August 2022 - “Swimming While Black"
Many of the children attending the Camp Linden Summer Camp outside of Philadelphia don’t have a lot of opportunities to learn how to swim. Many of them are from Black neighborhoods without easy access to public pools. The swimming lessons they receive can be lifesaving. Currently white children are two times more likely to know how to swim than Black children. The USA Swimming Foundation claims that 70 percent of African American children are non-swimmers. That’s why, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “black children aged five to 14 are three times more likely to die from unintentional drowning than their white counterparts.”
It’s not that Black Americans have never been active swimmers. It’s true that before the Civil War enslavers vehemently discouraged the practice, seeing it as an avenue for escape. Nevertheless, Black Americans were more active swimmers than whites. According to Jeff Wiltse, author of Contested Waters: A Social History of Segregation, people of the African diaspora had deep cultural bonds with water and were great swimmers.
After the Civil War, however, racism made swimming while Black dangerous. In July of 1919, for example, Black teenager Eugene Williams was murdered when he swam in the “whites only” section of Lake Michigan. Outrage was intense, and when police refused to prosecute the killers, a week of violence led to the death of 38 people, Black and white.
Racial tensions grew as swimming pools became more popular in the 1920’s and 30’s. Legal segregation and extra-legal methods, such as the closing of public pools and opening of restricted “swim clubs” continued denying people of color opportunities to swim. This followed the pattern we see in Virginia, after Brown v. Board of Education, when public schools closed and private schools were created to avoid legal integration requirements. The current 2022 exhibition at the Fairmont Water Works in Philadelphia, Pool, explains that when it became apparent that Black men and white women might share the same water, arbitrary enforcement of rules, like requiring a health card to enter, were used to keep Black folks out.
In Montgomery, Alabama, the YMCA became a convenient tool for continued segregation, according to a revealing article by The Guardian. Helped out with tax exemptions and free city water, the YMCA, a private organization, was able to open facilities that were exclusively for whites. This stopped only in 1970 due to a lawsuit won by civil rights lawyers, including Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center. Otherwise Black swimmers simply created their own opportunities, as in Yeadon, PA where, in 1959, the first Black-owned pool club was organized - The Nile Swim Club.
Black people wanting to swim in the ocean faced similar racist roadblocks. A century ago, Charles and Willa Bruce built a beach resort for Black families who faced harassment and threats at other seaside locations. In 1924, however, local officials took the land through eminent domain. Today county officials acknowledge that the seizure was motivated by racism, not by any real desire to support the common good. The Bruce’s lost their land and people of color lost easy access to the ocean.
Thankfully, Los Angeles County has proven that some forms of economic reparations are possible. This summer the Board of Supervisors gave the land to the descendants of Charles and Willa Bruce. Anthony Bruce, speaking on behalf of the family, described the victory as bittersweet. It’s what the family had been waiting for, but “it’s a reminder of the terrible and tragic events that took place before this happened…. Let this be the drop that creates the ripple that creates the wave that creates the tsunami that covers the country.”
Further Action:
1) Support Camp Linden https://phillyethics.org/camp-linden/camp-linden-program/ or other programs in your area to promote swimming lessons for children without easy access to pools or the beach. To get started, explore the Diversity in Aquatics website.
2) Support efforts to return land near swimming areas to families of color, such as in the case with Bruce’s Beach. While Where Is My Land focuses on land theft in general, not just on water access sites, consider supporting it in honor of the victory at Bruce’s Beach. More people need to start speaking out. Where is My Land Founder Kavon Ward explained that, “It took someone thinking outside of the box. It took someone courageous to say, ‘This was taken, it needs to be given back.’” Watch video of news coverage about Bruce’s Beach.
3) Listen to an NPR story about “Plunging into Public Pools' Contentious Past” which involves a conversation with Jeff Wiltse, author of Contested Waters.
4) Share this important article by James Hamblin, “A Racist History of Drowning” published in The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/06/a-racial-history-of-drowning/276748/
5) Further reading on the topic in The Guardian.