AJ Morse & Son

06/06/2025

Today we started teardown of AJMS #3 air pump 866. The thing about working on these old pumps is there isn't any repair manuals for them. You learn by doing. #866 was built in 1904 and she was due for an overhaul. The objective is to get her into working condition. The bigger plan is to use this pump at Sturgeon Bay in August. Time is passing fast and this is by far the most ambitious project connected with the SS Lakeland commemoration dives. If we are successful you can come to Door County Maritime Museum on Saturday August 16th and see #866 at work.

03/10/2025

Here is a link to the History of Diving Museum Facebook post of Jon Hazelbaker diving his restored 1916 A J Morse & Son Mark V helmet. I talked with Jon about all the air leaking from the rig. He told me the dress is brand new and on the next dive it had settled down and didn't leak. If you look close at the back of the helmet you will notice the air elbow on the left and comm elbow on the right. they both point downward like you see in the 1916 US Navy Diving Manual photo of 2178. You hardly ever see 1917 Mark V helmets but plenty of 1918 helmets. We had five in the shop atone time once. Two Morse and three Schrader. All the 1918 helmets had the conventional configuration.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1690176301567197

03/10/2025

Back in January we received a helmet from a long standing customer who wanted the helmet repaired. This particular helmet was an old A J Morse & Son Mark V which had been turned into a Frankenhelmet. The spitcock and original communication elbow had been removed. In place of the spitcock was a hardware store globe valve air control. Copper tubing was soldered to the ports on the valve then run into the cut off end of the original ductwork. The comm elbow was rigged with a compression fitting to hold a pass through cable. The owner wanted us to clean up the installations and make the helmet diveable. Something came to our attention which changed that plan.

Looking at the nametag this Mark V was serial number 2212 and dated 7-28-16. This was a summer of 1916 helmet somebody had hacked up. We thought wait a minute, this helmet has most of its original parts. The single spring eight point exhaust is still present, The faceplate and top & side windows look right. The air elbow is the Morse pass through type without rivets. we called the customer and told him we what he had and that it could be 95% restored. It would not have 1916 comms in it but real world that is a good thing for a helmet that will get wet. The comm elbow didn't cause a problem as the DESCO Stillson helmet uses the same Siebe Gorman clone they used in 1916. He chose to do the restoration. The helmet still had the telephone cup with the 1898 patent date stamped on it.

Here are the before photos. I will do another post with a link to a video of the helmet being dived in Florida last week. Somehow the helmet got shipped without us taking after shots. I will have to contact the customer and ask him to shoot some for us.

02/26/2025

Today we are pulling together the stuff we want to take to Ghost Ships this Friday. We did a bench layout to see what we can fit in the space alotted. Our commercial diver jake "Lee" will be going. People love taking selfies with him.

We will be exhibiting a Viking ProTech dry suit and some parts. DESCO is an importing dealer for Ansell Viking.

This will be the coming out for AJMS 1769. If you don't know the story here is a thumbnail. We received AJMS four light commercial #1769 in partial payment for a helmet chest. She was in bad shape with the bonnet shell collapsing and cracking. we had been trying to think of ways to keep Lake Michigan Classic Diving Org. in peoples minds while we search for a dive site. Last spring we held a workshop and let attendees tear into the helmet and get her down to component parts. After some DESCO magic we opened the shop again and had attendees do some reassembly work. Since the intention is to have 1769 returned to a diveable condition the DESCO crew finished her up. I think anybody would be proud to have this helmet in their collection. 1769 will be staying with us as part of the company museum collection and a a LMCDO rally helmet. We estimate this helmet was built in 1911.

Some people may claim it was blasphemy to rebuild a century old helmet. The condition of the bonnet shell made the helmet dangerous to display. There was jagged Copper in several places. Every useable piece of the helmet is on the new bonnet shell.

We need to give credit to those persons who came out to the workshops and put in the work to help bring 1769 back to her glory. Each one of you has a place in her history. We want to have more of these types of activities to give folks the chance to learn the gear and test their own capabilities.

02/21/2025

Last week we received a request for information on an old A J Morse & Son Three Light Commercial Helmet. Often times with the records being so incomplete we can be of little assistance. This time was markedly different.

Meet helmet 3376. The record book is fairly bursting with information on this helmet.

On 3/1/32 the helmet was sold to Mr. J W Clemente of Memphis Tennessee.

The helmet had found its way back home and on 2/1/33 Morse sold it to Mr. Charlese Garifales of 36 Brown Street Fairhaven Massachusetts in a cash sale. The helmet was again returned to Morse by Mr. Garifales and was resold on 6/7/34 to The International Grenfell Association. It turns out the father of the current owner was a physician for the IGA working in their hospital in St Anthony in the 1950s. His father was gifted the helmet. The owner told me that it was used for dock and harbor maintenance in St Anthony. I told the owner I thought the brown staining on the helmet was likely from crude or bunker oil. he said that would have fit in with working in St Anthony harbor. The IGA still exists today. They began as a group bringing medical and spiritual services to commercial fishermen in Newfoundland and Labrador. The medical part was turned over to the Canadian government but they continue social and community outreach. The owner is donating the helmet to the IGA museum in St Anthony NF.

It is rare to get any backstory on old helmets. This one really delivered.

12/16/2024

Time for an update on 4LC 1769. The bonnet is completely rebuilt. It just needs to be cleaned up. The breastplate has been buffed and the tag needs to go back on. It happens we are building a new 4LC #6933 right next to 1769. Their birthdays are only 114 years apart.
6933 is being made for stock so it is going to need a home. 1769 will be a primary dive helmet when LMCDO gets back into diving events. Who will volunteer to dive a century old rebuilt diving helmet? DESCO would prefer not to take helmets from inventory for rallies. If we can build a collection of diveable helmets dedicated to event diving that is preferable. We may need to find a cheap beat up Mark V to overhaul for a rally helmet. That would give LMCDO an opportunity to hold more shop classes.

I included a couple of photos of the bonnet as it was in case there are newcomers to this story.

11/27/2024

These guys wanted us to wish everyone a very Happy Easter. They really don't do Thanksgiving unless they have to. However the DESCO team does hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your families and loved ones.

11/20/2024

Earlier this week Lee got bummed out as we sold his helmet. AJMS 3LC 6902 (neck feed) and he had been together a long time. They were on display in a couple of places, most notably the Reiman Aquarium at Discovery World for over a year. He now is happier as he got AJMS 3LC 6904 as a replacement.

We took the opportunity to fix the cuff ring clamps from his dress. The threaded lugs had been stripped out and quick & dirty repairs were made. Divers are basically wet farmers and would fix anything with whatever is handy. We soldered on Brass nuts to replace the bad threads and there were some Morse clamp bolts in a box so we used the proper parts to replace the funky ones.

The three finger mitts are also in need of repair. We often get the question of what glue to use on the dresses. We have heard of a few different choices ranging from contact cement to tire patching adhesive. The mitt repair offers us the chance to experiment. We are going to try 3M 1300 Neoprene adhesive on one glove and Dap Contact Cement on the other. This is a display repair and these mitts won't be going into the water so we can't attest to the suitability for actual diving use.

11/14/2024

We just had a message supposedly from Meta saying our page was going to be deleted for copyright infringement. I responded:

"Facebook is welcome to telephone our company with the information they have on file. Phishing scammers can rot in HELL Thank you your attention."

Send a message to learn more

11/14/2024

Our nemesis in India is at it again (or yet). Found today on Ebay we bring you a replica AJ Morse & Son four light commercial helmet. The strange thing about this helmet is he put so much effort into making it he could have built a working helmet. Not something I would ever suggest since his character is subject in my opinion and trust is important when making equipment peoples lives depend on. Obviously he does not shy away from making the extra steps to pass off these replicas. The helmet even has snapped off turn k***s on the faceplate, faking damage from use. It has the applied patina to suggest it is an old helmet.

In a bold step he has copied Nations Attic's helmet stand design. Many people have recognized Don Creekmore's stands in the replica helmet posts using purloined photos of real helmets.

You can buy this helmet at the unbelievable price of $6,623.99, shipping included from Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India. Don't say we didn't warn ya.

11/11/2024

To all veterans, past, present. and future we are deeply grateful for the service you have rendered keeping America safe and contributing to a better world.

11/01/2024

The fall 2024 LMCDO workshop is one week away. In order to assure we have enough of everything we need I would like to get a headcount of possible attendees. We have heard that there may be people coming that learned about the workshop down at Vortex Spring last week. If you are planning on coming, or are thinking about coming drop us an RSVP email to [email protected] or [email protected]. We do not need a hard count but having some idea of how many to plan for will be a help. At the spring workshop we had 12 attendees. There were a half dozen more who wanted to come but had other things to do. I went out and bought 16 new pairs of safety glasses hoping that is enough with the 14 pairs we already had. We bought more gloves and particle masks and set up a station to dole them out. We have ear plugs but if you can't wear them we have a coupe of ear m**f hearing protectors. If you have your own and want to bring them that is fine. Shooters usually have them and those will likely be more comfortable for you. Hearing protection will be required where noise levels pose a risk.
On our side we will have a all hands on deck crew. Christian, Lily, Jared, Jim, and myself all plan on being here. We will do our best to provide a fun and educational experience. Commercial helmets 1021 & 1769 are ready to receive some TLC.
Also we have to know how much coffee to make and donuts to buy for before the workshop begins. Afterwards there will be the standard cheese & crackers, baby carrots, celery, etc. to munch on in the bull session.