Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1894-08-29
HOW TO TAKE A HEADER.
Points on Diving in Deep and Shallow
Water.

Points on Diving in Deep and Shallow
Water.
"Of what use is diving?' Well for ex-
ample. in bringing up an object from
the bottom and in saving life, where it
is almost always necessary to dive down
after the body Outside of the purely
utilitarian consideration it is delightful
sensation and adds greatly to the pleas
ure in swimming. Everybody can learn
to dive and practice it without any bad
results 1t is held by many persons that
diving produces headache. 1t may do
this at first but if the diving is done at
the right time of day and not to excess
the temporary rush of blood to the head
will do no harm.
The art of diving is best learned by
gradual approaches. After you are ac-
customed to putting your head under
water and keeping your eyes open, stOop
by the waters edge with your elbows
resting on your knees and your hands in
the position of breast stroke. Now
plunge in, but do not open your eyes I'M
til your head is under water striking
the water with eyes open will cause them
to become blOOdshOt.
Continue this until you can dive from
higher posture and finally when stand
ing erect.
The most natural position for a dive
is to hold the arms forward. inclosing
the head as wedge, the chest inflated
the knees together. the body bowed slight
ly toward the water. In striking the
water one must be careful not to fall flat,
but to throw the legs up in the air and
to cleave the water with the hands.
In swimming under water the breast
stroke is the best. When You want to
go down deeper raise your hands i'll MAX
ing the recovery and when you want to
come up paddle the water down under
your stomach and chest. The plunge diff
ferS from the dive in that the body is
held rigid without moving a muscle. The
great thing here is to have as little re-
sistance as possible. the head and chest
are thrown back. the legs together and
the feet laid straight out. The swimmer
comes to the surface simply by turning
the palms of his hands upward, and de-
sends by turning them downward. The
depths of water in which it is possible to
dive varies as the bulk Of the swimmer
and as the angle with which he strikes the
water. A thin man can so deeper than
q heavy one on account of the resistance
of the water, and one man will dive TWEEN
ty-fve feet into five feet of water without
striking bottom, and afother Wo9ll strike
it from a height of six feet. A good
J. B. Johnson, who for some years held
the championship in this line, dived eigh-
ty-fye feet into six feet of water. Last
year young Swede broke this record
by diving in Lake Michigan a distance Of
40 feet. but into water of great depth
Steve Brodie dropped from Brooklyn
bridge, also 14O feet in 4 second and
half. Before doing so. however, he
weighed his feet down with forty pounds
Of lead, which insured his landing right
side up
Salt water is much more buoyant than
fresh. When 4 diver is sent down 300
feet to a sunken vessel he is weighted
down with 300 pounds of lead 1t is
about impossible to go deeper than this
for the pressure is so great that it almost
brushes the copper head piece, while the