] you must watch your time carefully we've slipped over a hundred feet deep now the decompression meter tells you when it's time to come up as will your depth gauge and your wristwatch there is no equivocating when it's time to go it's time to go into the zone of light through the area of spayed fish out to the bars of the great cage into the open Gulf Beyond oh foreign [Music] the men on the surface world watch Us return from a world they will never see their eyeballs almost popped out of their heads when they saw the size of these Snappers we'd taken they dangle Hooks and they never catch them like that now any diver will tell you that the best time of day is called the happy hour whatever the toast we drink together now as veteran divers on the steel reefs a new adventure in my diving experience and a fine one I'll not forget I've enjoyed sharing this story with you and hope that we may dive together again soon [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] and you are besides watching our show and commenting occasionally you also are you have a podcast right yeah tell us a little bit about that I'm an occasional co-host of the cult movies podcast um the main host is Anthony King and the podcast is based on the cult movies books one two and three written by Danny Perry and I think the early 80s so every episode a guest come usually a guest comes on picks a movie from the book we're still on the first book um and then we talk about it and then we all suggest pairing recommendations nice yeah and what is a recent film that you've talked about that you you thought was a fascinating deep dive that kind of spurred a lot of really good conversation because you've I've been following it and there's I haven't watched the podcast but I've been following what you guys have been talking about yeah there's some pretty pretty interesting stuff in there I mean there's things like things I hadn't seen before like Behind the Green Door I saw for the first time for the podcast oh wow now San Francisco looks a little bit different to you now huh yeah it kind of just I knew that I knew that was there already um yeah we recently did a Herald and mod episode it's gonna come out soon um we did Citizen Kane which is like it's in the we did it because it's in the cult movies book but it feels like not a cult no because it's such a classic um my first when I was first on as a guest I did Johnny Guitar and I feel a strong love for Johnny Guitar nice nice and you also have this magic way of finding media on the Streets of San Francisco walking down the streets and finding video decks and videotapes the trick is to go on lots of walks fortunately San Francisco very beautiful city and with Pleasant weather so it makes it easy but yeah if you go on lots of walks your average of finding things will go up so recently we found like a big sack like a grocery sack of Chinese language audio cassettes and a lot of them were just for music wow it was really awesome that's really cool a lot of the covers are good so I should mention that today coincidentally is Stephen Parker day and so Stephen Parr was a film collector who had a collection in San Francisco called Oddball films video and and Stephen has left us but after he left us you found a tape that he was on public access yeah I found a couple stacks of betamax tapes uh it's shoved into this giant Street Library and it was right after I had to repaired a betamax deck so I was like okay I guess I'll take these home now and so every once in a while I would just like watch some of them they're all just like recorded off TV please um and at one point I saw I found this uh recording of a San Francisco Public Access show called do you remember where it is yeah it was it was straight up mvtv right no um but yeah Stephen Parr uh was on as a guest this was probably like the early 90s and he was talking about his Club yeah because he would have these kind of absurds like spectacle shows and so he was on there being cool and just talking about what he was gonna do and it sounded he was being very cool it was really awesome so we miss you very much Stephen uh this is of course what would Stephen do and what Stephen would do is not really the best thing that you should do but it would involve complaining a lot being a very caring person and maybe being a little bit of a pain in the ass to the people closest to you so Kristen thank you so much for for talking about what you do and look for her uh what's the name of the podcast again it's called The Cult movies podcast and where can one hear it wherever you find the podcast wherever you find podcasts all right Kristen thank you all right now we have to go to a panel all right we'll see you bye well thanks so much for tuning tuning in today I will be back in the studio on Monday um which is over the weekend but uh I appreciate your patience and and dealing with pre-recorded skip um and um it was great to see a bunch of uh peers people that I haven't seen in three years uh to kind of share stories and the camaraderie that we normally have um so I appreciate you letting me kind of play hooky from doing this show while still doing this show and I hope you appreciate the folks that we brought on um so you can kind of think about uh where media shows up and uh how people are dealing with that media uh similar to what I do but also in a more professional setting um and uh well thanks so much for tuning in if you like what you saw you can buy some coffee at Ko Dash fi.com you can go to patreon.com and hit uh Slash AV Geeks and kind of do the donation slash subscription um hit the thumbs up subscribe notify those are all great ways to say thank you and thank you appreciate dry balls so everybody have a great weekend and we will see you next week live take care