`Yellow Submarine' Resurfaces To Become Ore. Museum Exhibit

NEWPORT, Ore. - The most amazing thing to Kenny Sanford about Newmas is that the little yellow submarine somehow found its way back to Newport.

"And now it's going to stay here forever," he said as he helped apply a fresh coat of paint in the parking lot behind Oregon State University's Hatfield Marine Science Center, where the minisub will soon go on display.

Sanford and Steve Orr, a scuba-diving partner from Portland, built the two-person sub on the Newport waterfront in 1984 as the ultimate underwater plaything. "Newmas" is a mixture of Newport, where Sanford grew up, and his Navy friend's home of Camas, Wash.

The minisub ultimately took Sanford and Orr, who met while working as Portland police officers, to Washington on a treasure hunt that didn't pan out. They lost interest in underwater adventures and the little sub gathered rust for years until they donated it to Portland's Oregon Museum of Science and Industry more than a year ago.

OMSI never put Newmas on display, and Sanford, now retired and living in Waldport, Ore., forgot about it until a few months ago when he saw a small picture in the local newspaper of a minisub that had been donated to the marine science center - a marine research and educational facility with a large public exhibit wing.

"I knew it was my boat. I just knew it," he said.

To marine education specialist Bill Hanshumaker, the craft seemed to be a natural for the center. Only 13 feet long, Newmas looks like an oversized hot water heater with a tower. It's small enough to haul to parades and fairs to promote interest in the center.

Not only is Sanford volunteering much of his time for painting and getting the sub ready for display within the next month, but Hanshumaker said having Sanford describe how it was built and what it was like to journey deep into the ocean inside will be invaluable.

His reunion with the Newmas has brought a lot of memories for Sanford, who already has told his share of undersea stories to passers-by in the back parking lot in recent days as he scraped rust and painted the Newmas.

The video shot during seven 1985 dives as deep as 260 feet was to be used in planning an attempt to recover the purser's safe from the SS Governor.

Orr and Sanford did the job on speculation - promised 5 percent of the value of the safe's contents by the salvage organization if the venture was successful.

It wasn't.

"When they went down, it was a mess," Sanford said. "Everything had fallen into the ship and they couldn't possibly get the safe."

He and his partner lost thousands of dollars. The little sub suddenly was no longer fun.

"We never used it again," Sanford said. "After that it just sat in mothballs."

Newmas cost about $55,000 to build, Sanford said.

Designed to dive to 350 feet, the minisub was propelled by three electric motors. He and Orr built the sub for underwater recreation, and it was a just a fluke they became part of the salvage effort. Yellow just seemed the right color, Sanford said, but he acknowledges that the famous Beatles song, "Yellow Submarine," probably influenced their choice.

With a little work, he said, the minisub probably could be made ready to dive again. But he's glad it will be going on display to help fuel the imaginations of future young underwater explorers.

Most of all, he's just glad that Newmas is home.