Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America - Hardcover

Wiltse, Jeff

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 080783100X ISBN 13: 9780807831007

Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press, 2007

Synopsis

From nineteenth-century public baths to today's private backyard havens, swimming pools have long been a provocative symbol of American life. In this social and cultural history of swimming pools in the United States, Jeff Wiltse relates how, over the years, pools have served as asylums for the urban poor, leisure resorts for the masses, and private clubs for middle-class suburbanites. As sites of race riots, shrinking swimsuits, and conspicuous leisure, swimming pools reflect many of the tensions and transformations that have given rise to modern America.

About this title

Book Description

"I had always stared at those intriguing pictures of America's gigantic municipal pools of bygone eras, always curious as to who spent their days wading and plunging in those vast waters. Now I read with fascination, in Contested Waters, how the swimming pools of America were the quintessential backdrop of race, gender, and class relations for more than a century of our history. This book makes me long to have experienced afternoons in those historic swimming holes."--Diana Nyad

From the Inside Flap

From 19th-century public baths to today's private backyard havens, swimming pools have been a provocative symbol of American life. In this social and cultural history of swimming pools in the U.S., Wiltse relates how, over the years, pools have served as asylums for the urban poor, leisure resorts for the masses, and private clubs for middle-class suburbanites. As sites of race riots, shrinking swimsuits, and conspicuous leisure, swimming pools reflect the tensions and transformations that have given rise to modern America.

Edition details

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 080783100X
• ISBN 13: 9780807831007
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288