Cousteau Legacy Lives In Sea
Francine Cousteau, president of the Cousteau Society and the wife of the late underwater explorer, Jacques Cousteau, is launching the New York Cousteau Society. Also, on Thursday, she will address the United Nations, which has dubbed 1998 "The Year of the Ocean."
On Tuesday, she met with New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani to discuss the Cousteau Society's plan to clean up the East and Hudson Rivers.
Cousteau, who died last year at the age of 87, designated Mrs. Cousteau as the caretaker of his legacy, including an initiative called "Waters of Peace," a 10-year project originally conceived by Jacques Cousteau after 20 years of research. Its purpose is to develop plans to clean the oceans of the world.
Mrs. Cousteau told CBS "This Morning" Co-Anchor Jane Robelot that she wants to "involve millions of people around the world to help the water to be clean from the wars, economical wars, all those wars that spoil the waters. It is our duty today, not only to make the waters a symbol of peace, but to clean [the damage that] has been done.
The original Calypso sank in Singapore Harbor in 1996. It is now called Calypso I and is being preserved in La Rochelle, France, as a memorial to Cousteau. It will be a teaching vessel.
Improvements on Calypso II will make it possible for women to ride along on the expeditions for the first time, because sleeping quarters may be separated. It sleeps 36 people, and children will be allowed on board.
Calypso II will be the flag of the Cousteau Society," says Mrs. Cousteau, who always refers to her late husband as "the captain." "It is a boat that has been designed by the captain, not only to have this symbol, but to let the children of the world participate in his work and
represent Â… the goal of dignity that we want for the generation to come."
One of the Cousteau Society's goals always has been to get their message across to the children of the world.
"He was always saying, 'Teach your parents.' The children are the hope for the time to come," says Mrs. Cousteau. "And the children are going to help to assure that every action that we are going to select will be a success."
For years, Mrs. Cousteau wrote the scripts for Cousteau's undersea narratives. She was Cousteau's companion for 20 years. They were married the last six years of his life. They had two children, Diane and Pierre-Yves, who are teen-agers.