The Washington times., 1913-07-17
SW|MM|N' HOLE"
BEATSC|TY'S BEACH
Few Left in District, But They
Are Still Popular With Boys
of the Capital.

tofhishes nne swimming pools with
guards and other attendants, the old
swtmmin hole has not lost its attrac-
ton for juvenile humanity. Even the
city bred youth of Washington have a
natural hankering for the muddy hole
or hard beach where there is no re-
straint and no rules restrict exuberance.
Out in Rock creek, in what used 10 be
the hollow below Lovers lane, but
where now the Lydecker tunnel pump
house and the Massachusetts avenue
bridge stand as the sentinels of prog
ress and city growth, there is a real
old-fashioned swimming hole Here the
youngsters from Cooks Park and other
sections of Georgetown roll UP their
pants or discard them altogether, ac-
cording to size or inclination. UT possibly
parental injunction.
This spot for two or three generations
has been famous as a swimming hole
and IL is one of the few remaining in
the environs of the District.
City streets and modern improvements
now blot many noted spots of the past
where youngsters bathed and waded CT
hshed for minnows, Willing away a
summer day. One by one they have
gone before the encroachment of prog
ress. Still youth is not TO be denied.
and there is succor in the FOUNTAINS and
even in the sewers. But mans nodded
concrete does not furnish the joys and
the seclusion furnished by Mother
Nature.
'sThe wharf and the trestle." or
more exactly, II not as correctly. the
trussel," two of the most famed and
popular bathing and swimming points
along the river front, where the
Wharf Rats" the invincible' organiza-
ton of tough kids, used to foregather
every day from May to October, have
given way to boat houses. The wharf. I"
was the old public wharf at the stone
, crusher adjoining the Aqueduct bridge
and twelve years ago a hot afternoon
saw several hundred boys and young
men in the water. The men, scores of
Spectators used to line the bridge to
watch the antics of these expert swim
rners and divers, whose fame was nSyer
sung for athletic ability. because is was
common for a wharf swimmer to be an
expert, and athletics were not then
highly organized. The new house of
the Potomac Boat Club now crowds
this site and no bathing is allowed.
Swimming from the city's wharTes is
not the popular pastime II used to be
when there were fewer restrictions and
far less other amusements to attract.
There was a bathing beach at that
time, but among the hundreds, even
thousands of expert swimmers along
the water front, il was not overly popu
lar.
The Did trussel" above the bridge,
which has now given way before the
march of a line of lighthouses that at
tract young women devotees of the
canoe and bateauX was even more
popular, IL not so notorious, as the
wharf. Here the youngsters, learning
20 nd
stay In the water for sometimes eight
hours a day.
An old railroad trestle carried on piles
followed the shore line, keeping from
ten to twenty feet in the Potomac. This
furnished the limit and the danger line.
Behind il all were safe, and, besides, Its
cross bars furnished a diving ladder of
any desired height. The little fellows
going in here never thought of bathing
suits
1t was at the trestle that nearly all
of Juvenile Georgetown learned to SWIM.
.. College Rock, on the MARYLAND shore
above the culvert under the canal, was
another noted spot 1t was here that
the college youth escaped the plebeians
OF the street until they were discovered.
and forever after there was a battle
for possession. The water was deep
here, and the youngster acquired rapid
knowledge of the science of swimming
when ruthlessly cast from the rock to
be helped gasping ashore by four of
the best swimmers To be a receiver in
the water was an honor. and required
rare ability.
Fotty-foot Rock, on the Virginia
shore above the second quarry. still
holds its own, but an eferyincreasing
number of fair canoeists makes bathing
suits necessary now. This spot furnish
es an ideal place for swimming. Stand
ing well out, there is a rounded rock
about five feet above high water. Out
10 this rock there is a hard. sandy and
gently sloping beach. At the rock there
is q sheer drop to a forty-foot depth in
the channel way The beach ledge is
known 10 all its frequenters and the
rock and depth OF water are fine for
diving.
Boys in the vicinity of Bladensburg
have their swimming hole in the little
branch that recently flooded this section
Of the District. 1t is one. Of the kind
known a generation ago furnished by
Mother Nature.
In the southeast and southwest in
the sections away from the river the
boyB had swimming hole in the old
James Creek Canal bat this has given
way to modern sanitary engineering
as has the swimming hole at the old
Red Lot west of Thirty-seventh street,
near what Is now r street. and the
pond, higher up the branch which once
flowed through this section, but which
has now been converted into a sewer.
With the disappearance of many
swimming holes, the District Commits
sioners are now considering the estab-
lishment Of municipal swimming pools
in various sections of the District. pre-
fefably at the Fairgrounds. But these
VIII never take the place Of the ''old
swimmin' hola"