The record-union., 1893-06-01
AT THE BATHS.
The Formal Opening for the Season
Takes Place Tonight.
Captain Jack Williams VIII Show the
sacramento People Some of
His Wonderful Feats.

The formal opening of the Sacramento
Swimming Baths for the season will
take place tonight. The baths were
quietly opened last Thursday morning in
order that the public might enjoy the
luxury of a swim. but the preparations
for the real opening have been actively
going on ever since.
| And the people ought to be there, for
those who are will see what nearly, if not
quite all of them, have never seen i'll
their lives. 1t is a wonderful perform
ance. and will be given by Captain Jack
Williams who has come up from Los
Angeles under engagement to the man
agement to show to the Sacramento peo-
pie the wonderful feats which have made
his name famous on this coast. Captain
Jack has also most enviable record as a
lite-Sayer. His first start was made many
year ago, while yet boy scarcely in his
teens, in his native Portugal, and the
subject of his skill was his grandfather,
who would have drowned from the cap
sizing OF his boat had not young Jack
swan out to him anu held him up till aid
came. a few months after he saved II
/ boy playmate.
| He says he cannot help the instinct to
/
10 be in danger of drowning, and the
/ feeling must have seized him very often
and i'll all parts OF the world, for he saved
q man at kio de Janeiro, one at Calcutta.
at Liverpool and other places. During the
period he was swimming instructor at
NJ ontreal he saved twelve persons; in
| Havana harbOr he saved Il man and
| woman who tell overboard; on the
Mississippi he saved a man, his wife and
daughter, who jumped off steam boat
which caught fire, beside saving two
ladies and a gentleman who were out
sailing with him i'll Boston harbOr when
their boat upset
SEVENTEEN AT ONE TINE.
But the Captain says the hottest time he
ever had was at New Orleans, in the
spring of 1885. 4 crowd of whites and
blacks had gathered on the Government
wharf to witness the ceremony of bap-
tism. The wharf gave way and about
fifty of them fell into the water. II res
cued seventeen of them, and some fisher
men with their boats rescued the rest
not one being lost
THE FEATS HE PERFORMS
Are marvellous and have excited the de-
light and admiration of those who have
witnessed them at the Piedmont baths in
| Oakland, at Los Angeles and other
! places on the coast.
Tonight, with eight straps confn-
| ing his arms to his body and his
legs and feet together, he will jump from
! the balcony over the south end of the
swimming tank and swim twice the
length OF the tank in what would be to
others perfectly helpless condition. He
will also swim with a flag i'll each hand
which he waves continually and which
are never suffered to get wet. His great
Monte Cristo" act Is to be tied u in
sack and thrown into the water like the
! sE .I,t1
speedily frees himself and rises to the
| surface again.
He eats and drinks in the water SWIM
ming without using his hands, and also
walks through the water the whole
length of the tank, smoking a cigar
| all the while.
How he does it no one but himself
knows, but he lights a pair OF Roman
candles and dives with them, and when
| he again reappears they are still lit and
| sputtering and throwing their fireballs
| in the usual way.
He also gives a practical lesson in ford
| ing rivers to our National Guard, it case
they need to practice it, for he walks
| through the water with double bar
relied gun on his shoulder, discharging it
at will. A regiment naneuvering IN this
way would prove very effective in cross
! ing river in the face OF the enemy, and
we venture to suggest the new feature to
the Governor as an addition to the tactics,
now that the reorganization of the militia
is going Oh.
The Captain is long distance swim
mer as well as being thoroughly at home
in the tank. Some time ago he swan
across San Francisco Bay, taking about
two hours to do it, He had plenty OF
money with which to cross on the Terry
! boat, but be felt he needed a little gentle
exercise that morning, and he took It, He
also swan around Seal Rock once, where
the breakers roll so wildly that boats
give it wide berth, and seemed per-
| 1ectly at home among the seals.
This afternoon he will ride through the
! streets and show the citizens how he will
! be bound when he performs his great
| feat