Naked swimmming

In my youth swimming in YMCA pools in New Zealand was done naked. This was certainly the case at the Christchurch (NZ) YMCA in 1966. In the school holidays the Y ran a holiday programme for boys. My best friend was keen to join in. I was not ready for the nude swimming : this was a requirement, not an option. I suspect that this was why he was so keen to participate. What happened after that I cannot recall, that is whether he joined on his own account or not. My recollection is that nude swimming at the Y ended about this time.

With several exceptions none of the schools in Christchurch (NZ.) have ever provided nude swimming.

The boys' only school I attended from 1967-1971 had been formed in 1881. There was no tradition of nudity. How ever at Christ's College, a private Anglican school for day boys and boarders which dates from the 1850s naked swimming was allowed by the City Council in the nearby Avon River where it flowed past the school. Nudity was not allowed at the school pool when that was built : the right to swim naked in the river remained in the City by-laws for many years after the practice stopped.

The only primary school known to have provided naked swimming was Medbury, a small grammar school for day boys and boarders. The practice was dis-continued about 1968. Besides naked swimming instruction in class time, there was also naked swimming after school and in the weekends : the latter involving the boarders.

The alternative state secondary school "Four Avenues" which was co-educational (boys and girls) had nude swimming. The school did not have its own pool and hired a municipal pool during school hours. Nude swimming, it should be said, was never school policy and arose from the pupils themselves. "Four Avenues" came out of the "Hippie" movement, so there was an acceptance of nudity anyway. The school was set up around 1971 and only recently closed, being the last of this type to close. As nudity in swimming was never policy it is difficult to determine when this stopped, one would guess in the 1980s. Staff supervising swimming were not naked.

There are key differences and similarities between the two schools. At Medbury there was compulsory nudity for the boys. At "Four Avenues" it was always an option, a choice, though it would be fair to say there was a lot of social pressure to be naked in the first few years as social nudity was very much part of the "back to the land" movement. In both cases where there was student supervision, that is supervision by older pupils, there was an assumption of nudity. Another difference concerns the ages of the pupils. Medbury provided education for boys from the junior level to 13 years olds. With 13 year olds at Medbury it was not uncommon for some to have gone through puberty as far as sexual development goes having the larger penis and pubic hair of adult males. There tended to be less control over swimming in the weekends with those boarders who stayed on had the pool to themselves. Though students at "Four Avenues" would turn 14 in their first year and 18 in their final year, school nudity was more popular with the older pupils. Finally nudity at Medbury was boys' only, whereas at Four Avenues it was both sexes.

Medbury was a day and boarding prep school for boys up to Form 2 (the leaving age is normally 13 at that level). The roll was 300, and classes were small unusually 25 boys.

A former pupil I know attended the School from 1966-1968 (3 years) as a boarder.

Swimming and swimming instruction was always naked. Togs were considered unhygienic. None of the boys gave a toss about being naked : it was just accepted that you were. For that matter no one was concerned about how each other looked naked, even though at 13 boys are entering puberty.

Some of the older boys had pubic hair and larger penises. One boy had an unusually large penis and a particular interest in being naked. None of the staff ever remarked adversely about him. It was just accepted that penises varied in size and the larger ones would flop around. What was happening to the older boys was considered quite normal and never the subject of comment or discussion.

There was a fair amount of nudity it should be said at the school. In the common changing rooms, showering (no individual showers) ,with the swimming instruction (school time) and after school swimming. Gerald.

 

I have a personal story which might be appropriate at this thread.

I am not circumcised, because I was born at home, whereas most of my contemporaries were born in Hospitals, and were cut. When I entered the sixth grade, I was in Gym class after which we were expected to shower in the open gang-shower of the time.

The first time I undressed and went into the shower, one of the other boys looked at me and said "What's wrong with your dick?" He had probably never seen a foreskin! I was terribly embarrassed and got dressed as soon as I could.

It was the same every day. The other boys would crowd around and want to look at my dick, talking among themselves how "funny" it looked.

I went to the gym teacher and said I wanted to get out of gym. He said that wasn't possible and asked me why! All I could say was that the other boys made fun of me. He said he would "see to it" but I didn't know what he meant.

The next time we were to go into the showers, I was dreading it because I knew I would be the center of attention because of my uncut dick. But just as I was about to undress, the coach came in and started to undress too. he was obviously going to shower with the boys, something which he had never done before.

When he was naked, I understood why he was showering with us. He was uncut too! When the other boys saw the coach's cock, they all stared. I heard a few of them say "His is just like J's" From that moment on, I had a certain prestige among the others because my cock was "just like coach's".

I have always appreciated the fact that my teacher was willing to sacrifice his own modesty in order to keep me from feeling that I was a freak!

 

thats very interesting at my high school we HAD to wear swim suits and dress conservatively even in the pool. showing skin was genrally frowned on in the community where I grew up

 

I remember growing up in New Zealand in the 60's & 70's going to local swimming pools & seeing numerous children in the pools naked, These days with all the PC bullshit that has crept into society we see signs on the walls reminding parents that all children must wear suitable bathing costumes at all times, what is happening to society.

 

I swim nude in my pool all the time.

 

caliente, wish I was your pool boy

 

I wish she was my pole girl..

 

My usual pool guy is about 20 and when he's out there working with his shirt off, he makes me start thinking about that cougar thing ... whew!

If you wanna come and join him, I'm sure there's plenty of work to do .. lol

 

Pole dancing looks really hard to me. I'd probably break my neck. If I was a stripper, I'd have to stick to regular dancing .. lol

 

Nude showers were the order of the day when I was at school, but not nude swimming. I certainly think by the 1970s it was rare.

I would like either to have my own pool to swim naked in, or for one of the local pools to have an evening that allowed naked swims. I'd have to go on a two hour each way journey from where I live for one.

 

I've only recently discovered there is a pool night once a month 1 hour's drive from where I live where the venue is closed to the general public except those who wish to swim nude, open to families, singles ... anybody who likes this recreation. The organisation that runs the swim night is Down to Earth, which also runs the pseudo-hippie ConFest gatherings a couple of times each year where nudity is an accepted norm. The swim night is from 7.30 to 10.30pm and volunteers cover the windows etc (even in a markedly liberal-minded suburb of many students where nudity is common and acceptable). I'm thinking of going but like the post above, I don't really like the 1 hour drive up to the Big Smoke and back. NO such swim nights locally. This city has far too many prudes.

 

I have never been swimming naked but I would love to. Either in a pool or a spring for my first time.

 

You have missed an enjoyable experience and hope you don't have to wait too long. Once you've swum naked you won't want to swim with a costume again.

 

Hahahaha, I live in Christchurch. I never knew about the nude swimming regulations of my fair city. I don't think I'd want to swim nude in the Avon these days anyway...who knows what's floating around in there.

 

...A Kiwi that can't swim maybe ... ?
What a beaut place the Avon would be for a skinnydip in the moonlight. C'mon Kiwis, shed the feathers and take the dare!

 

In colonial times in N.Z. the usual practice was for boys and young men to swim naked. Women wore bathing costumes. There any many reports in the colonial press about naked bathing in public, usually at a beach. The early Wellington City by-laws allowed males to swim naked in public during certain hours of the day : the early morning and late evening. Even so there was an on-going situation which lasted for many years of young men swimmng in the sea around the city wharves, and diving as well, in the nude. The early public swimming baths, which were actually privately owned, allowed naked swimming for males during certain hours. There were regular complaints of naked men being able to be "seen" from the outside by the well-to-do. In Wellington there was a naked beach culture in summer at Lyall Bay in which groups of youth spend the day naked. This came to an end about 1910. Even so something of the social space which allowed male nudity in public remained in the public mind : during World War One bathing parade, in the Hutt River, for recruits stationed at Trentham (an army base outside Wellington) was carried out with all naked. Other examples of public nudity can be found in other parts of New Zealand. In New Plymouth males swam for years naked at the main beach and boys (read young men) were often seen naked on the beach itself. It was a feature of colonial life in Auckland. In the country (outside the main towns) it was taken for granted that groups of young men swam in the local river in the naked state and there wasn't the same campaign for the authorities to "do something". Maori have a long tradition of nudity and in pre-colonial days were generally naked in their day-to-day life. Some tasks such as gardening was carried out naked. The Maori haka was originally performed naked as was warfare. During the Land Wars of the 1860s the Hau Hau (a Maori group opposed to British colonisation of N.Z.) fought the British red coats, naked. The last reports of a naked haka are near the turn of the 19th C. Incidentally originally the haka was strongly phallic in nature. Maori did have a very restricted definition of nudity, in fact, the exposure of the glanus of the male penis : other than that a naked Maori man was not considered naked in the way the British settlers did. This information is not something you will find in an official history of NZ : there is another history : the real one. Gerald.

 

This is a very interesting read indeed.
The Maori engaged in naked warfare!? Oh dear. Wonder if they had any ... protective armour? I'm reminded of my last trip over the Tasman: en route Milford Sound in November 2006 a couple sat naked in the hot sun by the roadside in the Eglinton Valley sipping coffee and wandering around with their cameras getting the scene in (of the mountains, I mean!). I did the same thing (photographing the vista, albeit clothed) and nobody seemed to bat an eyebrow over this couple's rather carefree stopover. Approached later after seeming my photographic set up, during discussion I found they were from the Netherlands, which in hindsight is more liberal toward nudity. Still, I thought they were fairly game in a high tourist-traffic area in not-entirely-liberal New Zealand. There are many beautiful places to enjoy a clothes-free discovery in NZ: I went nude a few days later on a late afternoon walk at Purakanui Falls and again at Matai Falls in the Catlins. Bliss...

 

Same with me - looking back, it's odd that we were required to wear cozzies in the pool, but then had to take them off to shower together.

 

That's interesting; I believe some European tribes used to fight naked as well. Poul Anderson's well-researched historical novel Mother of Kings has Danish Berserkers fighting completely nude; the fact that they spurned any kind of armour would doubtless have terrified their foes even more.

 

True Victorian era stuff. I remember it at my school too.
Just wondering what it's like 30+ years... the same, or more liberal?