It turns out the world has Northern California to thank for a lot of widely-used everyday items, ranging from window squeegees to popsicles. In fact, NorCal is the official birthplace of the wetsuit, which in turn paved the way for some of the most beloved aquatic sports and activities. If we didn’t have the wetsuit, then Northern Californians certainly wouldn’t want to go out surfing in the cold ocean waters! The history behind the wetsuit invention is actually a lot more fascinating than you’d expect, as there have been some disagreements about who REALLY created the world’s first wetsuit.
Without the invention of the wetsuit, surfing those Northern California waves would be a lot harder. Not to mention, scuba diving would be impossible! It turns out the birthplace of the wetsuit is right here in Northern California, and the story behind its invention is full of a LOT more conflict than you'd expect.
For a long time, the question of who invented the first wetsuit was a highly contested subject that seemed to have no clear answer. In fact, three men claimed to have created the first wetsuit: Jack O'Neill, Bob Meistrell, and Hugh Bradner.
If you've ever worn a wetsuit or are involved with a sport that requires them, it's likely you've heard of Jack O'Neill. In fact, his O'Neill branded wetsuit are some of the most popular wetsuits on the market today. Although O'Neill certainly contributed a lot to the modern wetsuit, historians agree that it wasn't him who first invented it but Hugh Bradner.
Bradner was a physics professor at UC Berkeley and also a scientist on the Manhattan Project. Bradner's job at the university required him to do underwater dives, which wasn't easy back then. You simply couldn't stay warm in the cold water for very long, so Bradner set to work on creating a suit that could keep the user warm when underwater for long periods of time.
Therefore, the very first neoprene wetsuit was created by Bradner in 1952. It worked by trapping water between the skin and the neoprene. The water would heat up to body temperature and keep you warm inside of the suit. Bradner tried to sell his wetsuits to consumers, but he was never able to successfully market the suit the way Meistrell and O'Neill did.
Meistrell, along with his brother, started the company Body Glove. Body Glove is arguably the second most popular name in the wetsuit industry, next to O'Neill, and they both claim to have come up with the idea of developing nylon layers over the neoprene as seen in modern wetsuits today.
There's no arguing that both O'Neill and Body Glove are giants in the wetsuit industry, and they've both made the wetsuit what it is today. However, researchers agree that there was only one man who invented the very first wetsuit, and it was Hugh Bradner at UC Berkeley.
Did you realize that Northern California was the birthplace of the wetsuit? Check out more iconic inventions from our region of the state with this list of 12 Things That Originated In Northern California.
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