about DCS

About DCS

Dan

Warter

Carl

Stieglitz

Scott

Caldwell

Dan, Carl, and Scott had the pleasure of meeting on a normal Seattle, muggy afternoon in the

parking lot of their favorite dive shop, Starfish Enterprise run by Angela Ferdico and Tom Brickey. Having already taken their Open Water course together, Carl and Scott had already been somewhat friends.

Led by a man named Arnie the three of them plus a couple others would embark on their first dive together, Redondo Beach Seattle. Sort of put off, at first, by Carl and Scotts’ boisterous attitudes at the dive site, Dan succumbed to the fact that he needed dive buddy’s and quick. So, he planned to go dive again with these two clowns. By about the first five minutes of the next meeting, Dan had realized that the three of them together could do some real damage, so the deal was sealed. Over the next few years a solid team and friendship had been formed.

With several more advanced technical training classes under their belts, their dives were expanding to deeper dives on the west

coast and in other countries. With video camera in hand the expeditions were always filmed, most of the time for their own enjoyment. The tapes were then distributed around the U.S. for use in some scuba classes (why I don’t know), so a plan was discussed for creating some sort of underwater filming business.

Always looking for the newest in dive gear the three of them were soon easily persuaded to the Closed Circuit Rebreather world by a man named Peter Den Haan. Being given a two hour explanation on the Megalodon CCR Carl and Dan were hooked, and sequentially threw down $2500.00 that night for deposits. Scott feeling a bit left out secretly bought a Sport KISS and was trained on it before Carl or Dan knew what happened. Soon thereafter though, Scott jumped on the “Meg” bandwagon.

While this exciting and expensive transformation into the CCR world was the current focus of

the three, Dan and Carl would, at the same time, learn of a mystery unfolding right here in the Pacific Northwest. The Olympic National Park Service and some volunteers were taking part in a search for the remains of an automobile in the Olympic Peninsula's Lake Crescent. That artifact was found.

Thinking this was a truly heartfelt story, Dan, Carl, and Scott felt the attraction to somewhat be a “part” of the story. With camera in hand once again, they filmed what was to be known as the evidence hundreds of people were searching for for the past 75 years. Dan knew at this point this story had to be told.

Graduating from Saturday night home dive movies at friends houses, to a major documentary release in a small theatre in Seattle, the three now had to tell their story to hundreds of people packed into that theatre, the television press, newspapers, and radio stations. Dan Warter, Carl Stieglitz, and Scott Caldwell realized then that DCS Films was born.

Photo: Peter Den Haan

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