Editing Robert Ballard (section)

==Early life and education==
Robert Duane Ballard was born on June 30, 1942{{r|into_the_deep|p=192}} in [[Wichita, Kansas]].<ref name="britannica">{{cite web
  | title = Robert Ballard
  | publisher = Encyclopedia Britannica
  | date = 2021
  | url = https://www.britannica.com/biography/Robert-Ballard-American-oceanographer
  | accessdate = February 6, 2023
  | archive-date = September 28, 2020
  | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200928150350/https://www.britannica.com/biography/Robert-Ballard-American-oceanographer
  | url-status = live
  }}</ref> He had an older brother, Richard, and a younger sister, Nancy Ann. When Ballard was two years old, his family moved to southern [[California]], where his father worked as a flight test engineer.{{r|into_the_deep|p=15}}<ref>{{cite news|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE4D7143AF930A15755C0A96F948260|title=Crew of Bismarck may have sunk her|newspaper=The New York Times|agency=[[Associated Press]]|access-date=February 6, 2023|date=June 23, 1989|archive-date=February 2, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090202093146/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE4D7143AF930A15755C0A96F948260|url-status=live}}</ref> He has attributed his early interest in [[underwater exploration]] to watching the 1954 film ''[[20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954 film)|20,000 Leagues Under the Sea]]'', an adaptation of [[Jules Verne]]'s [[Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas|1870 novel]].{{r|into_the_deep|pp=19-20}} While he was a high school student, his father connected him with oceanographers at [[Scripps Institution of Oceanography]], and he participated in several short research expeditions. {{r|into_the_deep|pp=21-24}} Ballard enrolled at [[University of California, Santa Barbara]], and joined the Army [[Reserve Officer Training Corps]].{{r|into_the_deep|pp=27-30}}

Beginning in 1962, Ballard worked part-time with [[Andreas Rechnitzer]]'s Ocean Systems Group at [[North American Aviation]], where his father was the chief engineer of North American's [[LGM-30 Minuteman|Minuteman missile]] program. At North American, Ballard worked on its failed proposal to build the [[submersible]] [[DSV Alvin|''Alvin'']] for the [[Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]].{{citation_needed|date=August 2019}}

In 1965, Ballard graduated from the [[University of California, Santa Barbara]], earning undergraduate degrees in chemistry and geology. While a student in [[Santa Barbara, California]], he joined [[Sigma Alpha Epsilon]] fraternity, and also completed the [[US Army]]'s [[ROTC]] program, giving him an Army officer's commission in Army Intelligence. His first graduate degree ([[Master of Science|MS]], 1966) was in geophysics from the [[University of Hawaiʻi]]'s Institute of Geophysics where he trained porpoises and whales. Subsequently, he returned to Andreas Rechnitzer's Ocean Systems Group at [[North American Aviation]].{{citation_needed|date=August 2019}}

Ballard was working towards a [[PhD]] in [[marine geology]] at the [[University of Southern California]] in 1967 when he was called to active duty. Upon his request, he was transferred from the Army into the [[US Navy]] as an [[oceanographer]]. The Navy assigned him as a liaison between the [[Office of Naval Research]] and the [[Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]] in [[Woods Hole, Massachusetts]].{{citation_needed|date=August 2019}}

After leaving active duty and entering the Naval Reserve in 1970, Ballard continued working at Woods Hole persuading organizations and people, mostly scientists, to fund and use ''Alvin'' for undersea research. Four years later he received a PhD in [[marine geology]] and [[geophysics]] at the [[University of Rhode Island]].{{citation_needed|date=August 2019}}