Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D. - Academy of Achievement

<!doctype html> <html lang="en-US" prefix="og: http://ogp.me/ns#"> <head><script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/bundle-playback.js?v=HxkREWBo" charset="utf-8"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/wombat.js?v=txqj7nKC" charset="utf-8"></script> <script>window.RufflePlayer=window.RufflePlayer||{};window.RufflePlayer.config={"autoplay":"on","unmuteOverlay":"hidden"};</script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/ruffle/ruffle.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> __wm.init("https://web.archive.org/web"); __wm.wombat("http://www.achievement.org/achiever/robert-d-ballard-ph-d/","20170606114043","https://web.archive.org/","web","/_static/", "1496749243"); </script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/banner-styles.css?v=S1zqJCYt" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/iconochive.css?v=3PDvdIFv" />  <meta charset="utf-8"> <meta http-equiv="x-ua-compatible" content="ie=edge"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="57x57" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-57x57.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="114x114" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-114x114.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="72x72" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-72x72.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="144x144" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-144x144.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="60x60" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-60x60.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="120x120" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-120x120.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="76x76" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-76x76.png"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon-precomposed" sizes="152x152" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/apple-touch-icon-152x152.png"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/favicon-196x196.png" sizes="196x196"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/favicon-96x96.png" sizes="96x96"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/favicon-32x32.png" sizes="32x32"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/favicon-16x16.png" sizes="16x16"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/favicon-128.png" sizes="128x128"/> <meta name="application-name" content="Academy of Achievement"/> <meta name="msapplication-TileColor" content="#000000"/> <meta name="msapplication-TileImage" content="http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/mstile-144x144.png"/> <meta name="msapplication-square70x70logo" content="http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/mstile-70x70.png"/> <meta name="msapplication-square150x150logo" content="http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/mstile-150x150.png"/> <meta name="msapplication-wide310x150logo" content="http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/mstile-310x150.png"/> <meta name="msapplication-square310x310logo" content="http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/favicon/mstile-310x310.png"/> <link href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043cs_/https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Source+Sans+Pro:400,600,400italic,600italic,700,700italic" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"> <title>Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D. - Academy of Achievement</title>  <meta name="description" content=""Captain Nemo in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne is who I always wanted to be. Absolutely no doubt about it. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus." Like many young readers before him, Robert Ballard dreamed of becoming an undersea explorer after reading of Jules Verne's 20,0000 Leagues Under the Sea. Unlike most of Verne's readers, Ballard went on to realize his dream. For more than ten years, Ballard spent four months of every year at sea, and much of that time miles of feet below the water's surface, exploring the uncharted mountain ranges of the ocean floor. While his discoveries of undersea volcanoes and chemosynthetic life in the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos islands have earned him a place in the history of science, his expeditions to discover the wrecks of such famous lost ships as the Titanic, the Lusitania and the Bismarck also earned him a place in the headlines. His discoveries, and the amazing vehicles he has built to perform his explorations, are even more remarkable than the fanciful adventures of Jules Verne's Captain Nemo."/> <meta name="robots" content="noodp"/> <link rel="canonical" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/robert-d-ballard-ph-d/"/> <meta property="og:locale" content="en_US"/> <meta property="og:type" content="article"/> <meta property="og:title" content="Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D. - Academy of Achievement"/> <meta property="og:description" content="<p class="inputTextFirst">"Captain Nemo in <i>20,000 Leagues Under the Sea</i> by Jules Verne is who I always wanted to be. Absolutely no doubt about it. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus."</p> <p class="inputText">Like many young readers before him, Robert Ballard dreamed of becoming an undersea explorer after reading of Jules Verne's <i>20,0000 Leagues Under the Sea.</i> Unlike most of Verne's readers, Ballard went on to realize his dream.</p> <p class="inputText">For more than ten years, Ballard spent four months of every year at sea, and much of that time miles of feet below the water's surface, exploring the uncharted mountain ranges of the ocean floor. While his discoveries of undersea volcanoes and chemosynthetic life in the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos islands have earned him a place in the history of science, his expeditions to discover the wrecks of such famous lost ships as the <em>Titanic</em>, the <em>Lusitania</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em> also earned him a place in the headlines.</p> <p class="inputText">His discoveries, and the amazing vehicles he has built to perform his explorations, are even more remarkable than the fanciful adventures of Jules Verne's Captain Nemo.</p>"/> <meta property="og:url" content="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/robert-d-ballard-ph-d/"/> <meta property="og:site_name" content="Academy of Achievement"/> <meta property="og:image" content="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ballard-Feature-Image-1.jpg"/> <meta property="og:image:width" content="2800"/> <meta property="og:image:height" content="1120"/> <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary"/> <meta name="twitter:description" content="<p class="inputTextFirst">"Captain Nemo in <i>20,000 Leagues Under the Sea</i> by Jules Verne is who I always wanted to be. Absolutely no doubt about it. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus."</p> <p class="inputText">Like many young readers before him, Robert Ballard dreamed of becoming an undersea explorer after reading of Jules Verne's <i>20,0000 Leagues Under the Sea.</i> Unlike most of Verne's readers, Ballard went on to realize his dream.</p> <p class="inputText">For more than ten years, Ballard spent four months of every year at sea, and much of that time miles of feet below the water's surface, exploring the uncharted mountain ranges of the ocean floor. While his discoveries of undersea volcanoes and chemosynthetic life in the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos islands have earned him a place in the history of science, his expeditions to discover the wrecks of such famous lost ships as the <em>Titanic</em>, the <em>Lusitania</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em> also earned him a place in the headlines.</p> <p class="inputText">His discoveries, and the amazing vehicles he has built to perform his explorations, are even more remarkable than the fanciful adventures of Jules Verne's Captain Nemo.</p>"/> <meta name="twitter:title" content="Robert D. 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data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ballard-Feature-Image-1-380x152.jpg [(max-width:544px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ballard-Feature-Image-1.jpg [(max-width:992px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ballard-Feature-Image-1-1400x560.jpg"></div> <div class="display--table"> <div class="display--table-cell"> <figcaption class="feature-area__text ratio-container__text container"> <div class="feature-area__text-inner text-white"> <h2 class="serif-8 feature-area__text-subhead back"><a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever">All achievers</a></h2> <h1 class="serif-1 entry-title feature-area__text-headline">Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D.</h1> <h5 class="sans-6 feature-area__blurb">Discoverer of the <i>Titanic</i></h5> </div> </figcaption> </div> </div> </figure> </header> </div>  <nav class="in-page-nav row fixedsticky"> <ul class="nav text-xs-center clearfix" role="tablist"> <li class="nav-item col-xs-3"> <a class="nav-link active" data-toggle="tab" href="#biography" role="tab" data-gtm-category="tab" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever Biography">Biography</a> </li> <li class="nav-item col-xs-3"> <a class="nav-link" data-toggle="tab" href="#profile" role="tab" data-gtm-category="tab" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever Profile">Profile</a> </li> <li class="nav-item col-xs-3"> <a class="nav-link" data-toggle="tab" href="#interview" role="tab" data-gtm-category="tab" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever Interview">Interview</a> </li> <li class="nav-item col-xs-3"> <a class="nav-link" data-toggle="tab" href="#gallery" role="tab" data-gtm-category="tab" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever Gallery">Gallery</a> </li> </ul> </nav> <article class="post-651 achiever type-achiever status-publish has-post-thumbnail hentry careers-chemist careers-explorer"> <div class="entry-content container clearfix">  <div class="tab-content"> <div class="tab-pane fade in active" id="biography" role="tabpanel"> <section class="achiever--biography"> <div class="row"> <header class="editorial-article__header col-md-8 col-md-offset-2 text-xs-center"> <i class="icon-icon_bio text-brand-primary"></i> <h3 class="serif-3 quote-marks">I learned how to order my thoughts, and most important, learned how to develop a plan. I discovered the power of a plan. If you can plan it out, and it seems logical to you, you can do it. And that was the secret to success.</h3> </header> </div> <div class="row"> <aside class="col-md-4 sidebar clearfix"> <h2 class="serif-3 p-b-1">Modern-Day Captain Nemo</h2> <div class="col-xs-12 sidebar--chunk p-b-2"> <dt class="serif-7">Date of Birth</dt> <dd class="sans-2"> June 30, 1942 </dd> </div> </aside> <article class="editorial-article col-md-8"> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"> <html><body><figure id="attachment_16588" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignright"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16588 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16588 size-full lazyload" alt="Commander Robert Ballard, USN, in command beneath the waves. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" width="2280" height="3433" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022-252x380.jpg 252w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022-505x760.jpg 505w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Commander Robert Ballard, USN, in command beneath the waves. (Emory Kristof/National Geographic Society)</figcaption></figure><p>Robert Ballard was born in Kansas, but grew up in San Diego, California, where a childhood fascination with tidal pools and marine life led him to study marine geology. In 1962, when he was only 19 years old, his father, a missile scientist at North American Aviation, helped him get a job at the aerospace company’s Ocean Systems Group. The company was competing for a contract to build a three-man deep-ocean submersible. In later years, Ballard was to spend much of his career in such a vessel, known as ALVIN.</p> <p>Young Ballard earned undergraduate degrees in chemistry and geology at the University of California at Santa Barbara. While at Santa Barbara he participated in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) and earned an army commission. When he was called to active duty during the Vietnam War, he requested a transfer to the Navy, to make better use of his training as a marine geologist. The Navy assigned the young geologist to Woods Hole Oceanographic Research Institute in Massachusetts, where he continued his work in deep submergence. After leaving the Navy, he returned to Woods Hole as a research fellow. He earned a Ph.D. in geology and geophysics in 1974 and went to work at Woods Hole as a full-time marine scientist.</p> <figure id="attachment_16587" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16587 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16587 size-full lazyload" alt="Every detail counts. Robert Ballard and his team study the floor plan of the sunken Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" width="2280" height="1534" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021-380x256.jpg 380w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021-760x511.jpg 760w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Every detail counts. Robert Ballard and his team study the floor plan of the sunken <em>Titanic</em>. (Emory Kristof/NGS)</figcaption></figure><p>His first major expedition, Project Famous, was the first to perform successful field mapping underwater. For more than a decade he spent four months a year at sea, logging countless hours underwater, exploring the uncharted mountain ranges of the ocean floor. Ballard and his team explored the undersea mountain range known as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, and descended 20,000 feet in the Cayman Trough.</p> <p>In these expeditions, Ballard discovered that the entire volume of the earth’s oceans is, over a period of years, recycled through the earth’s crust. This phenomenon explained the mineral composition of sea water for the first time. This stage of Ballard’s career climaxed with the landmark discovery of thermal vents off the Galápagos Islands. Ballard and his crewmates were astounded to find an abundance of plant and animal life in the deep-sea warm springs. Plants found here synthesize food energy chemically, rather than from sunlight, through photosynthesis, as all other vegetation on land and sea does. This discovery has enormous implications for the possibility of life on other planets, as well as here on Earth. Ballard was also among the first to see the “black smokers,” submarine volcanoes in the Pacific Rise, whose emissions are hot enough to melt lead.</p> <figure id="attachment_16583" style="width: 930px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16583 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16583 size-full lazyload" alt="1985: ALVIN is a manned deep-ocean research submersible owned by the United States Navy and operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. ALVIN was involved in the exploration of the wreckage of the Titanic." width="930" height="1197" data-sizes="(max-width: 930px) 100vw, 930px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible.jpg 930w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible-295x380.jpg 295w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible-590x760.jpg 590w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">1985: ALVIN is a manned deep-ocean research submersible owned by the United States Navy and operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. ALVIN was involved in the exploration of the wreckage of the <em>Titanic</em>.</figcaption></figure><p>Not satisfied with the possibilities of undersea research offered by the slow-moving submersible ALVIN, Ballard developed ANGUS (Acoustically Navigated Geological Underwater Survey), a submersible camera which could remain at the ocean floor for 12 to 14 hours, and take up to 16,000 photographs in a single lowering.</p> <p>In 1980, Ballard took a sabbatical from Woods Hole to teach at Stanford University in California. While there, he conceived a new automated system, for undersea exploration: a maneuverable, remote-controlled photographic robot which broadcasts live images to a remote monitor, where a large team of scientists can survey the ocean floor continuously and maneuver the remote camera. By now, Ballard had earned tenure at Woods Hole, where he had the opportunity to assemble a top-notch team to build such a system. But like all team leaders at Woods Hole, he was required to find his own funding for the project. Ballard took his proposal to the U.S. Navy, and received the go-ahead from Navy Secretary John Lehman in 1982.</p> <figure id="attachment_16589" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16589 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16589 size-full lazyload" alt="September 1985: Robert Ballard and his crew celebrate a successful mission, exploring the wreck of the Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" width="2280" height="1534" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023-380x256.jpg 380w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023-760x511.jpg 760w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">September 1985: Robert Ballard and his crew celebrate a successful mission, exploring the wreck of the <em>Titanic</em>.</figcaption></figure><p>Ballard and his crew embarked on a mission that was to make headlines around the world. Ballard had resolved to find the sunken hulk of RMS <em>Titanic</em>, the supposedly “unsinkable” ocean liner which had sunk, with massive loss of life, after she struck an iceberg on her maiden voyage in 1912. Drawing on all of Ballard’s accumulated expertise in undersea exploration, he and his crew located the wreck, more than two miles beneath the waves of the North Atlantic, on September 1, 1985. Ballard was then forced to wait an excruciating year for weather conditions favorable to a manned mission to view the wreck at close range. The next year, he and a two-man crew, in the ALVIN submersible, made the two-and-a-half-hour descent to the ocean floor to view the wreck firsthand. Over the next few days, they descended again and again and, using the Jason Jr. remote camera, recorded eerie scenes of the ruined interior of the luxury liner.</p> <p>On subsequent expeditions, Ballard perfected the ARGO/JASON system, using it to locate the German battleship <em>Bismarck,</em> sunk in World War II, and the passenger liner <em>Lusitania,</em> sunk by a German torpedo during World War I. In 2002, he located the wreck of John F. Kennedy’s PT-109, the craft commanded by the future president in World War II. To date, he has conducted more than 120 undersea expeditions, pioneering the use of the latest in submarine technology to plunge ever deeper into the mysteries of the ocean.</p> <figure id="attachment_16584" style="width: 1586px" class="wp-caption alignright"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16584 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16584 size-full lazyload" alt="Dr. Robert Ballard speaks at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston, Veterans Day, 2002. Ballard found the wreck of Kennedy's boat, PT-109, off the Solomon Islands. The PT boat, of which the young Kennedy was captain, was sunk by the Japanese during World War II. (AP Images/Steven Senne)" width="1586" height="2000" data-sizes="(max-width: 1586px) 100vw, 1586px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018.jpg 1586w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018-301x380.jpg 301w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018-603x760.jpg 603w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">2002: Ballard speaks at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston, Veterans Day. Ballard found the wreck of Kennedy’s boat, PT-109, off the Solomon Islands. The PT boat, of which the young Kennedy was captain, was sunk by the Japanese during World War II. (AP Images)</figcaption></figure><p>In 1989, Ballard founded the JASON Project to bring the wonders of the earth, air and sea to classrooms around the world. More than 1.7 million students have participated in JASON programs, learning about natural phenomena — from volcanoes to storm systems — and viewing live transmissions from JASON robots as they explore the undersea world. Dr. Ballard has received numerous awards and honors for his discoveries, including the Lindbergh Award, the Explorers Medal and the Hubbard Medal of the National Geographic Society. In 2003, President George W. Bush presented him with the National Endowment for the Humanities Medal in a ceremony at the White House.</p> <p>Today, Robert Ballard is an Explorer in Residence at the National Geographic Society. He is also President of Ocean Exploration Trust, the Institute for Exploration in Mystic, Connecticut; Scientist Emeritus at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; and Director of the Institute for Archaeological Oceanography at the University of Rhode Island.</p> <p>In recent years, much of his exploration has centered on the Mediterranean, the Aegean, and most intriguingly, the Black Sea, where a unique combination of fresh water and salt water has preserved sunken ships for centuries. In the Black Sea, Ballard has located ships lost at the time of the Roman Empire, some dating as far back as the second century AD. In some cases, entire deck structures have been found intact, along with cargo in the forms of <em>amphorae</em> — ceramic jars used to transport oils, wine or honey. Subsequent explorations, following through on Dr. Ballard’s work, have located more than 40 wrecked vessels of the Roman, Byzantine, Venetian and Ottoman Empires.</p> <p>In 2008, Dr. Ballard acquired the <em>E/V Nautilus</em>, his primary exploration vessel, operated by the Ocean Exploration Trust with partial funding from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The vessel spends four to five months at sea every year. A high bandwidth satellite link streams video of his explorations on <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://www.nautiluslive.org/" target="_blank">Nautilus Live</a>. Robert Ballard has conducted more than 150 deep sea expeditions, plumbing ancient mysteries, and uncovering the history that has been lost for centuries beneath the waves.</p></body></html> <div class="clearfix"> </div> </article> </div> </section> </div> <div class="tab-pane fade" id="profile" role="tabpanel"> <section class="clearfix"> <header class="editorial-article__header"> <figure class="text-xs-center"> <img class="inductee-badge" src="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/themes/aoa/assets/images/inducted-badge@2x.png" alt="Inducted Badge" width="120" height="120"/> <figcaption class="serif-3 text-brand-primary"> Inducted in 1990 </figcaption> </figure> </header> <div class="row"> <aside class="col-md-4 sidebar"> <dl class="clearfix m-b-0"> <div class="col-xs-12 sidebar--chunk p-b-2"> <dt class="serif-7">Career</dt> <dd class="sans-2"> <div><a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/#filter=.chemist">Chemist</a></div> <div><a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/#filter=.explorer">Explorer</a></div> </dd> </div> <div class="col-xs-12 sidebar--chunk p-b-2"> <dt class="serif-7">Date of Birth</dt> <dd class="sans-2"> June 30, 1942 </dd> </div> </dl> </aside> <article class="col-md-8 editorial-article clearfix"> <p class="inputTextFirst">“Captain Nemo in <i>20,000 Leagues Under the Sea</i> by Jules Verne is who I always wanted to be. Absolutely no doubt about it. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus.”</p> <p class="inputText">Like many young readers before him, Robert Ballard dreamed of becoming an undersea explorer after reading of Jules Verne’s <i>20,0000 Leagues Under the Sea.</i> Unlike most of Verne’s readers, Ballard went on to realize his dream.</p> <p class="inputText">For more than ten years, Ballard spent four months of every year at sea, and much of that time miles of feet below the water’s surface, exploring the uncharted mountain ranges of the ocean floor. While his discoveries of undersea volcanoes and chemosynthetic life in the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos islands have earned him a place in the history of science, his expeditions to discover the wrecks of such famous lost ships as the <em>Titanic</em>, the <em>Lusitania</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em> also earned him a place in the headlines.</p> <p class="inputText">His discoveries, and the amazing vehicles he has built to perform his explorations, are even more remarkable than the fanciful adventures of Jules Verne’s Captain Nemo.</p> </article> </div> </section> </div> <div class="tab-pane fade" id="interview" role="tabpanel"> <section class="clearfix"> <div class="col-md-12 interview-feature-video"> <figure> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/Zeyxy6TA3fA?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0&end=3946&version=3" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.01_14_54_00.Still005-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.01_14_54_00.Still005-760x428.jpg"></div> <div class="video-tag sans-4"> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> <div class="video-tag__text">Watch full interview</div> </div> </div> </figure> </div> <header class="col-md-12 text-xs-center m-b-2"> <i class="icon-icon_bio text-brand-primary"></i> </header> <aside class="col-md-4 sidebar"> <h2 class="serif-3 achiever--biography-subtitle">Modern-Day Captain Nemo</h2> <div class="sans-2">Woods Hole, Massachusetts</div> <div class="sans-2">February 13, 1991</div> </aside> <article class="editorial-article col-md-8">   <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <p class="inputtextfirst"><b>In the early 1980s you were already a veteran of many missions in the ALVIN deep-ocean submersible, and had begun developing the ARGO/JASON system you would eventually use to find the wrecks of the <em>Titanic</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em>. How did the <em>Titanic</em> come to be a part of this?</b></p> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/UruKo033jNI?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_59_11_23.Still020-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_59_11_23.Still020-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p class="inputtext">Robert Ballard: I began the development of the ARGO/JASON system, which was a seven-year development, to go from my dream to reality. Along the way I was building systems and testing them. So, from 1982 to 1989, I was developing a new mousetrap. I wasn’t ready to do what I had designed it for: a full-fledged scientific expedition. That takes place this August. August of 1991 is my first chance to do what I dreamed of doing ten years ago. For that ten years, I was building my equipment and testing it. So, the <em>Titanic</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em> were a part of my engineering test program. They weren’t designed to do science; it was designed to prove I could do science. It just turned out to be what most people got interested in. I did not do all this to find the <em>Titanic</em> and the <em>Bismarck</em>. They were a by-product, now very important to the public, but that isn’t what I set out to do. I set out to build this to do exploration. My reason for developing the ARGO/JASON system was to improve my ability to explore the mountains of the sea, which I have been doing all of my life. I wasn’t ready to take that tool down and do that scientific thing. But I could do other things. So I said, well, here we are at Woods Hole, we are building Argo, we’ve got to go and test it, and we will probably go out here in the deepest water that we can get to. Well guess who’s out there? The <em>Titanic</em> is out there. Now if the <em>Titanic</em> had been in the Indian Ocean, I probably would have never found it. But the fact that it was in my backyard, I went, “Let’s go find the <em>Titanic</em>.”</p> </div> </div>      <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"> <html><body><figure id="attachment_16593" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16593 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16593 size-full lazyload" alt="RMS Titanic departing Southampton on April 10, 1912." width="2280" height="1677" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic-380x280.jpg 380w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic-760x559.jpg 760w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">RMS <em>Titanic</em> departing Southampton. The British passenger liner sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in the early morning of April 15, 1912 after colliding with an iceberg during her maiden voyage. Of the 2,224 passengers and crew aboard, more than 1,500 died in the sinking, making it one of the deadliest maritime disasters in history.</figcaption></figure><p><strong>Of course the <em>Titanic</em> couldn’t be more famous, right?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I didn’t know that at the time. I knew it was a neat ship, but I didn’t know that it could hit this magic chord. I was completely surprised by the world’s response to our discovery of the <em>Titanic</em>. I thought they would say “Hey, that’s sort of neat. Next.” But I still can’t get away from finding the <em>Titanic</em>. It’s going to track me to the grave.</p> <p><strong>What was the date when you found it?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: September 1, 1985.</p> <figure id="attachment_16592" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16592 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16592 size-full lazyload" alt="Front page of the New York Times, April 16, 1912. (© New York Times, 1912)" width="2280" height="3047" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912-284x380.jpg 284w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912-569x760.jpg 569w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Front page of the <em>New York Times</em>, April 16, 1912. (© New York Times, 1912)</figcaption></figure><p><strong>At some point in this project though, the poetry of the <em>Titanic</em> must have struck you.</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: That came later. When I first set out after the <em>Titanic</em>, it was sort of a mechanical, technical problem. My soul was not in it. My mind was in it. But in the course of getting ready, I had to study it, and I met a man by the name of Bill Tantum, who died just before I found the <em>Titanic</em>. Bill was the soul of the <em>Titanic</em>. He lived in Connecticut, and he started the <em>Titanic</em> Historical Society. He had been injured in Korea, always wanted to be a career Army officer, but he got hurt. His dream went away, and he needed a new dream, and it became the <em>Titanic</em>. This man lived and breathed Captain Smith. When you sat and talked with him, you talked with the past. He knew how many buttons the Captain had on his uniform. He knew everything about it. I was going after him in a very investigative reporter way, but in the course of asking those questions, I had to listen to all this other stuff. It enters your soul, that tragedy. I wasn’t terribly conscious of that, until I found it. Then it blew me right over, like a truck ran over the top of me. It was months before I could deal with it emotionally. It was a complete surprise.</p> <p><strong>When did you go back to dive on it?</strong></p></body></html> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/tVA1rj-Jleg?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_42_38_23.Still028-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_42_38_23.Still028-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> <figcaption class="achiever__interview-video-terms"> <span>Keys to success —</span> <a class="comma-item" href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/keys-to-success/courage/">Courage</a> </figcaption> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p>Robert Ballard: After finding the <em>Titanic</em> in September of 1985, I had to wait an entire year before I could go back. The longest year of my life waiting to go back for the weather window to open up. We got back out there. We went out with ALVIN and our little JJ, the vehicle I wanted to send inside to investigate the <em>Titanic</em>. Beautiful weather — gosh, it was gorgeous. It was the summer season, the perfect time to dive. We went out. We had satellite navigation. We knew exactly where the <em>Titanic</em> was. We put in our tracking network, and I got into ALVIN, buttoned up, put it over the side, pulled the valves, to vent it, and down we went. We now began to fall like a big rock for two-and-a-half hours; we’re falling towards the <em>Titanic</em> with all this great anticipation. For the first time seeing it, landing on its deck, tasting it, having it pop into reality from the myth that it was living in, to make it real. Falling through total darkness, and then everything started to go to hell. Everything. We started to have our maiden voyage. The first thing that started to happen was the sonar stopped working, so we couldn’t sweep out and find the ship. Well, that’s okay, because I’ve got my tracking, and I know where I am, and I’ll just drive over there. Then the tracking went out. So now I don’t know where I am. I can’t reach out. All I am is a ball somewhere in the ocean, with a little window. Am I a mile from the <em>Titanic</em>? Is it behind me? Is it in front of me? Is it right or left? Then the submarine starts to take on water into the battery systems, and the alarms start coming on. And, the pilot’s looking at me. We haven’t got sonar, we haven’t got tracking, we are becoming deaf, dumb, and blind down there, and on top of that, the submarine is taking on water, and it’s penetrating into the batteries, and it’s starting to short circuit the batteries. It’s just turning into a disaster, and the pilot says, “Look, we are going to have to abort.” “No! No, no, no. Come on, I’ve waited so long for this moment. Don’t abort the dive.”</p> </div> </div>      <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <p class="inputText">He said, “We’re going to watch it, if it gets too much water, I’ve got to get us out of here. If we destroy the batteries, the expedition is over, and you will never see the <em>Titanic</em>.” We went down, and the batteries’ alarms are screaming; he is turning it down so it doesn’t blast in our ears. The bottom comes into view, and it’s just mud. I’m sitting there, and he says, “Well, now what?” All that three-dimensionality in my brain is taking in all this limited data. I’m looking at the currents, I’m looking at everything and my brain just said, “It’s over there.”</p> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/J5qIUrSRPC0?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0&end=91&version=3" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_51_11_27.Still029-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_51_11_27.Still029-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p class="inputtext">We brought the submarine around, and started driving. The alarms are getting worse, and he says, “We’ve got minutes, Bob. We’ve got to get out of here.” “Keep going. Speed up, go faster.” Then I saw a clump of mud, like a mud ball. Like someone had a snow fight. Well, they’re not supposed to be down there. And then there were a few more. I said, “Turn over towards those mud balls.” What it was is the <em>Titanic</em> had hit with such force, it just threw mud balls everywhere, and we were seeing the splatter. I said, “Follow that splatter,” and the mud balls got bigger and bigger and bigger. Finally, out of my window on the starboard side, there is a wall of mud, like a giant bulldozer had just been down there bulldozing the bottom of the ocean. And I said, “Ralph, it’s right around the corner.” We came around the corner and it was in my view port. There was this wall of steel. Like the slab in 2001, like the walls of Troy at night. It was just big, the end of the universe. It just was there as a statement. We came in and I just looked out of my window — I had to look up — because the <em>Titanic</em> shot up a hundred and some feet above me. I’m down at the very keel, and I just went “My God.”</p> </div> </div>      <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"> <html><body><p>Then we aborted the dive, and we were out of there. I saw it for 12 seconds.</p> <figure id="attachment_16586" style="width: 2280px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16586 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16586 size-full lazyload" alt="Using the Jason Jr. remote camera system, Dr. Ballard and his crew explore the ruined interior of the sunken Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" width="2280" height="1534" data-sizes="(max-width: 2280px) 100vw, 2280px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020.jpg 2280w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020-380x256.jpg 380w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020-760x511.jpg 760w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Using the Jason Jr. remote camera system, Ballard and his crew explore the ruined interior of the sunken <em>Titanic</em>.</figcaption></figure><p><strong>You and your crew were the first people to see the <em>Titanic</em> for how many years after it hit that iceberg?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Well, the <em>Titanic</em> hit the iceberg April 14, 1912, at 11:40 p.m. It sank the next morning at 2:20 a.m., April 15. And we were there on September 1, so it was over 73 years since it had vanished.</p> <p><strong>Did you feel at that point that history kind of struck you in the face?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Of course. You know, it’s interesting, when you look back into time. In 1912, the very early moving picture cameras were around, but the world was black and white. When you think of the past, you think of it as if there was no color, and it sort of distances you from that. Black and white always sort of distances you. Even when we first found the <em>Titanic</em> in 1985, our cameras were black and white cameras. So it was still black and white. It wasn’t until I saw it in color that it zoomed from the past to the present, like a lightning bolt, and there it was in today’s reality.</p></body></html> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/kRT-w4wNMIM?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0&end=55&version=3" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_00_59_07.Still026-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_00_59_07.Still026-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> <figcaption class="achiever__interview-video-terms"> <span>Keys to success —</span> <a class="comma-item" href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/keys-to-success/passion/">Passion</a> </figcaption> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p class="inputtext">The real thing that got me, when the goose bumps were having goose bumps, was after we fixed the submarine and came down on the second dive. That’s when we made love. Because we came in on the bow and landed, and it was clunk, clunk. It was like Armstrong on the moon. And you took on the ten-degree list of the <em>Titanic</em>. It was listing to the starboard, and you listed. You just sat there. “We… are… on… the… deck of the <em>Titanic</em>. Oh my God!” And you just looked out the windows and just looked at it.</p> </div> </div>      <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <p><strong>Did the discovery of the <em>Titanic</em> change your life in any way?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Dramatically, in good ways and bad ways. Mostly good ways.</p> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/8Tq-FeAy4dQ?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0&end=73&version=3" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_26_42_17.Still024-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_26_42_17.Still024-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> <figcaption class="achiever__interview-video-terms"> <span>Keys to success —</span> <a class="comma-item" href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/keys-to-success/integrity/">Integrity</a> </figcaption> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p class="inputtext">I had a chance to warm up to success. I had that ego thing that you go through of being on television and newspapers, and all of that sort of thing when the media has their meal with you. I had done that on a smaller scale. So, when this big thing came, I think I had a proper frame of mind about it. A lot of people who succeed, the ones that do it overnight, it can ruin them. But the ones that work at it for a long, long time, like some stars who get discovered after a 30-year career, they tend to handle it better than the people that are a star in their first movie. I’m thankful that I was prepared, as much as you could be, for something like that. It still was quite an experience, but I think I kept my feet on the ground through it all. You can’t take it too seriously when the spotlight, to some degree arbitrarily, says “Now you are famous.” You say, “Well, I don’t feel any different.” The key is: don’t act any different then.</p> </div> </div>      <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"> <html><body><figure id="attachment_16590" style="width: 1026px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><noscript><img class="wp-image-16590 size-full " src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043im_/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024.jpg"></noscript><img class="wp-image-16590 size-full lazyload" alt="Dr. Robert D. Ballard, undersea explorer. (© National Geographic Society)" width="1026" height="1368" data-sizes="(max-width: 1026px) 100vw, 1026px" data-srcset="/web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024.jpg 1026w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024-285x380.jpg 285w, /web/20170606114043im_/http://www.achievement.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024-570x760.jpg 570w" data-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043/http://162.243.3.155/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024.jpg"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Dr. Robert D. Ballard, undersea explorer. (Nat Geo)</figcaption></figure><p>It’s one thing to climb to the top of the mountain, it’s another thing to stay there. To stay there, you have to be pretty stable about it, and know what you are up against, and use it in a productive way. I think finding the <em>Titanic</em> has helped my career because people believe me when I say I have a new dream. Some people say “Why did you find the <em>Bismarck</em>?” To some degree, to prove it wasn’t luck.</p> <p><strong>Was it anticlimactic, in a way, going for the <em>Bismarck</em>?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: The <em>Bismarck</em> was more difficult technically, not anticlimactic. I didn’t expect the <em>Bismarck</em> to be on the Richter scale of the <em>Titanic</em>, but it registered pretty strong. I think the television special we created on the <em>Bismarck</em> — which won an Emmy for the best documentary — was a better film. I think the book we did on the <em>Bismarck</em> was a better book. It was more difficult, but I accept the fact that it isn’t the <em>Titanic</em>.</p></body></html> </div>     <div class="achiever__video-block"> <figure class="achiever__interview-video"> <div class="embed-responsive embed-responsive-16by9"> <iframe class="embed-responsive-item embed-responsive--has-thumbnail" width="200" height="150" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20170606114043if_/https://www.youtube.com/embed/3yrGmWgjqDA?feature=oembed&autohide=1&hd=1&color=white&modestbranding=1&rel=0&showinfo=0&theme=light&start=0&end=21&version=3" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <div class="embed-responsive__thumbnail ratio-container__image lazyload" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_17_01_07.Still003-380x214.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Ballard-Bob-1991-Upscale-1of4.00_17_01_07.Still003-760x428.jpg"></div> <i class="embed-responsive__play icon-icon_play-full text-brand-primary"></i> </div> </figure>  <div class="achiever__interview-video__copy"> <p class="inputtext">I don’t want on my gravestone: “Bob Ballard, Discoverer of the <em>Titanic</em>.” I want “Bob Ballard, Explorer.” I’ve got many years to prove that point still left ahead of me. The <em>Titanic</em> is going to help me, but I don’t want to stop right now.</p> </div> </div>     <aside class="collapse" id="full-interview">    <div class="achiever__interview-copy"> <p><strong>Presumably the <em>Bismarck</em> helped you, too, in some ways, didn’t it?</strong></p> <p>The <em>Bismarck</em> helped with the momentum. It showed it wasn’t luck. I am now embarked upon several major programs of that ilk, that are being funded by National Geographic. I can’t wait to get started. I am looking into the future, not the past. I can’t wait to get going in the next project.</p> <p><strong>To the general public, you are probably best known as the scientist who finds the wrecks of famous ships. How do you see yourself?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I think of myself as an explorer. I’m very romantic. I grew up as a child reading stories of Marco Polo and Jules Verne’s <em>20,000 Leagues Under the Sea</em>. I think throughout man’s history, there have been explorers. A lot of people think there is no longer a place for them to live. There is, particularly in the ocean. So that’s what I am.</p> <p><strong>Was this always your interest? What kind of books did you like to read when you were a kid?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Adventure books. Generally a mix between fiction and non-fiction. I loved <em>The Travels of Marco Polo.</em> It amazed me how he would walk — maybe 30 miles a day is what a human being can walk back then — and he would go from one world to another world. And the one world he could go to was like Eden, an incredibly wonderful place, and down the road was Hell. And how there was such diversity on our planet. Now you find McDonald’s everywhere. But there was a diversity of the human species that mimicked other life. The true beauty of this planet is its diversity, not its sameness. So Marco Polo just opened up my eyes to the diversity of the human experience. Jules Verne opened me up to the fantasies of the time machine. I loved <em>20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.</em> Captain Nemo! Here was a person who built his own submarine, using advanced technology, nuclear energy before anyone even knew that it existed. He was a technologist, but he was an adventurer. He explored beneath the sea. He had a giant window, and he saw the sea through that window, and that’s exactly what I’m doing. I always had this dream of being inside his ship, the Nautilus. I even went to Disneyland and rode it. I lived near Disneyland, and that had a lot of impact on me, I’m sure.</p> <p><strong>Some people believe that from birth their lives are pre-destined. When you were growing up, what did you think you wanted to be?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: What I am. A high-tech, modern-day Captain Nemo. Absolutely no doubt about it. I always wanted to do what I’m doing, as long as I can remember. All kids dream a marvelous images of what they want to do. But then society tells them they can’t do it. I didn’t listen. I wanted to live my dream. So I broke it up into little bite-sized pieces.</p> <p><strong>Where did you grow up? </strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: San Diego. Our family was the first family to grow up in the Claremont development. There were 40 houses. I used to go and hunt tarantulas with BB guns. San Diego was an incredible place to be introduced to the sea, back in the late ’40s, early ’50s.</p> <p>I used to love to go down to tidal pools. What an adventure a tidal pool is! The tide comes in, covers the rocks, and then it goes away, and it traps life from the sea, and they can’t get away. It’s like a nature-made aquarium. You look around and there’s fish, crabs and all sorts of things. Then they get washed away and in twelve hours there will be a new aquarium. I loved tidal pools. I also loved the tide, when it would come in, and you’d find adventure washed up on your shore. Like a Robinson Crusoe walking along, and seeing a float that had come from Japan, that had crossed the Pacific Ocean, a third of our planet, and just washed up at your feet. It was so exciting, I couldn’t wait to go and walk the tide line and see what treasures were waiting for me.</p> <p><strong>Explorers are, to some extent, risk takers. As a child, did you enjoy taking risks and having adventures, like Captain Nemo?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Oh, yes. I think all kids live on the edge, until they are beaten back from it. I think all kids are born explorers. All kids are born scientists. All kids ask “Why?” The first dialogue you’ll ever have with your children begins, “But why?” And then you’ll explain. And they’ll say, “But why?” That “why?” can take you all the way back to the origin of the universe. I think people are born curious, and they have it pounded out of them. I was in an environment that encouraged it, not discouraged it.</p> <p><strong>Did your teachers recognize that you had a special talent? Did any of them take a real interest in you?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: To most of my teachers I was just a pain in the neck. I was full of energy. I was a bubbly vat of energy. I was hyperactive and I was all over the place, and that can be disruptive. I can be very disruptive. So most people would rather say, “Slow that guy down or get him out of here.” But then, fortunately, there is always one out of a hundred teachers who loves that characteristic about a person, and those are the people that always encouraged me. All through my life, I can point to someone at a critical point, when I was ready to quit, who said, “Keep it up.” That I respected. You’re always going to be criticized if you’re a “doer.” You have to make sure you know who to listen to. You need to pick out certain people who you have great respect for, and listen to them. I’ve always had those mentors throughout my life, whether it was in the Navy, business, academia — even in sports — that I listened to.</p> <p><strong>Let’s start with academia. What did you really expect and what did you get?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I learned how to think. I learned how to problem-solve. I learned how to bust things up and develop a logic tree. Classic example was, someone asked me, “How many barbers are there in the United States?” Now how would you dissect that question? You can calculate it, if you just run a number. You take the population of the United States, 250 million, you cut it in half, because half are women. Then you say, how many of those would have a haircut? Well, one year-olds don’t. How many haircuts do you have in a year? How many haircuts can a barber give in a day? Before you know it, the number spits out: the right answer, or doggone close. So I learned how to order my thoughts, and most important, learned how to develop a plan. I discovered the power of a plan. If you can plan it out, and it seems logical to you, you can do it. And that was the secret to success.</p> <p><strong>You are also the director of the Center for Marine Exploration at Woods Hole Oceanographic Center. What kinds of degrees do you have?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I have several different degrees. I went to the University of California, Santa Barbara, right on the ocean. Beautiful place, I took two degrees there. Majored in chemistry and geology and I minored in math and physics. So I got a very good basis in the physical sciences. When I was at Santa Barbara, I went into the Army ROTC program, so I had an Army commission. My graduate degrees are in geology and geophysics. When I finished my undergraduate degree in 1965, I went off to graduate school at the University of Hawaii Institute of Geophysics. I trained porpoises and whales to make a living. I loved that. Then I transferred to the University of Southern California, and while at the University of Southern California, I was called into the military, during Vietnam. I requested to be transferred to a branch of service that would utilize my skills in oceanography. They accepted it and Army intelligence transferred me into the United States Navy.</p> <p><strong>When the Navy got you, they got a trained marine geologist. They sent you to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. What was that like? What did they put you to work doing?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Woods Hole is the most incredible organization I have ever worked with. You don’t work for it, you work with it. Woods Hole is the wild west underwater, as far as I’m concerned. It’s a non-profit, but private, institution. When you first come here, they sort of put two guns to your head. One is: up or out on the tenure track. You start here as a young Ph.D., and then you have eight or ten years to make tenure. Eighty percent don’t make it. I got tenure in 1980. Now, once you get tenure, they take one gun away, but that other one is always there, and that means you have to fund yourself. They don’t fund me; I pay them to be here. I rent their flag, if you will. I do expeditions under their name, but I have to raise the money, so I have to be an entrepreneur.</p> <p><strong>When you first went there, the Navy was paying your salary, right?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I was the Navy’s liaison officer for the first three of my 23 years at Woods Hole. I thought I had finished my Navy career in 1970, when I went back to graduate school to finish my Ph.D. I came back aboard Woods Hole as a scientist, but the Navy put be back in several years ago. I’m a commander in the United States Navy.</p> <p><strong>Did the Navy put you to work experimenting with new equipment? Where did you begin experimenting? Was it then?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: No. My first brush with exploration technology was when I was in high school. My father helped me get a job at North American Aviation, in a new budding group called the Ocean Systems Group. They were bidding on a contract to build a submarine for the academic community. This was 1962, and that submarine was ALVIN. I was 19 years old, and I was able to actually work as a small person, a little cog in a big machine. They didn’t get the contract, but that was my introduction to deep submergence. The first time that I ever dove in a submarine was as a naval officer here at Woods Hole. When I left the Navy and got my doctorate, I was still in the ALVIN program. I’ve continued to dive, to this day.</p> <p><strong>When you began diving in ALVIN with the Navy, what was the purpose of those dives? Were you taking that submarine down to see if it would crack in two, or catch on fire? Was this a dangerous thing?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: In the early years of the ALVIN program there was a lot of danger. The first years of deep submergence were to de-bug it, and make it work as a system, so it became routine. In the early years, there was a lot of apprehension about a deep dive: Was everything going to work? Were you going to come back? As you did it over and over again, it became real routine.</p> <p>Like the space shuttle, you could never lose sight of the fact that you were doing something dangerous. It may be apparently routine, but if you mess up, it will bite you, and it has over the years. I had a fire once — not in ALVIN, in a French bathyscaphe — at 9,000 feet, and almost died. I crashed into the side of a volcano at 20,000 feet and almost died. I got stuck in a crack for hours and almost died. Now I don’t mean that it’s really risky. It’s probably safer than flying from here to La Guardia. Those planes fall out of the sky, and they crash and burn, and I suspect more people per hours have actually died in airplanes than in deep submergence. Only one person has ever died in a deep submersible, only one.</p> <p><strong>Up to the 1980s, your expeditions were all about searching for scientific data. You made discoveries that were helpful in solving certain scientific problems. You went after the famous sunken ships after you developed the ARGO/JASON system. What was the reason for that change?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I used ALVIN until I was convinced that there was a better mouse trap. We were starting to reach diminishing returns with our technology. I was up for tenure; it was a cross-roads in my life. I wanted to get out and stand back and look at it and think about it. Otherwise, I’d just keep going on without any thought. So I said, I’m going to get out of the submarine and decompress. I’m going to not dive for a year, I’m going to go to Stanford and sit on a mountain and think about it.</p> <p>So in 1980, I was teaching geophysics at Stanford as a sabbatical. That’s when I dreamed up the ARGO/JASON system. Then I had to come back and convince someone to fund it, which is a story unto itself. It did not occur the way it was supposed to occur, because things never occur the way they’re supposed to occur.</p> <p>But I finally convinced a person, the Secretary of the Navy, John Lehman, that he ought to bet on me, and he did. The Navy funded the ARGO/JASON system. He was that type of person I described, who knew enough, just looking me in the eye. I sent the right message to him, and he said, “Do it.”</p> <p><strong>What do you think the message was that he received, as the representative of the Navy?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I had paid my dues, and I had succeeded. I knew what I was talking about. I was sincerely committed to it. I really wanted to do it, it was important, and I could do it. So he said, “You can’t ask for much more, go do it.” He authorized the program, and I went and did it.</p> <p><strong>From the standpoint of advancing scientific knowledge, which of your accomplishments are you most proud of?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I would say the discovery of the hydrothermal vents off the Galápagos Islands. That really turned science upside down. Until that time, there were a lot of things we didn’t know about the ocean. We didn’t know why it was salty. We didn’t know why it had the chemistry that it had.</p> <p>The most obvious way minerals come into the sea is from rivers. The problem is: when you compare a bucket of water from the ocean with a bucket of water from a major river like the Amazon, the chemistries don’t make sense. It wasn’t until we found these underwater hot thermal springs that we discovered the ocean itself is going inside the earth and out every six million years. The whole volume of the world’s oceans actually goes inside the earth, and we never knew that. Once we learned that, we could finally make sense of the chemistry of the sea, and make all of our mass balance equations balance for the first time. That was exciting.</p> <p>Plus the animals that we found living in these hot springs turned the world upside down. We discovered the first major ecosystem ever found that does not live off the energy of the sun, but the energy of the earth itself. This changes all those thoughts about how life began on our planet. It changes the thoughts about the potential for life on other planets. You don’t have to have a sun nearby. You can live off the energy of the planet itself. It’s called chemosynthesis. Little bacteria, thermophilic bacteria, figured out how to replicate photosynthesis in the dark, how to fix carbon and start a food chain.</p> <p><strong>What do these creatures look like?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Pretty gross, actually. There are worms that are eight feet long and, if you cut them, they bleed like a human. There are clams that are a foot across but when you open them, they look like liver. Bizarre fish. It’s like that movie where they descended into a volcano and found another world, but this was real.</p> <p><strong>In some of your expeditions, you also gained certain knowledge about earthquakes.</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: That’s right. We were the first group to ever enter the largest mountain range on our planet, the Mid-Ocean Ridge. This mountain range covers 23 percent of the earth’s total surface area. Almost a quarter of our planet is one mountain range, and we didn’t even know it existed in its totality until 1960. We had landed on the moon before we had entered this mountain range on earth in 1973. I was fortunate to be one of the first human beings to go into this mountain range.</p> <p><strong>How deep down was that, and what did you find there?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: You have to go down about eight to nine thousand feet to enter a deep valley that’s called the Rift Valley. In the Atlantic Ocean, it’s called the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. You enter the mountain range, go down into this deep valley, and on the floor of this valley are hundreds and hundreds of active volcanoes. There are more earthquakes taking place in the adjoining fault systems of this mountain range than all the earthquakes on land by a factor of probably ten or 100. There are many more volcanoes, belching out molten lava, underneath the ocean than above. But no one knew that. No one had ever gone down there.</p> <p><strong>Did they belch when you were down there?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: If they did, we’d be dead. It’s like Hawaii; you can go there even though there are recent volcanoes. We have yet to observe one erupt. We know they erupt because we see their products. We know when they’re erupting, because we can hear them on our seismic networks. Fortunately we haven’t been there when one erupted. There was an expedition recently, where one erupted and the ship vanished. Everyone died. So you’ve got to be careful around these things.</p> <p><strong>Did you find any information that would help you predict when we’re going to have earthquakes here?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: The whole objective of earth science, is to understand the earth. I view the earth as a living organism. Now it’s very difficult for normal people to view the earth as alive. Let’s say you were interviewing a butterfly — or a Mayfly. A Mayfly lives for four or five days. Say that Mayfly was standing on the branch of a giant Sequoia tree in California, which lives for thousands of years. If you were to ask that Mayfly, “Do you perceive this branch that you are standing on as being alive?” The Mayfly would say, “Of course not. I’ve been here my entire life, four days, and the branch hasn’t done a doggone thing.” Yet when you look at the tree in our context, it is very much alive. It started with a seed, and it grew. Well, the earth is very much like that tree, and mankind is very much like that Mayfly. If we are lucky, we will live a hundred years. We are standing on a planet that was born four and a half billion years ago. It looked very different when it was born; it evolved and has changed. Africa used to be just outside the window here. Morocco was connected to Cape Cod. Beneath this building are rocks from Africa. It’s hard to imagine that. But if you were to sit on the moon, and look at the earth and blink your eyes once every million years, it would come blossoming to life.</p> <p>So what we, as scientists, try to do, is to look at its four and one-half billion-year history and see it start as a child, and grow up and become a young adolescent. Some day the earth will probably die, like Mars did, and Venus did, but right now it’s a thriving adult. Given that view of the earth as a living, thriving organism, our science, and what we try to do underwater, is to see how the earth does its thing. What it does in this mountain range is create its outer skin, the lithosphere. It does it very systematically.</p> <p><strong>You’ve invented new systems to make these discoveries. Would you list those among your accomplishments?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: There are two aspects of my life as an explorer. You want to go explore, but you need the tools to explore. In my particular field, you can’t go down to Sears and Roebuck and buy them. General Motors doesn’t build my robots. I have to develop my tools myself. So half of my life is exploring, and the other half is building tools to do it better the next time.</p> <p>The major innovation that we have developed is to move away from manned exploration, to teleoperated exploration, or remote presence. There has always been this debate in space: do you send an astronaut, or do you send an unmanned space probe? We send a hybrid of both. It’s not manned and it’s not unmanned. A teleoperated system is robot-controlled, on a second-by-second basis, by human beings. But the human isn’t physically there. The average depth of the ocean is 12,000 feet; 50 percent is deeper, 50 percent is shallower. The <em>Titanic</em>, for example, sits at 12,000 feet. It took me two and a half hours to get to the <em>Titanic</em> in the morning, and two and a half hours to get home at night. I had to commute five hours a day to work, and I was only allowed to work for three hours before I had to go back up. What we’ve done is develop robots that can go down and stay down. They are connected to humans, by a fiber optic tether, and that permits us to explore 24 hours a day. That’s been my major technological contribution: to develop the first full remotely operated robotic systems for deep sea exploration.</p> <p><strong>Let’s talk about your first project. This was the one where you explored that mountain range. You found a new form of life down there. It was a very important expedition. Who did you have to go to, to talk to, and convince?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I’ll never forget that day. Deep submersibles were evolving as a technology, but they hadn’t been accepted yet. The geophysical community, the big gurus, viewed it as a toy, a plaything that couldn’t possibly do anything important, because it hadn’t done anything important up to that point. I remember that the National Academy of Sciences, which is a pretty high-falutin’ outfit, had a meeting in Princeton in the early 1970s review our understanding of our planet. The plate tectonic theory had just blasted all over the countryside. It was exciting, but they needed a new phase in higher detail.</p> <p>I was a graduate student and K. O. Emery, my mentor, had me present to this august body. Very scary. My knees were knocking. These were all the big gods of the earth. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Princeton, but they have the old classrooms that are just like an operating pit. You stand there and you look up, and it’s sort of intimidating. I got done and a very preeminent scientist — I won’t say who he is, because he is still very preeminent — stood up and said, “That’s cute, but tell me one significant thing a manned submersible has ever done.” We hadn’t. I didn’t have an answer. I was standing there frozen, and another colleague stood up, and he said “That isn’t the problem. The technology is not at fault; we haven’t dreamed of a way of using them.” Out of that came Project Famous, and the first manned expedition.</p> <p><strong>Your dream encompassed the kind of equipment that you were developing. Right?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Manned submersibles are a part of the total thing we had to work on. You can’t run around the planet with a manned submersible and a flashlight. You have to go to just the right spot, one where the questions are very important. And if you can answer your questions there, it explains thousands and thousands of square miles of real estate. That’s what we had to learn how to do: to focus that technology on the right spot.</p> <p><strong>How did you sell your ideas? Did you tell scientists who might be interested, “You may have thought you couldn’t get down that far, but I’ve got an invention here, that will allow you to do that.” </strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Salesmanship is a critical part of accomplishment in any field. You have to look people in the eye and not blink when you say you can do it. A really good leader, a really good manager, a good decision maker, doesn’t know the details, can’t necessarily follow a specialist through a labyrinth of explanations, but they listen. They get a feeling about whether people are educated and know what they’re doing. Ultimately they have to look the person in the eye and say, “I think this person can do it.” You must be able to transmit to them, through body language, through whatever, that you are confident, you’ve thought it out, you know what you are going to do, and you will take the risks, professionally.</p> <p>The more you build your reputation, the more they know how much you are putting at risk. “He wouldn’t do this if he didn’t think he could do it.” The first time is difficult, because you don’t have any track record. They say, “Who is this person?” I gave my presentation, we went and we did it, and then we went and did another one. Finally you build up a reputation.</p> <p><strong>What had you invented that helped make that first expedition successful?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Back in Project Famous, I made my first major scientific contribution. Geologists had learned how to map on land. They learned how to do their thing mapping that part of the planet that sticks above water, and they had been doing it for hundreds of years, and they had perfected it. It’s called field mapping. But no one had ever applied it underwater. It’s a totally different planet when you go underneath the sea. You are going to another planet that is more hostile than Mars and the moon. You can’t get out, you can’t walk around, the pressures will kill you. The temperatures are freezing, and it’s totally dark. It’s a lot easier to walk around on the moon and work than it is down there. So you had to take that way of doing things and “marine-ize” it, and make it work underwater so that people were comfortable with the quality of the data that you were collecting. And that’s what I did. I was the first scientist to field map underwater.</p> <p><strong>You say working in darkness was a problem. How did you solve that problem?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Fortunately, I can visualize in three-dimensions. I think any good field mapper can look at a map and see the Grand Canyon in three dimensions. You conceptualize, because you can’t see more than 30 or 40 feet under the ocean. So you must have a complete sense of reference. I don’t know whether that’s a gift, a compass that’s built into your brain, like a bird’s ability to migrate. I can know where north, south, east and west is at all times. I can remember where I was, and I can integrate it all in my mind. So when I go down there, I’m not lost. I’m very comfortable in total darkness with just a flashlight. It’s like working in the Rocky Mountains at night in a snowstorm from a helicopter with a spotlight. You can develop that skill. Certain people have that three-dimensional skill set.</p> <p><strong>What about ANGUS, the Acoustically Navigated Geological Underwater Survey? Wasn’t ANGUS a way of taking pictures down there?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: ANGUS was the first vehicle I built with “staying power.” Fundamentally, I’m an observational scientist. I look, I think about what I look at, and I explain it. I’m not a numerical scientist, although I use numbers. I’m basically relying on a Mark I eyeball. Sixty-five percent of the brain processes visual information. We are visual creatures. I look and I try to think about what I see, and explain it. Imagine standing on the moon, and beginning a trip towards a small object in this mountain range. First you see the earth, then you see the continent, then you see the ocean, and if you go under the ocean you see a mountain range, and you are homing in. You have to have all of the technologies that can zoom in, and not get lost each time you change the power on the microscope. You make that transition. So finally, when you get down there in total darkness, and you are looking out your window, you know exactly where on the planet you are, and why that is the key thing to look at. That’s what I do.</p> <p><strong>What other equipment did you invent that helped you do that?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Because I’m a visual creature, ANGUS has the capability to give me massive images. Initially, it was sort of a wind-up toy. You wound up this camera so to speak, and it could take 16,000 photographs at one lowering. I would drop it down, and then for 12 to 14 hours, I would tow it through the valley, bring it up, process all the film, and then look at all the pictures. All those images were my windows into the deep sea. But it was frustrating because the vehicle didn’t have any intelligence, it just took pictures. If I came across something that was really important, I didn’t know about it until 14 hours later, so the vehicle just kept on going, and took awful pictures that weren’t much value. That’s why I developed ARGO. Which was “give it to me now.” I want it in real-time. I want to make decisions now.</p> <p>Science is very much like the game of Clue. Remember that? “The butler did it in the library with the candlestick.” The game of Clue was to get the answer with the minimum amount of clues. Clues are expensive in science, and scientists have finite resources. Can you figure it out with the minimum amount of time and money, and get the answer? We want to optimize our clue gathering. So when we put our robot down we want to be thinking “No, stop. Turn left. No, turn right.” We want to be in charge., because we don’t want to just take a massive look. We want to do a surgical look and get the treasure. It’s sort of like Dungeons and Dragons. Get in there, and find the treasure box, and open it before anyone else can. That’s the game.</p> <p><strong>How does ARGO do that? I mean, do you give the instruction?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: With ARGO, I have two advantages over ALVIN and ANGUS. ALVIN, I had to get inside of, and make this journey to work for three hours, with no friends along to say, well, what do you think? No person knows everything. No person can solve a problem alone. If it’s worth solving, you need help. You want that help all around you, but they wouldn’t fit inside the submarine. So you had to go back and explain things. It was very time consuming, very inefficient. So I built a window up on the surface where I could bring all my friends, and we could look through the window and say, “What do you think?” Not only could I have a lot of people looking through the window with me, I could look through the window 24 hours a day. It was cheaper and it was more comfortable. I had the computers, charts, all sorts of things at my disposal. I had a library behind me, to go and look for facts real quick if I was stumped. I had a video archive. I could call up images and say, “Yeah, that’s it.” You can’t cram that inside a little submarine.</p> <p>ANGUS couldn’t react in real time, there was a big lag. ARGO has the staying power of ANGUS, but it has the human presence of the submarine, so you can sit there and, as you are going along and you are just about to lose it, you go “Turn”. You can control the robot and get it back on track, so its very efficient. The problem is, it’s a data monster. It works 24 hours a day, and you have to go sleep. You have to devise a team that can work together so there is a corporate memory and you don’t repeat one another. That’s the excitement we are in now. How do you handle a machine that’s like HAL in 2001,. How do you handle something that is almost smarter than you are? That’s where we are right now.</p> <p><strong>Is that a real possibility?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: We’re there. Our machines are working harder than we are. They don’t have the element of human frailty. They don’t sleep — I do. They are impatient machines. They say “Get up! Wake up, I’ve got all sorts of things I want to talk to you about.”</p> <p><strong>You’re 48 now. What are you planning to do in the next 48 years?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Survive. I have so many things that I want to do. I have my own company that builds robots. I want to be a successful businessman. You only come on this planet once, so I’m trying to live six or seven lives simultaneously, just in case I don’t get to come back. I like all aspects of life. I love writing. I just wrote my first spy thriller. That was a lot of fun. I started doing children’s books, because I love children. We did the Jason Project for kids. I’m still a naval officer, very proud of that. I just recently got married, and I’m all excited about that. There are a million things to do.</p> <p><strong>Looking back on those first 48 years, if you will, there was some bad luck, too. There were some tragedies.</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Yes, I lost my boy. I think that whenever things are going great, you are going to get zinged. I couldn’t have been at a higher point in my life. I had already found the <em>Titanic</em>. I was able to add to that point, when I found the <em>Bismarck</em>. Then to have my boy die, who had been with me for three years at sea. I went to the bottom.</p> <p><strong>How did he die?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: He died in a car accident. He had been with me in tough, dangerous settings. He worked the deck in storms, where a father wants to not let his son be out there, but he can’t say that, because he’s got to be out there with everyone else, and to just be terrified that he was going to get injured in the heavy seas, with the heavy equipment. And then to have that all behind you, and take a sigh of relief that he is no longer at risk, and then to have him die the next week, when you weren’t looking, when you weren’t ready. It’s devastating. To try to make that a positive experience — for you, certainly not for him — but to make the most out of your son’s death is a big challenge.</p> <p><strong>What were some of your other setbacks along the way?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: People not believing me. It’s getting a little easier, but it’s funny how people will say, “I don’t think you can do that.” Then you do it, and they say “That was great” and you say, “Well, I’ve got this other idea.” “Naw, I don’t think you can do that.” So you do it again.</p> <p>When I said I was going to find the <em>Titanic</em>, no one believed it. When I said I was going to find the <em>Bismarck</em>, everyone believed it, and then I failed in my first attempt to find the <em>Bismarck</em>. So people expect you to succeed, but they don’t want to stick their own necks out, and so risk-taking can be very lonely at times. You know that classic saying, which is very true: “Failure is an orphan, but success has many fathers.” I’ll tell you, when I’m most at risk, I look around, and there are not a whole lot of people there. But as soon as I succeed, they say, “We were always there.” And I say, “Yeah, but 500 miles behind me.” You have to learn to accept that. You have to know that when it gets dicey, and there is a lot on the line, you are going to find out who your friends are, not at the party afterwards.</p> <p><strong>Did these setbacks reaffirm your direction in life, or give you second thoughts? Did you have doubts about your work, your abilities, or your style of living?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: Yes. A massive failure causes you to rethink everything, but if you thought it out right in the first place, when you review the logic that sent you down that path, you say “Well, that’s pretty good logic. I’d better keep going.” I always said to my son, before he died, “If you stay in the game, it’s never over. It may be a bad inning, but if you don’t quit you can’t lose. You only lose when you quit. So hang in there, and you will succeed.” I am convinced that if you can think it out, and dream it, you can do it. It’s just a question of how much you want to do it. What life does is test your determination. That’s the important thing. Don’t give up. And guess what, you’ll make it.</p> <p><strong>What advice would you give to young people, just beginning their careers?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: You have to build confidence. Most important, you have to like yourself. Not to be egotistic about it, but to come to grips with yourself. Most of the time you are growing up, people tell you what’s wrong with you. Your coach tells you, your parents tell you, the teachers tell you when they grade you. I think that that’s good in the early stages, because it helps you then develop skills. But at some point in your career, generally I think when you are in your teens, you look in a mirror and you have to say, despite all the bumps and warts, “I like that person I’m looking at, and let’s just do our best. ”</p> <p>It’s that point, where you start to take what’s good about you and polish it like an apple. I think everyone is unique. We know that. The only way you find out what you are is by trying everything, and then at some point you take what you are, which is unique. Don’t ever try to mimic anybody, because you will only be second best. You can never outshine the thing you are trying to mimic, so don’t ever do that. Don’t idol worship. Finally, be yourself. Then you are going to be really unique and exciting. People are going to beat a path to your door if you polish your inner self.</p> <p>I think Joseph Campbell summarized it: “Life is the act of becoming, you never arrive.” People plan a lifetime to climb Mount Everest, and they only stay up there five minutes. It isn’t the view they’re after, it’s the fact that they made it. It’s in the act of becoming that you learn about life. You learn about yourself. The only way you are going to discover that is to try. And I always say to a kid, “If you scale a mountain a thousand feet high and fall off of it, you are going to break your neck. So scale one a hundred thousand feet high. If you fall off it, you are still going to break your neck.” I believe that it’s just as difficult to do something easy as to do something difficult. You get up in the morning, you put on your pants, and you work till you go to bed at night. So shoot for a big one. There is no added risk in shooting for a tall mountain. But what’s so beautiful about a tall mountain is, when you get to the top of it, you can see over all the other smaller mountains, and you can see these other peaks. The most exciting thing about success is being able to meet the people on those other peaks, and learn how they got there. You’ll find that whether it’s in the arts, or science, or in sports, it’s still the climbing process. So there isn’t any specific mountain that’s unique. Don’t spend all your time trying to figure out which big mountain. Pick the closest one, and climb it.</p> <p><strong>You have indicated that, very soon now, you intend to make the biggest, most important climb of your whole career. What’s that all about?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I’m excited about my marriage. I’d say that’s the most important mountain, probably the tallest of all. Again, I revert back to Joseph Campbell. A person as an individual can only scale mountains so high. Man sees the world through a particular set of eyes. Woman sees it through a different set of eyes. It’s like binocular vision. You can’t see the world in stereo without both views — slightly different, both valid — that collectively show the world as you can never see it through one eye. To find your other half, that’s what your mate is all about. I’ve been lucky and done that, and now I want to see the world through that binocular view. I want to know what she thinks about everything, because the truth is in between.</p> <p><strong>Is there also a new scientific project in store for you?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: I’ve got a lot of challenges right now, but I’m not driven by anything right now, other than my marriage. That’s as intellectual a challenge as any scientific challenge I can think of. I’m really homing in on that.</p> <p><strong>You’ve been doing some work with children. What’s the project called, and what’s it all about?</strong></p> <p>Robert Ballard: It came out of the <em>Titanic</em> experience, like so many things that changed my life. When I found volcanoes, and the hydrothermal system, I did well in the scientific community, but I was not flooded by letters from kids. The day I found the <em>Titanic</em> I started having thousands and thousands of pen pals: kids all around the world. Our book on the <em>Titanic</em> came out in eleven countries, and what we discovered was a fascination with high-tech adventure, at a time when children were dropping out of real science, not taking physics, not taking math. America’s scientific literacy was plummeting. We are now seventeenth in scientific literacy in just the Western world. We saw an opportunity. Why are kids writing me letters if they don’t like science? I’m a scientist. What I do is science. I need to communicate that to them. What’s exciting about what I do is the moment of discovery. Unfortunately, you can’t take kids down in your submarine, or out on your ships, in large quantities.</p> <p>So we devised a project called the Jason Project. Remember that I am in an imaginary submarine at sea. I’m not down there, my robots are. I’m in my room. What if I built identical rooms and put them all over North America, and connected them by satellite? If a child entered one of these other rooms, they’d see what I see, when I see it. So I’ve built twelve of them. I went to teachers, and I said, give me your students, and bring them into this room, and I’ll take them on the expedition. We signed up 250,000 kids. We told the kids that they couldn’t get in the room unless they promised to study science for four months. We wrote a tough curriculum, in the physical sciences, where they’re not just studying math and physics and chemistry, but robotics, telecommunications, the language of science. They studied it, no problem. They wanted to get in that room. See, you have to think of math as wind sprints.</p> <p>When I played college basketball, I’d practice for two hours, and just as I wanted to go to the locker room, the coach would say, “Give me 20 wind sprints.” “I don’t want to do 20 wind sprints.” And he would say, “Do you want to play in tomorrow’s game? Then you’d better do 20 wind sprints.” And I did those 20 wind sprints, which gave me the stamina to survive four quarters of basketball. You will never sell a kid on mental wind sprints. You’ve got to sell them on the game, then they’ll do the wind sprints. So what we wanted to do, is to show them what excitement exploration is, and sell them on exploration, on the quest for knowledge. Sell them on that, and how exciting it is and rewarding it is. And when you hook them, then they will go prepare themselves.</p> <p>So every year, we mount an expedition somewhere in the world. This coming year, we are going to go to the Galápagos Islands, and the kids will go there live, through our technology base. But they don’t get to go unless they study science. It’s working. The first two years we had a half a million kids involved. And they are coming back. We are in our third year. They keep signing up for science. Lehigh University has joined the Jason network, and they are tracking the kids, and asking them the questions. We discovered that the excitement of exploration has no sex. It’s as exciting to boys as it is to girls. The most formative point in a child’s mind about science is between grades six through ten. Six through ten is when kids decide whether they are going to go into science or not, long before college. The game is over before they take their SATs. We’ve got the greatest university system in the world, but one of the worst pre-university systems in the world. I want to change that. And we are.</p> <p><strong>Great idea. Thank you, Dr. Ballard. It’s been fascinating.</strong></p> </div>  </aside>  <div class="read-more__toggle collapsed" data-toggle="collapse" data-target="#full-interview"><a href="#" class="sans-4 btn">Read full interview</a></div> </article> </section> </div> <div class="tab-pane fade" id="gallery" role="tabpanel"> <section class="isotope-wrapper">  <header class="toolbar toolbar--gallery bg-white clearfix"> <div class="col-md-6"> <div class="serif-4">Robert D. Ballard, Ph.D. Gallery</div> </div> <div class="col-md-6 text-md-right isotope-toolbar"> <ul class="list-unstyled list-inline m-b-0 text-brand-primary sans-4"> <li class="list-inline-item" data-filter=".photo"><i class="icon-icon_camera"></i>11 photos</li> </ul> </div> </header> <div class="isotope-gallery isotope-box single-achiever__gallery clearfix"> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.2881355932203" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible.jpg" data-image-caption="ALVIN is a manned deep-ocean research submersible owned by the United States Navy and operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. ALVIN was involved in the exploration of the wreckage of the <i>Titanic</i> in 1986. " data-image-copyright="ALVIN_submersible" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible-295x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ALVIN_submersible-590x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.2603648424544" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018.jpg" data-image-caption="Robert Ballard speaks at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston, Veterans Day, 2002. Ballard found the wreck of Kennedy's boat, PT-109, off the Solomon Islands. The PT boat, of which the young Kennedy was captain, was sunk by the Japanese during World War II. (AP Images/Steven Senne)" data-image-copyright="bal0-018" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018-301x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-018-603x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.3333333333333" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-019.jpg" data-image-caption="Dr. Robert D. Ballard, undersea explorer. (© National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="Photo courtesy National Geographic Society" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-019-285x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-019-570x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="0.67236842105263" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020.jpg" data-image-caption="Using the Jason Jr. remote camera system, Dr. Ballard and his crew explore the ruined interior of the sunken Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="Image by Emory Kristof, courtesy National Geographic" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020-380x256.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-020-760x511.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="0.67236842105263" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021.jpg" data-image-caption="Every detail counts. Robert Ballard and his team study the floor plan of the sunken Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="Image by Emory Kristof, courtesy National Geographic" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021-380x256.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-021-760x511.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.5049504950495" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022.jpg" data-image-caption="Commander Robert Ballard, USN, in command beneath the waves. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="Image by Emory Kristof, courtesy National Geographic" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022-252x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-022-505x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="0.67236842105263" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023.jpg" data-image-caption="Dr. Ballard and his crew celebrate a successful mission, exploring the wreck of the Titanic. (Photo by Emory Kristof, courtesy of the National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="Image by Emory Kristof, courtesy National Geographic" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023-380x256.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-023-760x511.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.3333333333333" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024.jpg" data-image-caption="Dr. Robert D. Ballard, undersea explorer. (© National Geographic Society)" data-image-copyright="bal0-024" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024-285x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bal0-024-570x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="0.675" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-Ballard-1986.jpg" data-image-caption="Dr. Robert Ballard, 1986 Titanic Expedition. (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)" data-image-copyright="Dr. Ballard, 1986 Titanic Expedition. (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-Ballard-1986-380x256.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-Ballard-1986-760x513.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="1.3356766256591" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912.jpg" data-image-caption="Front page of the New York Times, April 16, 1912. (© New York Times, 1912)" data-image-copyright="Front page of the New York Times, April 16, 1912. (© New York Times, 1912)" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912-284x380.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-NYTimes1912-569x760.jpg"></div>  </figure> <figure class="isotope-item ratio-container--gallery photo" data-category="photo" data-ratio="0.73552631578947" title="" data-gtm-category="photo" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Achiever - ">   <div class="lazyload ratio-container__image" data-toggle="modal" data-target="#imageModal" data-image-src="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic.jpg" data-image-caption="RMS Titanic departing Southampton on April 10, 1912." data-image-copyright="RMS Titanic departing Southampton on April 10, 1912." data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic-380x280.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/01/wp-RMSTitanic-760x559.jpg"></div>  </figure>    </div> </section> </div> </div> <div class="container"> <footer class="editorial-article__footer col-md-8 col-md-offset-4"> <div class="editorial-article__next-link sans-3"> <a href="#"><strong>What's next:</strong> <span class="editorial-article__next-link-title">profile</span></a> </div> <ul class="social list-unstyled list-inline ssk-group m-b-0"> <li class="list-inline-item"><a href="" class="ssk ssk-facebook" data-gtm-category="social" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Shared Achiever on Facebook"><i class="icon-icon_facebook-circle"></i></a></li> <li class="list-inline-item"><a href="" class="ssk ssk-twitter" data-gtm-category="social" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Shared Achiever on Twitter"><i class="icon-icon_twitter-circle"></i></a></li>  <li class="list-inline-item"><a href="" class="ssk ssk-email" data-gtm-category="social" data-gtm-action="click" data-gtm-label="Shared Achiever via Email"><i class="icon-icon_email-circle"></i></a></li> </ul> <time class="editorial-article__last-updated sans-6">This page last revised on December 5, 2016</time> <div class="sans-4"><a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/how-to-cite" target="_blank">How to cite this page</a></div> </footer> </div> <div class="container interview-related-achievers"> <hr class="m-t-3 m-b-3"/> <footer class="clearfix small-blocks text-xs-center"> <h3 class="m-b-3 serif-3">If you are inspired by this achiever’s story, you might also enjoy:</h3> <div class="centered-blocks"> <div class="isotope-achiever science-exploration difficulty-with-school small-town-rural-upbringing ambitious analytical extroverted resourceful explore-nature " data-year-inducted="2012" data-achiever-name="Berger"> <div class="achiever-block view-grid"> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/lee-r-berger-ph-d/"> <figure class="ratio-container ratio-container--square bg-black"> <div class="lazyload box achiever-block__image" data-sizes="auto" data-bgset="/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/ber2-001a_190x190_acf_cropped.jpg [(max-width:576px)] | /wp-content/uploads/2016/02/ber2-001a_190x190_acf_cropped.jpg"></div> <div class="achiever-block__overlay"></div> <figcaption class="text-xs-center achiever-block__text"> <div class="display--table"> <div class="display--table-cell"> <div class="achiever-block__text--center"> <div class="achiever-block__name text-brand-primary">Lee R. 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Bezos</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/benazir-bhutto/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Benazir Bhutto</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/keith-l-black/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Keith L. Black, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/elizabeth-blackburn/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Elizabeth Blackburn, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/david-boies-2/"><span class="achiever-list-name">David Boies</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/norman-e-borlaug/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Norman E. Borlaug, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/benjamin-c-bradlee/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Benjamin C. Bradlee</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sergey-brin/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sergey Brin</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/carter-j-brown/"><span class="achiever-list-name">J. Carter Brown</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/linda-buck/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Linda Buck, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/carol-burnett/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Carol Burnett</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/george-h-w-bush/"><span class="achiever-list-name">George H. W. Bush</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/susan-butcher/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Susan Butcher</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/james-cameron/"><span class="achiever-list-name">James Cameron</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/benjamin-s-carson/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Benjamin S. Carson, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/jimmy-carter/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Jimmy Carter</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/johnny-cash/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Johnny Cash</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/francis-s-collins/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/denton-a-cooley/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Denton A. Cooley, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/francis-ford-coppola/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Francis Ford Coppola</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/ray-dalio/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Ray Dalio</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/olivia-de-havilland/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Olivia de Havilland</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/michael-e-debakey-m-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Michael E. DeBakey, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/michael-dell/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Michael S. Dell</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/joan-didion/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Joan Didion</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/rita-dove/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Rita Dove</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sylvia-earle/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sylvia Earle, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/elbaradei/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Mohamed ElBaradei</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/gertrude-elion/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Gertrude B. Elion, M.Sc.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/larry-j-ellison/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Larry J. Ellison</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/nora-ephron/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Nora Ephron</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/julius-erving/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Julius Erving</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/tony-fadell/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Tony Fadell</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/paul-farmer/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Paul Farmer, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/suzanne-farrell/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Suzanne Farrell</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sally-field/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sally Field</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/milton-friedman-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Milton Friedman, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/carlos-fuentes/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Carlos Fuentes</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/athol-fugard/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Athol Fugard</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/ernest-j-gaines/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Ernest J. Gaines</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/william-h-gates-iii/"><span class="achiever-list-name">William H. Gates III</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/frank-gehry/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Frank O. Gehry</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/vince-gill/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Vince Gill</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/ruth-bader-ginsburg/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Ruth Bader Ginsburg</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/louise-gluck/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Louise Glück</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/whoopi-goldberg/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Whoopi Goldberg</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/jane-goodall/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Dame Jane Goodall</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/doris-kearns-goodwin/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Doris Kearns Goodwin, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/mikhail-s-gorbachev/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Mikhail S. Gorbachev</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/nadine-gordimer/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Nadine Gordimer</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/stephen-jay-gould/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Stephen Jay Gould, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/carol-greider-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Carol Greider, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/john-grisham/"><span class="achiever-list-name">John Grisham</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/dorothy-hamill/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Dorothy Hamill</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/lauryn-hill/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Lauryn Hill</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sir-edmund-hillary/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sir Edmund Hillary</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/reid-hoffman/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Reid Hoffman</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/khaled-hosseini/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Khaled Hosseini, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/ron-howard/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Ron Howard</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/john-hume/"><span class="achiever-list-name">John Hume</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/louis-ignarro-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Louis Ignarro, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/daniel-inouye/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Daniel K. Inouye</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/jeremy-irons/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Jeremy Irons</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/john-irving/"><span class="achiever-list-name">John Irving</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sir-peter-jackson/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sir Peter Jackson</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/donald-c-johanson/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Donald C. Johanson, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/frank-m-johnson/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Frank M. Johnson, Jr.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/philip-johnson/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Philip C. Johnson</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/chuck-jones/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Chuck Jones</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/james-earl-jones/"><span class="achiever-list-name">James Earl Jones</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/quincy-jones/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Quincy Jones</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/thomas-keller-2/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Thomas Keller</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/anthony-m-kennedy/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Anthony M. Kennedy</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/b-b-king/"><span class="achiever-list-name">B.B. King</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/carole-king/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Carole King</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/coretta-scott-king/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Coretta Scott King</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/henry-kissinger-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Henry A. Kissinger, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/willem-j-kolff/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Willem J. Kolff, M.D., Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/wendy-kopp/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Wendy Kopp</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/henry-r-kravis/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Henry R. Kravis</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/nicholas-d-kristof/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Nicholas D. Kristof</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/mike-krzyzewski/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Mike Krzyzewski</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/ray-kurzwell/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Ray Kurzweil</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/eric-lander-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Eric S. Lander, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/robert-s-langer-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Robert S. Langer, Sc.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/richard-leakey/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Richard E. Leakey</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/robert-lefkowitz-m-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Robert J. Lefkowitz, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/congressman-john-r-lewis/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Congressman John R. Lewis</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/maya-lin/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Maya Lin</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/george-lucas/"><span class="achiever-list-name">George Lucas</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/norman-mailer/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Norman Mailer</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/peyton-manning/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Peyton Manning</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/wynton-marsalis/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Wynton Marsalis</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/john-c-mather-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">John C. Mather, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/johnny-mathis/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Johnny Mathis</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/willie-mays/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Willie Mays</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/frank-mccourt/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Frank McCourt</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/david-mccullough/"><span class="achiever-list-name">David McCullough</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/audra-mcdonald/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Audra McDonald</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/admiral-william-h-mcraven/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Admiral William H. McRaven, USN</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/w-s-merwin/"><span class="achiever-list-name">W. S. Merwin</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/james-a-michener/"><span class="achiever-list-name">James A. Michener</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/marvin-minsky-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Marvin Minsky, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/mario-j-molina-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Mario J. Molina, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/n-scott-momaday-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">N. Scott Momaday, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/story-musgrave/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Story Musgrave, M.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/peggy-noonan/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Peggy Noonan</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/jessye-norman/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Jessye Norman</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/tommy-norris/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Lt. Thomas R. Norris, USN</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/joyce-carol-oates/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Joyce Carol Oates</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/pierre-omidyar/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Pierre Omidyar</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/larry-page/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Larry Page</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/arnold-palmer/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Arnold Palmer</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/rosa-parks/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Rosa Parks</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/suzan-lori-parks/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Suzan-Lori Parks</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/linus-pauling/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Linus C. Pauling, Ph.D.</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/shimon-peres/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Shimon Peres</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/general-david-petraeus/"><span class="achiever-list-name">General David H. Petraeus, USA</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sidney-poitier/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sidney Poitier</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/general-colin-l-powell/"><span class="achiever-list-name">General Colin L. Powell, USA</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/harold-prince/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Harold Prince</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/lloyd-richards/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Lloyd Richards</span></a> </li> <li> <a href="/web/20170606114043/http://www.achievement.org/achiever/sally-ride-ph-d/"><span class="achiever-list-name">Sally K. 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