San Francisco celebrates with a bang,
dives into the New Year,
and bonds watching football.
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| New Year's Eve, Palace Hotel, December 31, 1934 - January 1, 1935 |
dives into the New Year,
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| San Francisco Olympic Club's New Year's Day Dip, Ocean Beach, January 1, 1965 |
and bonds watching football.
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| East-West Shrine Game, Kezar Stadium, January 1, 1949 |
100 plus South End Rowing Club, and Dolphin Club members will jump at 12:30 at the rock, for the 43rd annual New Years' Day Alcatraz Swim. It will take 28 to 68 minutes for the swimmers to make the distance. Here is the history of the swim as Told by Archivist Pat Cuneen:
ReplyDelete"Hi Bryce, The very first swim was by the SE in 1969. There were three South Enders, legends. Geo. Farnsworth, Norm Petersen and Tom Rice. From there it grew and grew. In the beginning there was no qualifying. Just jump in and swim, even some with swim aids. After the most frightening swim our club ever had in my opinion qualifiers were instituted. It was a very cold swim and the tides were unworldly. I recall picking up swimmers that were ashen in color and in hypothermia. Some heading west out the Gate. We had the SFFD rescue squad out on the shore etc. This was prior to our Zodiacs and SFPD and SFFD water rescue units. Only a few made this swim. If you you look on the Ball Room's west wall there is a short account and a poem for this day. The swim has grown tremendously and in later years the Dolphin Club was invited. We didn't have near the amount of swimmers but mainly the powerhouse swimmers of today with a few exceptions. This morn there were about 82 swimmers in the NYD qualifier swim. Hope this is a start. Lee Block sent me your inquiry." Patrick.
Thank you for sharing about the New Years' Day Alcatraz Swim. There are more details in the Dolphin Log too (recently digitized and hosted on the Internet Archive). http://www.archive.org/details/DolphinLogs1967To1972
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