College Hill Swimming Pool, 1940s, by Elaine Creed

From MemoryArchive

Who: Elaine Creed
What: Swimming Pool 
When: early 1940s
Where: Wichita, Kansas

The other day in the paper there was a picture of children swimming in one of the local swimming pools. Almost all of the children had a plastic inner tube or a foam rubber float stick which are so popular today. It made me realize how different swimming pools of my day were. Today, a great many of the neighborhoods have a community pool. Mothers accompany their children and both spend a big part of the afternoon enjoying the summer sun. Mothers either work on their tan lying on a chaise lounge or sit in a chair under an umbrella while the children play in the water or just sit on the edge and dangle their feet. Some of the smaller children spash in the baby pool while mother sits nearby supervising. It is all very relaxed. Nothing is really organized. Rules are limited to those that apply to safety - such as do not run, no glass in the pool area, look before jumping into the water (obviously to protect those already in the pool) and, of course, no diving in the shallow end. For the most part pools today are only for fun and recreation. That was not the case when I was young.

The first real difference was that there were very few pools when I was a kid. In fact, my town had only a few and they were located at the various parks. The biggest pool was Municipal in Riverside Park. It was a hugh pool approximately 60-75 feet by 200-225 feet. It was obviously meant to be used by the entire city but since it was on the west side of the city and half of the population lived on the east side, it was not very convenient for everyone especially children to use on a daily basis. It is important to remember that when I was a kid (I'm not saying I'm old but most families had only one car and mothers did not have a way to "take" their children to a pool ten miles from home) young people were limited to "bicycle" distance. I was one of the many who lived on the east side. As a result, Municipal was certainly out of my bicycle distance. The pool that was closest to me was College Hill Park Pool. My mother originally took me there each day when I was in third or fourth grade but for reasons which I will explain later stopped when it became too time consuming and inconvenienct. It was located about three miles from my house which was bicycle distance, so when I was old enough, I began to go by myself.

There was a regular routine associated with swimming at this particular pool so one had to be very determined to go everyday. Getting there was only part of the routine. Once you got there - and you had to go at a specific time depending on your age - there were a series of things you had to do to even get into the pool. Because the pool was relately small, only swimmers of a certain age group were allowed in at specific times. I can't remember the exact breakdown for the groups but it was something along the line of 6-7, 8-9,10-11, and so on. You had to be on time, or you did not get in. This usually meant standing in line so you were not late. The whistle would blow when one session was over and the swimmers would leave the pool area, take a shower (to get the chlorine off of the skin) and leave the bathhouse. Then another whistle would blow, new swimmers would enter the bathhouse, take a quick shower - this was mandatory and there were instructors to see that you did - then line up to enter the pool area. At the entrance to the pool area was a chlorine "foot bath" to step in before you were allowed on the pool deck or in the water. Once in the pool area, each swimmer lined up again at the side of the pool. At that point, the instructor would enter the water and demonstrate the lesson for the day. There was always a lesson. Instruction lasted about thirty minutes and then swimmers were allowed "free swimming" for another 15 minutes. (Of course, there was a whistle between instruction and free time.) At the end of the free swim, the whistle would blow once again and swimmers were required to leave the pool area, shower and leave. The whole process took less than an hour which is the reason many mothers (mine included) were not too eager to "haul" their children to the pool. If they went, they had to stand outside of the fence surrounding the pool. There were no chaise lounges, no umbrellas, no chairs - cement benches placed in appropriate places were as good as they could expect

Going to the pool when I was young was definitely different from what it is today. It was fun but also instructive and it was only for eager young people with a desire to learn the sport of swimming while keeping cool for just a little while. But like many of my era, I felt fortunate to have the opportunity just to swim for a little while in an area that was safe, clean and relatively close to home.