Body Glove Heritage

Body Glove Is A Family Company With Rich History

Body Glove founders Bill and Bob Meistrell helped transform surfing and diving from smalltime niche activities into the worldwide phenomena they are today. Without the Meistrells’ singular talents, amiable personalities, and ground-breaking inventions, the world of watersports may never have transcended into cultural, athletic, and recreational significance on the global scale. Bill and his twin brother Bob were among the most influential pioneering watermen of the 20th century, and were named to both the surfing and diving halls of fame for their significant contributions to watersports and the billion dollar industry that has arisen around them.

Born in Booneville, Missouri in 1928, the Meistrell twins were water enthusiasts long before they ever swam in the ocean. Bill and Bob started their adventures in diving as young boys in a small pond on the farm where they grew up, using a bicycle pump and a hose to pump air into an oilcan helmet. According to Bob, the boys had three goals: to someday own a submarine, go deep-sea diving, and find lost treasure. “Somehow we managed all three,” says Bob.

When the twins were teenagers, they moved with their family to Manhattan Beach, and quickly took to the sea. They attended El Segundo High School, and became Los Angeles County Ocean Lifeguards.  The Meistrells were both drafted into military service during the Korean War, during which Bill was awarded a Bronze Star. It was the only time in their lives that the twin brothers lived apart from each other.

After the war, Bill and Bob borrowed $1800 from their mother to buy a stake in the Redondo Beach surf shop Dive N’ Surf, then owned by legendary surfboard maker Hap Jacobs and renowned surfer and diver Bev Morgan. The shop is the oldest in the South Bay of Los Angeles, and is still in the family today. In 1953, the Dive N’ Surf team invented a neoprene wetsuit with a fit “like a glove,” and Body Glove was born. Now 83, Bob Meistrell still loves the water, and is still involved with the company. Bill Meistrell passed away in 2006.