Dear Rintin,
You are correct. There was a PBS documentary program done on this
story for "Nova."
The title is NOVA: Hitler's Lost Sub
You can purchase a copy of this program on VHS at the PBS store:
Price: $19.95
http://www.shoppbs.org/product/index.jsp?productId=1895139
It is also available on DVD.
http://www.shoppbs.org/product/index.jsp?productId=1895136&cp=1412584&clickid=lftnav_sbs_txt&parentPage=family
The video is available here as well.
http://shop.wgbh.org/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?productId=12032&storeId=11051&catalogId=10051&langId=-1
I discovered this information in a BRIAN LAMB interview with Robert Kurson.
Here are the relevant excerpts:
?BRIAN LAMB, HOST: Robert Kurson, where did you get the idea for your
book, "Shadow Divers"?
ROBERT KURSON, AUTHOR, "SHADOW DIVERS": A friend told me about the
story originally. And at first, it sounded too unbelievable to be
true. Two New Jersey shipwreck divers, recreational divers, find a
virgin lost German U-boat off the New Jersey coast. I couldn`t believe
it. It started from there.?
(. . .)
?KURSON: I immediately got on the phone to the divers, the two
principal divers behind this story, and asked them, Could this be
true. And they said, Not only is it true, it`s even more than that.
And I asked if I might come out and see them. They agreed, and I was
on my way.
LAMB: And who were the divers?
KURSON: John Chatterton and Richie Kohler, both New Jersey residents,
who had made this amazing discovery.
LAMB: What year was the start of all this for you?
KURSON: For me, it was 2001. For them, it had begun 10 years earlier, in 1991.
LAMB: Now, before you got into this, there`d already been a major PBS
program done on it for "Nova."
KURSON: Yes.
LAMB: Had you seen that?
KURSON: No, but I made it my business to see it right away, after I`d
heard this story, and found it pretty amazing, and prepared myself, at
least in watching that, before I went out to meet the divers?.
(. . .)
?LAMB: In 2001. Why did you think that there was a book here, when it
already had had international publicity and the "Nova" program?
KURSON: Because everybody treated this story as a story about a lost
submarine and also about the U-boat war and U-boat technology, and
finally, about a discovery. But after I met Chatterton and Kohler, it
seemed to me much more than that. It seemed to me a story about two
men in search of themselves and two men who were asking very
fundamental questions about who they were and who they would be. And
that element of it, that it was really about that moment in a person`s
life when he gets to know himself, struck me. And it was completely
absent in any story I`d read or seen about this adventure.?
Booknotes: Transcript
http://www.booknotes.org/Transcript/?ProgramID=1788
=================================================
This story had been covered in a PBS Nova segment.
?Then, one day in September 1991, a diving-ship captain learned of a
possible U-boat wreck, and the lives of Chatterton and Kohler, and
those of many colleagues, were changed forever. When Kurson, formerly
a Chicago journalist and now a contributing editor to Esquire,
interviewed the men after learning of their story (parts of which had
been covered in other books and in a PBS "Nova" segment), he became so
enthusiastic that he made them business partners for the telling of
it.?
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/entertainment/reviews.nsf/0/83F4BF1A61A317C786256EC20079E958?OpenDocument&Headline=Adventure,+mystery+surface+in+story+of+sunken+U-boat
==================================================
?The familiar story of sport divers discovering an uncharted U-boat
wreck off New Jersey in 1991, and their six-year effort to identify
it, is primarily a vehicle for the admirable talents of writer Robert
Kurson, and for the kudos so well deserved by the two protagonists,
wreck divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler.?
(. . .)
?Parts of the story were better reported in an earlier book, Bernie
Chowdhury's "The Last Dive," which focused on two of the three divers
who have been killed on the wreck. And there was a highly rated PBS
"Nova" special broadcast in November 2000. Much of what Kurson adds is
only intermittently interesting.?
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040711/news_lz1v11divers.html
==================================================
Here is some more information about the documentary NOVA: Hitler's Lost Sub
?In 1991, a fisherman's net snagged on a massive object on the
seafloor 60 miles off the coast of New Jersey. Professional diver John
Chatterton went down to investigate and discovered an intact German
U-boat from World War II, complete with unexploded torpedoes and the
remains of its crew. Astonishingly, neither the American or British
authorities, nor even the German government itself, had any record of
a U-boat having sunk there.
Chatterton and his diving partner Richie Kohler set out to establish
the submarine's identity. After six years of work, which included the
tragic loss of three divers, they finally did so. The boat is U-869, a
submarine previously thought lost off the coast of Morocco.?
PBS
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/lostsub/tour.html
Hitler's Lost Sub
?In 1991, professional diver John Chatterton discovered a sunken
German U-boat from World War II, lying undetected only 60 miles off
the New Jersey shore, its unexploded torpedoes and the bodies of its
crew still aboard. This two-hour special follows Chatterton and his
dive partners in their dangerous quest to identify the missing U-boat,
a pursuit that takes six years and costs three lives. The U-boat's
history involves unusual coincidences and a startling twist of fate.?
Original broadcast date: 11/14/2000
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/listseason/27.html#2712
Transcript
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2712lostsub.html
=================================================
Shadow Divers will be made into a movie
http://www.thezreview.co.uk/comingsoon/s/shadowdivers.htm
?Hollywood buys rights to 'Shadow Divers': Movie deal could top $1
million Fox 2000 Pictures won a bidding war with a deal that Hollywood
trade papers report could top $1 million. Paramount, Warner Bros. and
Universal also reportedly bid for the book.?
http://www.cdnn.info/industry/i040628/i040628.html
"Fox 2000 has jumped deep for Robert Kurson's "Shadow Divers: The True
Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the
Last Mysteries of World War II," acquiring the nonfiction book in a
deal that could go north of $1 million. Kurson's work, which is
described as a blend of history and deep sea adventure, centers on the
story of two divers who became historical detectives when they
discovered a German WWII U-boat off the New Jersey coast..."
Hollywood Reporter
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr/film/brief_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000552475
Search criteria:
Shadow Diver +PBS
Shadow Diver +History channel
Shadow Diver documentary
PBS submarine documentary
I hope you find this information helpful!
Best regards,
Bobbie7 |
