03/05/2010
These are from the "Wirral Globe" (UK).
MY SKINNY DIPPING DAYS ARE OVER!
HAVING only just started at Pilgrim Street Primary School in 1967, I don't remember much about the previous time The Open Golf Championship was held at Hoylake.
My family left Wirral in 1977, so I took the opportunity to use this year's Open as an excuse to return for a visit. I must say that Wirral has improved almost beyond recognition over the intervening 28 years.
It's amusing to hear the teenagers in Hoylake and West Kirby complaining about the heat. In 1976, not only was it warmer but we had a plague of ladybirds to contend with!
These were contributory factors to the secret' outbreak that year of skinny dipping' (naked swimming) at night off Mockbeggar Wharf.
There were far more females than males who indulged in this pastime and after 30 years I can admit to being one of them!
My friend and I had gone down there to swim in our bikinis, but when we came across 40-50 nude swimmers I thought to heck with it' and stripped off totally naked for an exhilarating dip. My friend was more modest and wore her bikini, but she was the one who looked out of place on the beach!
Happy times but I don't think I'd try it today!
Jenny Jardine (ex-Noctorum),
Leeds.
DAY I “SKINNY DIPPED” FULLY CLOTHED!
ALWAYS feared that the widespread tales about skinny dipping' on the Wirral coast in the '70s were urban myths.
Thanks to Jenny Jardine's letter (My skinny dipping days are over!' Mailbox, July 26), I am relieved to find that the stories were, in fact, true and we weren't such a staid bunch in Wirral in the '70s after all!
My own recollections of swimming in the Summer of 1976 are the exact opposite to those of the bold Ms Jardine but are equally bizarre . . .
In 1976 I was part of a group of students from Birkenhead Tech who decided to meet up for an afternoon of swimming at Derby Pool, New Brighton. In time-honoured fashion, we crept in under the chain link fence without paying to enter. But when we sneaked into the women's changing room to my dismay I found that my cozzy' wasn't in my bag!
As a teenage girl in the '70s I genuinely envied the courage and indifference of those of my friends who could pad around completely naked in female changing rooms without a care in the world.
So unlike the sensible and practical Jenny Jardine, I simply could not bear the idea of stripping bare for a swim, but because of the heat the pool was irresistible. I kicked off my shoes and, barefoot but otherwise fully-clothed, dived in.
I managed an entire length of the pool underwater in my clothes (which in that temperature was a lot more refreshing than it sounds) before surfacing at the deep end, gasping for air.
Even before I had finished furiously shaking my head to get the water out of my ears, I was accosted by a lifeguard, who escorted me to the exit, gave me back my shoes and ordered me to leave.
If anyone remembers a dripping wet, saturated teenage girl waiting for a train at Grove Road Station in July, 1976, that was me!
Barbara Gibson,
Shevington Avenue,Oxton
FULLY CLOTHED SWIMMER WAS MY INSPIRATION!
I was a regular swimmer at the Derby Pool, New Brighton, in the scorcher of 1976' and I witnessed a girl who swam a length underwater with her clothes on (Day I skinny dipped full clothed', Mailbox, September 6).
I would like to say that Barbara Gibson, as I now know her name to be, understates the impact of her magnificent feat!
Those of us who saw her dive in fully clothed - it was an excellent dive as well - pointed her out to those who hadn't. We could follow her underwater progress easily, even though she was swimming lower and lower in the water as the pool gradually increased in depth, because her hair and distinctive blue dress billowed around her.
We expected her to swim for the surface at any moment, but as it became clear she was heading for the opposite end of the pool without coming up for air we started cheering her.
When she finally surfaced, having made it to the deep end, nearly everyone in the pool applauded!
Ms Gibson mistakes the bikini-clad member of staff who escorted her to the exit for a lifeguard - she was in fact a temp named Samantha, a nice-looking student doing office work at the Derby Pool in the Summer recess. She practised diving during her work breaks because she was a member of her University's diving team.
Her diving attracted a lot of attention, so she was probably a bit put out when Ms Gibson's performance stole her thunder!
From that day on I determined that one day I would swim an entire pool length underwater as well. I finally achieve my ambition 21 years later at the ripe old age of 35 at the Rawlinson Centre in Speke. By that time I was the mother of two teenage daughters. Although my impressed girls cheered me from the pool side when I finished my first-ever underwater length, there was no mass applause for me from anyone else in the pool.
But when you come to think of it, I did it with my long hair in a neat bun and wearing a one-piece swimsuit, not fully clothed like my inspiration, Ms Gibson!
Carol Taylor,
Wavertree, Liverpool
Poster:
Geraldine June