Angela Parker, co-founder with her late husband David of the diving-equipment manufacturer AP Diving, has died at the age of 88.
As the ‘AP’ in the British company’s original name AP Valves, Angela became known for helping to shape modern underwater breathing and safety equipment for recreational, technical and professional divers worldwide.
The couple had been diving together since the early 1960s, had become instructors and established their diving business in 1969 in a garden storeroom behind their Parker Hardware store in Canley, Coventry.
When not selling ironmongery or training divers, the Parkers would spend time exploring the waters of the Lake District and coastal sites in north Wales and Devon, over time also introducing their three sons to the excitement of the underwater world.
Joint exploits would include a 1971 dive on the wreck of Donald Campbell’s record-breaking Bluebird K7 hydroplane at a depth of 39m in Lake Coniston and, five years later, carrying out what was possibly the first dive on the WW1 battleship HMS Formidable in Devon at around 52m – on air.
Mouthpiece to Buddy
But it was in producing ground-breaking dive-gear that the couple would make their mark among the international diving community. Recognising the need for an effective emergency breathing system, they first came up with the AP Valve automatic mouthpiece.
This would give divers the chance to breathe air from their BC for long enough to save themselves should their regular supply be cut off.
“In the mid-1960s your dive-partner was your emergency bail-out,” said Angela. “All well and good – except that your buddy normally had their head down a hole looking at something fascinating just when you needed help! We invented the AP Valve for those critical first few ‘out-of-air’ seconds.”
In 1971 the Parkers opened a dive-shop with an air-filling and cylinder-test station on the premises. By the following year they had patented the forerunner of the Auto Air, their direct-feed power inflator and octopus bail-out device.
This led to the development in 1974 of the first in the Buddy range of BCs, which included their own emergency mini-cylinder.
Move to Cornwall
In 1979 the burgeoning family business moved to its current location at Water-Ma-Trout in Helston, Cornwall and doubled its workforce to six. It has since gone from strength to strength, employing hundreds of locals and giving many of them 30+ year careers.
The first Buddy stab jacket of 1983 was followed three years later by the Commando, originally built exclusively for the Royal Marines.
Angela was well-known for her control of the purse-strings and managed the business finances with single-minded focus, ever-present at the Crystal Palace, London and Birmingham Dive Shows.
She and David retired from daily working in 1993 but remained active shareholders of the “AP Diving” business until their deaths.
Angela Parker died at a hospice in Hayle on 21 December, but she had “managed to lead a full and active life until 10 days before the end”, said Martin Parker, her son and business partner. Her funeral is to be held in Camborne, Cornwall on 12 January.
David Parker, who died in 2011, and Angela leave their three sons, 10 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.
