Swimming pools & swimmers

Gosford Pool on a beautiful sunny afternoon, 1958. A boy dives in the shallow end like a spear entering the water, he takes three dolphin kicks under water, rolls, pushes off the far end, and like a beautiful dolphin, surfaces, his arms out in front. Parts his hands, pulls the water and surges forward - he was the nearest thing to a fish I had ever seen, it was sheer joy to stand and watch. Coventry's own Graham Symonds.

Hi Kaga, could be the carnival, the outfit the lady is wearing in Queens Road is quite distinctive so I think I will find it when I get around to it. The class thing was a big deal back then, could be my imagination but I have an image of my mom tugging her forelock in the corner shop.

I learnt to swim there. It was the chosen school swimming baths until the Fairfax Street baths were opened. Thanks for the memory!

I was a member of the Godiva Ladies there in the early 60's and I still have a certificate to show that I could swim one width in good style.

Loved those baths. I went swimming there both with Radford Junior School and then with Coundon Court. I often used to walk there on a Saturday to be there when it opened at 9.00am. Then you got a nice calm empty pool and an end lane because I didn't like to go out of my depth. Loved swimming but not very confident. I have my certificate for swimming a length when I went with Coundon Court, dated June 1960.

A good one Prof. Like Anne I lost all my confidence when on the end of a rope with a rubber ring. I was booked in for a few lessons but the lady instructor was chatting to the lady next to her and I experienced a few 'duckings' trying to swim back. Needless to say I didn't go back again, only with my dad.

We've added some lovely photographs of Livingstone Road Baths, by Jenny Parkin, to Coventry Digital.

Reading through this old post made me recall Woodlands swimming pool (to which I must have donated at least £1 towards its construction in the early 60's) being so frozen over that Colin Dick (art teacher) was actually ice skating on it.

I hated it, Mick. Don Thompson seen here making sure everyone froze.

How about converting it into a nice theatre?

How's about converting it into a swimming pool? We're a large city, we need one in the city centre. It makes my blood boil the way they have allowed it to become run down over the years. Absolutely shameful. And is that monstrosity in New Union Street supposed to pacify us? Who on earth builds a "child friendly" thing like that, surrounded on 3 sides by busy roads. So busy that they had to build an embankment along the road. Sigh

Gosford swimming pool. We used to go there with Freddies around 1960. Bloody freezing in the winter. The kids used to hide and the teachers rounded them up and slung them in. There was sometimes a thin layer of ice on the surface of the pool, I kid you not. They used to call it character building, but that is not the phrase the kids called it.

I think I've mentioned before that the only heated part of the whole site was a cup of oxo!