Bob Hollis’s existence, stout of adventure, got here to a delicate cease on January 4, 2023, in Salt Lake City, Utah, with household surrounding Bob’s side.
Born on April 25, 1937, in Orland, California, to Robert and Elinor Hollis, Bob leaves a legacy as a pioneer, entrepreneur, businessman, and, most significantly, a loving father and grandfather.
Bob completed extra in 85 years than most and lived his existence to the fullest. He become a threat-taker who if truth be told did what he preferred and impressed others to attain the identical. If there wasn’t a diagram, he created one.
Bob will most certainly be remembered by many as a groundbreaking impact in each the sport of scuba diving and underwater photography. Bob’s indulge in of the ocean started in 1955 after finding out an editorial about underwater exploration in Smartly-liked Mechanics.
Following his first scuba abilities, Bob grew to change into hooked in to the water, turning into one amongst the earliest underwater photographers on the West Soar and setting up the Underwater Photographic Society of Northern California in 1966. Moreover, Bob become appointed to the Advisory Board of the Underwater Parks and Reserves (California Insist Parks Department), the set up he assisted in exploring the coastline and identifying future areas for preservation, including Point Lobos, La Jolla, and the Salt Point Insist Park.
A lawful entrepreneur, when Bob realized that the scuba diving and photography equipment obtainable within the intervening time failed to meet his needs, he enviornment about developing his have. All this become performed whereas Bob persisted to assist school for industry and engineering and worked at Habitual Oil to present a enhance to his young household.
In 1966, Bob opened the Anchor Shack dive store in Hayward, California, and started developing underwater camera housing, strobes, and hand lights, which served as the jumping-off point for his firm Oceanic. By 1976, the Oceanic product line had fully developed, finally turning Bob and the Oceanic model into leaders within the scuba diving neighborhood.
Over the direction of his lifetime, Bob founded many corporations, including American Underwater Products, Pelagic Rigidity Systems, ROMI Enterprises, and the eminent scuba diving producers Oceanic, Hollis, and Aeris. Bob wished everybody to abilities scuba diving and gave thousands across the field the alternative to attain so.
Utilizing his abilities, Bob helped make an underwater saturation system in 1978 for the Andrea Doria shipwreck. The system become hooked up to the damage at a depth of 240’ for up to seven days, permitting divers to search out the damage for various days with out swimming to the ground. Bob logged extra dives than somebody on the damage and, in 1981, served as the underwater photographer for the nationally-aired film called “Andrea Doria: The Final Chapter,” detailing the personnel’s map of recovering the bank sterling from the renowned sunken Italian ocean liner.
As well to developing photography and scuba diving equipment, Bob led one of the most first dive journeys to Cozumel, the Bahamas, the Virgin Islands, Belize, the Yucatan Peninsula, and the Galapagos. He moreover led tours to the distant vacation problem of Papua Contemporary Guinea, the set up he later built a household house and vacation problem dive resort for other underwater followers.
Over his storied profession, Bob obtained many awards and achievements, including the NOGI Award and the DEMA Reaching Out Award. He become an inductee of the Scuba Diving Hall of Standing.
During all his official success, Bob’s ultimate fulfillment become his household, including his teens Debbie (Jon), Mike (Molly), Prick (Brittany), and Zach (Danica), grandchildren Heather, Elizabeth, Jonathan, Caitlin, Robert, Seth, Preston, Olivia and Sloane, and mammoth-grandchildren Benjamin, Natalie, Henry, Eleanor, Samuel, Ian, and Colin. Bob shared his passion for the ocean and traveling the field with them, including abalone diving journeys on the California flee, household dwell-aboard dive journeys, motorcycle adventures, and creating memories for lots of lifetimes. His household and company will deeply cross over him.
The household will most certainly be maintaining non-public services and products in Orland, California, and asks those in honoring Bob to portion your sage and images through social media. Ought to you are going to moreover bask in to portion those with the household, they will also be sent to bobhollisfamily@gmail.com. In lieu of plant life, please donate to an ocean conservation charity in Bob’s memory.
