Celebrate Water Polo’s Venue: Happy National Swimming Pool Day (July 11)
BRIDGEPORT, Pa. — July 11 is recognized as National Swimming Pool Day – a day to celebrate the venue in which water polo competitions occur around the country and globe.
Pools have been around for centuries as the ancient city of Mohenjo-Daro (now in Pakistan) had a 40 by 23-foot pool lined with bricks and sealed with a tar-like substance back in 3,000 B.C.
The Romans built pools for military exercises, nautical games and athletic training. The Roman emperors even had private pools filled with fish, leading to the Latin word “piscina” meaning “fish pond” being associated with pools. Gaius Maecenas, a wealthy Roman lord and patron of the arts, is credited with constructing the first heated swimming pool around 100 B.C.
Moving ahead to the mid-1800s, swimming pools gained popularity in Britain. In 1837, the earliest indoor pools with diving boards emerged, providing a platform for daring aquatic acrobatics. The Maidstone Swimming Club, established in 1844 in Maidstone, Kent, stands proudly as one of Britain’s oldest surviving swimming clubs. Its noble mission was to teach people to swim and prevent drowning incidents, following a tragic series of river-related deaths in the area.
Crossing the Atlantic to the United States, the oldest known swimming pool is the Underwood Pool in Belmont, Mass. The longest pool in North America is the 137 meter long Kitsilano Pool, an outdoor saltwater swimming pool, located at Kitsilano Beach in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
