Chain Dive
Billy Morrison and Val Demery perform a chain dive from the 5-metre platform at Blackrock Baths. The Annual Gala of the Sandycove Club was generally a two-night affair with swimming, water polo and diving. Diving featured international spring and high-board diving, as well as the ever-popular comedy and fancy dress diving performances by home and visiting divers.
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks to Manolo Demery.Chain Dive
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks to Manolo Demery.
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks to Manolo Demery.
Chain Dive
Billy Morrison and Val Demery perform a chain dive from the 5-metre platform at Blackrock Baths. The Annual Gala of the Sandycove Club was generally a two-night affair with swimming, water polo and diving. Diving featured international spring and high-board diving, as well as the ever-popular comedy and fancy dress diving performances by home and visiting divers.
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks to Manolo Demery.'Apart from the galas and club members, there were regular bathers and social patrons and ordinary spectators who frequented the baths, some of whom became well known in other more cultural pursuits then, and subsequently.
'I once heard Maureen Charlton who, with her sister Nuala, composed the musical "Furzy and The Hearts a Wonder", speaking nostalgically about cycling daily to the baths from Mount Merrion.
'Another regular was Frank Kelly of Hall's Pictorial Weekly and more recently Father Jack fame, Billy Murphy from Cork - later to become more well known as Liam O'Murchú of "Trom agus Éadtrom" and "Up for the Match television" programmes, was another occasional dipper.
'Others of that era were two Trinity College students of the time, one the son of Yul Brynner and the other whose father was Larry Adler, so we weren't without our domestic and international celebrities in our midst.'
'On another occasion I shared the three-metre springboard with a certain Brendan Behan, who was better known for his prose than for his pointed toes in the swallow dive.
'One other prospective diving enthusiast from those days was a well known jazz drummer called Ian McGarry, who subsequently went on to produce a number of television musical spectaculars on R.T.É. including award-winning Eurovision Song Contest transmissions.
'In more recent years, having long forsaken the one metre springboard, he has qualified as a professional ski instructor in France.'
UCD Ladies team 1950s
The UCD ladies’ team who competed in the Irish University Swimming Championships at Blackrock Baths in the 1950’s. M. Fitzpatrick, M. Woods, A. Kealy, M. O’Donnell
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks also to Manolo DemeryUCD Ladies team 1950s
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks also to Manolo Demery
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks also to Manolo Demery
UCD Ladies team 1950s
The UCD ladies’ team who competed in the Irish University Swimming Championships at Blackrock Baths in the 1950’s. M. Fitzpatrick, M. Woods, A. Kealy, M. O’Donnell
By kind permission of Billy Morrison and thanks also to Manolo Demery'If there were too many names included in this swim down memory lane, please forgive me, but they were an essential aspect of the happy times I spent in my days/months/years at the baths.
' If there are names omitted - and I'm sure there are - which should have been included - mea cupla, again tá bron orm, my recall may not be what it was, and obviously I didn't get to know and meet all those who shared our enjoyment of the facilities.
'I do hope that this list of names will be seen as a tribute to all those who participated rather than a mere roll call of bathing boys and belles of the mid-nineteen hundreds.'