Back in the day, deep South Philadelphia had an especially grand public pool in “the Lakes,” otherwise known as FDR Park. Huge and legendarily awesome, it closed in 1996, leaving the Barry Playground Pool as the only free spot for a swim south of Oregon Avenue. Barry’s been more than up to the task – as this 2010 summer journal attests – except when repairs (in 2002) or budget cuts (in 2009) have kept it dry. Author Jennifer Baldino Bonnet, who learned to swim at Barry and decades later watched her children do the same, calls the pool “a gift from my city.”

In 2001, a kerfuffle over Barry’s gender-segregated swim days resulted in changes at pools city-wide. On July 2^nd of that year, Jim Nolan and Carla Anderson of the Daily News reported, “It was 95 degrees in the shade in South Philadelphia on Wednesday, and like any sane person, Anne Marie Ulerick decided to take her 11-year-old daughter and 7-month-old son to the Barry Playground pool for a swim. Seconds after arriving at the well-kept rec center on 18th and Bigler Streets, Ulerick’s daughter jumped in and began frolicking in the refreshing water. But when Ulerick decided to take a dip with her baby boy, she was told to stay out of the pool. The reason? It was ‘girls day’ at the pool.”

Most if not all Philadelphia public pools once held “girls days” and “boys days” – you can see as much on outdated schedules posted on pool gates around the city. Dividing the population along gender lines helped control the number of people trying to swim on any given day, and allayed fears (as old as the pools themselves*) of inappropriate contact among swimsuit-clad young people.

But by July 17^th, 2001, two weeks and a flurry of articles after they first shared Ulerick’s story, the DN was reporting that all children five and younger and their parents would be allowed to swim on both boys’ and girls’ days (which was already the case at many of the pools with gender-segregated swims, though not at Barry), and that in future years, pool supervisors would need to provide justification and get approval from Rec Department brass to continue any single-sex swim times.

Barry still takes its rules seriously. While most city pools rely on the department-issued Rules and Regulations signs, Barry’s got additional directives duct-taped to a board by the entrance. (Mind you, this is a service. Plenty of other pools have these same additional rules; you just might not hear about them until you’re en route to breaking them.) These include leaving your belongings outside the pool gate, so leave your valuables elsewhere.

Barry Playground sits between Johnston Street to the north, Bigler Street to the south, and 18^th and 19^th Streets to the east and west. The pool is on the Bigler Street side, but its entrance is inside the playground and most easily accessed from 18^th Street.

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* In Contested Waters, Jeff Wiltse writes, “Since their origin in the nineteenth century, sexuality and concerns about sexuality have profoundly shaped the use and regulation of municipal pools. During the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, cities gender-segregated pools in order to protect women’s modesty and protect them from advances by anonymous men. Gender separation also served as a means of social control. It limited the opportunities unrelated males and females had to meet and interact in public, thereby maintaining traditional family authority over mixed-gender socializing and courtship.”

Philadelphia built our first municipal pools in the 1880s as public baths for the poor, most of whom did not have bathing facilities at home. Working-class men and boys of all races bathed on some days; (many fewer) women and girls on others. Swimming gained popularity among women in the early decades of the 20^th century (Wiltse: “In 1914 an average of 300 to 500 females swam in each of Philadelphia’s twenty-three outdoor pools each week. By 1934 the city averaged 1,200 to 1,500 female swimmers a day at each of its thirty-nine pools.”), and public pools began allowing men and women to swim together in the 1920s. Not coincidentally, that was also when pools across the northern U.S. started segregating along racial lines.

Hemmed in mid-block, Ford’s got an often trash-filled playground to one side, a bright and busy mural looming over another, and the rumble of Snyder Avenue laid out in front. There are no open fields here.

Steps from one of South Philadelphia’s more notorious corners, “the Ford Recreation Center at 7th Street and Snyder Avenue – a one-time haven for drug sellers – suddenly became the anti-drug rallying point for a neighborhood” in 1990, according to this Daily News piece, which also mentions that the Police Athletic League (PAL) took over center operations that spring. PAL did not take on the swimming spot, however, and Parks & Rec still staffs and runs Ford Pool.

It is the only pool I’ve visited where they asked to search my bag for weapons. From 1911 through the 1950s, 7^th and Snyder was the site of the Grand Theater (you can still make out the old “Talkies – Matinee Daily” sign on its castle-like exterior). These days, like in 1990, it’s an intersection with a rough reputation. That being said, as the South Philly Review reflected in this 2009 feature on Ford: “During a bright and sunny mid-summer day, there is no safer place then [sic] a neighborhood pool.”

The pool entrance is on the north side of Snyder Avenue, halfway between 6^th and 7^th.

South Philly’s largest public swim spot, Vare’s pristine waters sparkle between a century-old rec center and its adjacent expanse of threadbare fields. People who’ve been around for a while sometimes refer to the pool as “Gray’s Ferry” for the surrounding neighborhood, a blue-collar community hit hard by deindustrialization and often defined – at least externally – by racism.

Originally built around 1925, the pool (which has been rebuilt since) was in a white section of the neighborhood and did not start integrating until the late 1970s/early 1980s. In response to some particularly scrutinized area incidents of racial violence in 1997, the City committed to funding programming and renovations at nearby recreation facilities – which were both sites of conflict between Irish-Americans and African-Americans, and sites with particular potential for reconciliation and community-building. That commitment included valiant measures to keep Vare’s pool open, including fully or partially draining its 75,000 gallons every night during pool season (to be able to clean up bottles that were thrown in the pool to keep Black swimmers out) and equipping Vare with the largest police presence of any pool in the city.

Vare’s pool still gets drained every night (although I’ve heard now that’s more to keep people from swimming than to clean up hate-fueled debris), and the regular circulation means it’s got some of the freshest swimming water in the city. Its size and shape make it perfect for laps, though when I’ve visited jumps and flips seem to be more common.

Vare Playground occupies the block between Morris and Moore and 26^th and 27^th; the pool is on the Morris Street side.

“Stinger Square is only one square Philly block, but I think of it as a little slice of heaven,” says Irene Russell, President of the Friends of Stinger Square. “Although Stinger Square was established in 1910, it wasn’t until the early 70s that the pool was built. Vare Recreation Center had long been the only pool in Grays Ferry, but Grays Ferry was the most racially volatile area in the city and Vare was in the white neighborhood, which did not want Black kids swimming with their children. So the answer to the problem was to give Blacks their own pool, and that would keep them away from Vare. Since then our children have been swimming in a safe environment that welcomes all ethnicities, and having the time of their lives.”

The gate was closed when I walked up to the pool on a sweaty Saturday in July, so I asked the PMA on the other side if I could come in. “Of course, honey,” she said, taking a momentary break from sweeping the pool deck. “This pool is for everybody.” The bathing-suits-only rule seemed to have gone out the window that day, and a fair number of kids were swimming fully clothed. The lifeguards had enough to handle trying to keep the enthusiastic jumping and flipping games under some semblance of control. “Can you believe I learned to swim in this motherfucker?” I heard one woman laugh to another.

Search through local news archives, and the main things you’ll turn up about Stinger Square are a flurry of reports, every ten years or so, about anti-violence efforts in the area. Talking to Irene Russell paints a much fuller picture. “Stinger Square has always been a safe haven for families to come to, for generations,” she explains. “And the atmosphere at the pool reflects that. It is an air of camaraderie and good wholesome fun. Most of the people who work there are from the neighborhood and familiar with the children and their families so things don’t ever get too far out of hand. It is important to the neighborhood because it is a vital part of our park, which hosts reunions, birthdays, church picnics and many other community events. Also, many summer camps come to the pool so their campers can swim. There is also a high attendance from younger and older adults for adult swim time.”

“Over the years Stinger has evolved with the times. A group of community members formed the Friends of Stinger Square and have been working since 2000 with Parks and Rec, PA Horticultural, the Conservancy, as well as our Council leaders and State Reps to keep our park ‘An Urban Oasis,’ as our welcome sign says. We will be getting a major makeover this winter and look forward to the ribbon-cutting in the Spring. I welcome everyone to come out and visit our park but I must warn you too: ‘Once you do Stinger, you don’t go back!’ But really though, everyone I’ve seen visit our park I’ve seen come back and bring their families with them. They become a part of the Stinger Square family.”

The pool is on 32^nd Street between Reed and Dickinson, on the east side of Stinger Square. Wind your way through the family and neighborhood cook-outs to the pool entrance, which is inside the park.

The mini melting pot that is Sacks Pool encapsulates South Philly’s diversity – racially, linguistically, aesthetically – and has the energy to match. The surrounding fence hugs the pool close. And despite Solomon Sacks Playground’s 3.7 acres and Jefferson Square Park across the street, there’s no mistaking that you’re anywhere but the heart of the city.

Sacks Pool was built in 1971, a few years after the recreation complex of which it’s part. Sacks’ well-worn soccer field and baseball diamond now also host the culminating event of the largest Cinco de Mayo festival in the United States, the San Mateo Carnavalero or Carnaval de Puebla. Back in 1778, the site hosted a different sort of festival, a giant farewell party (known as the Mischianza) for British General Sir William Howe, Commander-in-Chief of the British forces during the early years of the Revolutionary War. In the intervening years, from around 1836 to 1945, the spot was home to the Southwark Foundry and Machine Company, manufacturing engines, boilers and other machinery.

In 1994, Bruce Springsteen filmed part of his video for “Streets of Philadelphia” at Sacks (you can almost make out the pool deck around minute 1:45) and afterwards donated $45,000 to its upkeep. Successful community efforts to maintain and improve the underfunded facilities made the Inquirer in both 1990 and 2004, and in 2005 Home Depot and the National Council of La Raza paid to refurbish them. Closed for the season during the 2009 budget cuts, Sacks also hosted Mayor Nutter’s 2010 press conference to announce all the pools would re-open that summer.

Sacks’ facilities take up the block between Washington and Federal and 5^th and 4^th Streets; the pool is on the Federal Street side, closer to 4^th.

It may be little, but Chew isn’t a pool to mess with. Their swim team is sizable, and one of the best in South Philly. The rules – No Jumping as well as No Diving – are strictly enforced. And hopefully by now, city officials have learned to stop trying to shut it down.

In 2004, Chew Playground (which includes the pool, a playground and constantly-in-use basketball courts and playing fields) was part of the 25% of city recreation facilities Mayor Street proposed to close, lease or sell. But Point Breeze marched and rallied behind it, and City Council ended up restoring funding for Chew and all the affected centers. In 2009, Mayor Nutter did shut Chew’s pool for the summer – and the surrounding community was again one of the most vocal about their need and love for this oasis.

The Playground entrance is on Ellsworth Street between 18^th and 19^th; from there, the pool is on the far side of the colorfully muralled building to your left. You’ll need to leave all your belongings outside the gate (on the ground or wedged into the fence), sign in and shower before getting in the water. On a hot day, children’s shouts will drown out the sound of the traffic on Washington Avenue.

Check out this nice picture too.

Community rally in 2009’s empty pool. Photo by Coalition to Save the Libraries.

Ridgway has many fans. Shiny blogs like Daily Candy and Curbed Philly endorse it. My landlord loves it. And I once sat beside an especially loud and tattooed fellow at an East Passyunk coffee shop who went on about it with great passion. It’s actually now my home pool, though it’s not the one I visit the most. The first time I went (in 2007), it was so full of kids that if you dunked under the water you practically had to check to make sure none of them had swum above your head before you popped up again. I have heard and noticed (thanks to the clear view of the pool from the 13^th Street sidewalk) that it’s much less crowded these days.

Nestled under the trees behind the many-pillared High School for Creative and Performing Arts (CAPA), Ridgway is a “detached pool,” meaning that there’s not a rec center right beside it. (Until the early 1990s, there actually was a Ridgway Rec in the basement of the building that’s now CAPA’s – and was formerly the Ridgway Library – but it was displaced by the City’s development of South Broad into the “Avenue of the Arts.” In 1997, the Department of Parks and Rec opened the Hawthorne Cultural Center at 12^th and Carpenter, and it’s now the rec affiliated with Ridgway. HCC’s mandate to integrate dance, music, and visual arts into the regular athletic-recreation programming has contributed a beach-scene mural to the wall of the pool shed.) The pool’s shape (something like a rectangle with a large lima bean popping out of one corner) isn’t one designed for traditional lap swimming, and there’s a very cool sprinkler that rains down over the two-foot-deep section. The attendants may ask you to sign in as you enter, and you’re welcome to bring your stuff in with you.

You can get to the pool gate from a path that starts at the corner of Broad and Carpenter.