the student did in the pool. This helps me take them on a guided tour. They can interact with the fish and use the equipment,” Littrell said.
The minimum age to be certified as a scuba diver is 10 years old. Once certified, it is valid for your lifetime.
In the early years of Diver’ s Den, Littrell and his other local scuba diving buddies would scour the lakes for hidden treasures.
“ If you’ re local, you like to dive in the lake,” Littrell said.“ You’ ve got Lake Cumberland, you’ ve got Laurel Lake. There are so many different things that you can do with scuba. If you love treasure hunting, check out Harmon’ s Creek on the lake. About seven years ago, I went there with seven friends. We found nearly 1,000 pairs of sunglasses!”
Even though 1,000 pairs of used sunglasses couldn’ t keep his Diver’ s Den location running, one special pair made a big impact.
“ Many of the sunglasses we found were cheap pairs with little or no resale value,” Littrell stated.“ One of my friends had a pile of glasses he had cleaned up and was ready to throw most of them away. His wife stopped him and said,‘ Do you know what this is?’ He responded,‘ It looks like garbage. I’ m throwing them away.’ Immediately, she Googled the glasses to find out they were a $ 2,500 pair of sunglasses.”
Littrell and his friends started diving for treasure on weekends. Soon, they got requests to find small lost items in the lake. One time, they even searched for a wallet with $ 10,000 in cash inside. But for the most part, their diving recovery was limited to wallets, car keys, and the occasional rod and reel. Although Littrell was once asked to recover a set of false teeth.
“ Just last weekend, we recovered three cell phones and a wedding ring,” Littrell said.
Diver’ s Den’ s reputation for finding small things in the lake soon turned into much bigger recoveries.
“ One day a man told me his dad’ s bass boat sank at Lee’ s Ford Marina, and he asked me if I had ever brought up a sunken boat,” said Littrell, who had never taken on such a huge lake recovery, but he couldn’ t resist the underwater challenge.
Nearly three decades later, Diver’ s Den has brought up nearly 200 boats ranging in size from small fishing boats to large houseboats.“ That first boat I recovered, I charged $ 500, only to find out that the next nearest bid was $ 3,500,” Littrell laughed.
The first few boats Littrell and his team brought up, they did so by trial and error. But they soon developed special techniques to bring up any size boat from the bottom of the lake. Littrell and his diving teams earn good pay for their expert underwater services.
Photo courtesty of Diver’ s Den Stay & Play Lake Cumberland Region- Summer 2025 31