The Trail of Discovery Click to enlarge The French submersible Cyana took part in Project FAMOUS. (Courtesy of IFREMER) Click to enlarge Alvin is photographed from Cyana’s viewport on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge during Project FAMOUS. (Courtesy of WHOI Archives) 1974 - Project FAMOUS Were submersibles worth the expense? In 1972, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences convened a meeting of international earth scientists at Princeton University to discuss the proposed expedition. At the time, many scientists had doubts about how useful submersibles might be. The new submersibles had not really been fully tested in the field. Could they withstand the difficulties of deep-sea work? The submersibles also could not cover much ground in the dark depths. Would the information they collected be worth the big price to operate them? Many scientists preferred to devote limited funding to other research pursuits. In the end, the major decision-makers in the community of oceanographers agreed to fund a research program that was called Project FAMOUS (French-American Mid-Ocean Undersea Study). As the meeting came to a close, Maurice Ewing, one of the giants of oceanography, wagged his finger in Bob Ballard’s face. If you fail, Ewing told Ballard, we’ll melt down Alvin’s pressure sphere into titanium paper clips.  Page 1 Page 3