Simon Lake (1866-1945) was born in Pleasantville, New Jersey.
He was a God fearing and patriotic American who came from a family of inventors. Simon Lake had several hundred patents awarded him over his lifetime, but he is primarily known as “the inventor of the modern, even-keel submarine†whose designs and patented methods are in use to this day. The USS Simon Lake AS33 Naval tender-ship was named in his honor.
In 1904 Simon Lake took his submarine to Europe after years of rejection from his own government. In Europe he competed in and won grueling underwater sea trials against his US and foreign competitors. Simon Lake was awarded contracts to oversee and build submarines for many countries including Russia, Germany, and Austria.
Lake submarine boats in Russia
Lake built Austria's first two submarines
Simon Lake's submarine "Argonaut" went hundreds of miles down the Eastern Seaboard in 1898 during a Nor-Easter that sunk over 200 ships. Jules Verne, author of "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" sent a cablegram to Simon Lake congratulating him on the" first successful open sea voyage in a submarine boat", and making his dream a reality.
In 1893 Four out of five Naval Admirals wanted Simon Lake's submarine to be built for the US Navy. But Lake did not submit required monetary bid to secure the contract. The Naval board requested to bring Simon Lake back for a bid to build it, but this was not allowed by 'higher ups" with political power. His competitor secured the contract for a submarine that never properly functioned and was abandoned.
Ever the patriot, Simon Lake never lost sight of the United States. He began to build to build for the US Navy after other countries had adopted his methods. He built over 20 submarines for the United States Navy before and during WWI.
The USS G-1 was Simon Lake's first submarine built for the US Navy. It was originally launched as the Seal on February 9, 1911 and set a dive record of 256 feet in November of 2012. The submarine was decommissioned after WWI in 1920.
One of the Lake boats
Lake Torpedo Boats, Subs being built
The Lake Torpedo Boat Company
Fortunes Under The Sea
Simon Lake had many 'firsts" underwater. He took the first underwater pictures, movie, the first underwater ship-to-shore phone calls and much more.
Scientific American, 1909.
Simon Lake had contracted with Lloyds of London to salvage the Royal Navy's Lutine. Lloyds had insured the frigate's heavy cargo of gold and silver. She went down in 1799 near the Frisian Islands, the majority of her cargo has not been found to this day. The Lake family still retains a Lutine 'Bible', a record book of her cargo with the binding being made of her wooden planks.
On the Sea Floor.
Illustrated London News, 1920. Simon Lake salvage apparatus. He later attempted to locate the Hussar in 1937, a British frigate believed to be secretly carrying gold and silver which sunk off Long Island Sound, NY, in 1780.
In 1903, Secretary of War and future president William H. Taft requested the building of five submarines to secure our shores after the Protector concluded very successful trials in icy, cold, wintery conditions. But again, there was gridlock in the halls of Washington DC and Congress. This was ten years before World War One.
Simon Lake aboard the submarine boat "Protector", 1902.
The Protector successfully breaking through the ice during US government trials, 1903
1904 Simon Lake Entrance Visa to Russia from Nicholas II
Letter from Theodore Roosevelt
Letter From Thomas Edison
Letter from Franklin D Roosevelt
(Reprinted with permission from YANKEE magazine, Publication Date: April, 1974
by Dorothy Needham, pictures courtesy of Simon Lake School.)
The Article is entitled "The Dream that had Fins" and is posted book style to page through on this website.
For easier reading , and to help people find this information better through search on the internet, I decided to not only include the scanned article but also type it out for you.
In 1898, immediately after the Spanish-American War, Simon Lake made the first successful open-sea voyage in a submarine boat. On the occasion his submersible, the Argonaut --launched at Baltimore in 1897--traveled from Norfolk, Va., to New York, running along the bottom of the sea for many miles of the voyage.
Jules Verne, the famous author of "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea," celebrated this historical occurrence on August 21, 1898, by sending the following cablegram to Mr Lake:"While by book, 'Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,' is entirely a work of the imagination, my conviction is that all I said in it will come to pass.
"A thousand mile voyage in the Baltimore submarine boat is evidence of this. This conspicuous success of submarine navigation in the United States will push on underwater navigation all over the world.
"If such a successful test had come a few months earlier it might have played a great part in the war just closed.
"The next great war may be largely a contest between submarine boats. I think electricity rather than compressed air will be the motive power in such vessels, for the sea is full of this element: it's only waiting to be harnessed as steam has been. It will not be necessary to go to the land for fuel any more than for provisions. The sea will provide food for many and power without limit.
"Submarine navigation is now ahead of aerial navigation and will advance much faster from now on. Before the United States gains her full development, she is likely to have mighty navies not only on the bosom of the Atlantic and Pacific, but in the upper air and beneath the water's surface. "
July 24, 1929, New York Times
Amelia Earhart walks the harbor
From Simon Lake's Defender submarine, Amelia Earhart walks the harbor floor off Block Island, RI, 1929.
From Simon Lake's Defender submarine, Amelia Earhart walks the harbor floor off Block Island, RI, 1929.
