Allen J. Pertner

Shipwreck Interpreter

Allen Jay Pertner was born in Northport, Michigan in 1940, where he lived until the age of 18. He spent his childhood on his grandfather’s farm, where there was no electricity or running water, and the fields were plowed with teams of horses. Most of his friends and neighbors were Ottawa and Ojibwe, who taught Al many things. Al’s father was a boat builder, and he spent countless hours in Fred Tellgard’s boat yard, fascinated with the process of building boats in a way few alive today have witnessed.

Boats, sailboats in particular, were a constant in Al’s life (along with books). Immediately following high school, Al joined the Navy, and became a submariner, serving for five years aboard the diesel electric submarine SS480 USS Medregal. Following several years as a Michigan State Trooper, Al moved to the Pacific Northwest where he lived aboard a 30-foot, gaff-rigged sailing vessel called Nomad, a wooden ship built the old way, with double sawn frames. His paying job as marketing manager for AT&T funded his pursuit of Finn racing, ocean cruising and yacht design. In time, Al relocated to Florida where he was involved in every aspect of boat building and design (and more racing), eventually becoming the chief yacht designer for Morgan. During this time, he captained two Atlantic crossings as well as a voyage across the Pacific.

In the mid 1990’s Al started diving and quickly became interested in cave diving, wreck diving and all other aspects of technical diving. He became a world-renowned technical diving instructor of instructors, and eventually moved to Akumal, Mexico.

Here he worked with one of his students, Memo D’Anda, an Archeologist from the University of Merida exploring the underwater cave systems in the Yucatan, mapping archaeological sites and identifying artifacts. Memo is now the leading maritime archaeologist in the country of Mexico. In 1999, Al relocated to Colorado, far from the water, where he became a stepdad to Forrest and Cooper, a cowboy (turns out he also has a gift with horses), a baker and a builder of many, many things, including an X-wing fighter and Bugs, a sailboat now captained by Forrest in the Pacific Northwest. Eighteen years later he returned to the Great Lakes where he now lives in Charlevoix with his German Shepherd, his books, his wife and their sailboat, Apache.

Throughout his life, Al has been a scholar of science and history, and possesses considerable knowledge of Ancient Greek and Roman history, world history, Mayan history, Native American history, physics, philosophy, cultural anthropology, archaeology, marine history and marine archaeology.

His unique and comprehensive naval background, his aptitude for understanding and illustrating complex structures and concepts and his broad and deep knowledge of history and cultures, all come to bear in his shipwreck interpretation. Al has a great and deep respect and admiration for the brave men who went to sea on these magnificent old ships, and it is in their honor that he does his best to consider the story from their perspective.