Sepia Saturday
Using Alan's theme for sports since the Olympics are going on and since swimming is my favorite I found this on Wikipedia.
I am just guessing the four people in the background are time keeper and/or judges.
Swimming in 1920 at Antwerp
The swimming events were held in a hastily
constructed pool in the middle of Antwerp. The water was noted to be
very dark and very cold. In addition, the weather throughout the Games
was cool and damp and the swimmers scrambled to warm up after every
race.
The men were led by a star from Stockholm, Duke Kahanamoku, the famous Hawaiian swimmer who made his international début at the 1912 Olympics, and a star from Paris, Norman Ross, who had won five of six individual gold medals at the 1919 Inter-Allied Games in Paris. Duke won two gold medals and Ross three, leaving only the backstroke and breaststroke events for others to win. Ethelda Bleibtrey led the women by winning gold medals in all three of the freestyle events on the program for women at Antwerp.
The men were led by a star from Stockholm, Duke Kahanamoku, the famous Hawaiian swimmer who made his international début at the 1912 Olympics, and a star from Paris, Norman Ross, who had won five of six individual gold medals at the 1919 Inter-Allied Games in Paris. Duke won two gold medals and Ross three, leaving only the backstroke and breaststroke events for others to win. Ethelda Bleibtrey led the women by winning gold medals in all three of the freestyle events on the program for women at Antwerp.
Bleibtrey began swimming as therapy to counteract the effects of polio. Because she swam without stockings in 1919, she was given a summons for “nude swimming”; the subsequent public support for Bleibtrey led to the abandonment of stockings as a conventional element in women’s swimwear. By the 1920 Olympics she held the world record in the backstroke. Since the Olympics had no backstroke event for women, she entered the only three races open to women that year. Despite having to compete under difficult conditions in a tidal estuary, she set a world record for the 100-metre freestyle race in the third heat, then set a new world record of 1 min 13.6 sec in the final race. She set another world record (4 min 34 sec) in the 300-metre freestyle. Her third gold medal came in the 4 × 100-metre relay, which the U.S. team won in 5 min 11.6 sec.
Bleibtrey won every national American swimming championship from 50 yards to long distance (three miles) and never lost a race during her amateur career. In 1922 she turned professional. She was credited with rescuing a woman and her two sons in Narragansett Bay, R.I., in 1925. Three years later she was arrested for swimming in the Central Park reservoir while demonstrating for more public swimming facilities in New York City. She spent much of her life teaching swimming to handicapped children.
Hope everyone is enjoying the games as we are.
Nothing like it.
