the last day of balliol baths

[bernie johno]

https://www.facebook.com/mickey.hough.7 ... 147135121/
just seen this on facebook

[Brunnyboy]

happy days there learned how to swim there remember swimming a mile the it felt it was never going to end

[bernie johno]

happy days there learned how to swim there remember swimming a mile the it felt it was never going to end

yes Alan had some good times there remember we would put are clothes back in the changing room and get back in when the fella checked he would threaten to through your clothes in if you never got out boss times

[IanA]

I still have my certificate to say that I could swim thirty-three and a third yards.

[Mack]

Me too, I've got a certificate stored away somewhere if I remember for swimming 15 yards

Must have been about 7 years old at the time.

Well chuffed

Mack

[bernie johno]

Me too, I've got a certificate stored away somewhere if I remember for swimming 15 yards

Must have been about 7 years old at the time.

Well chuffed

Mack

maybe you can move this in a bit to photo video gallery Mack

[BOBHAMO]

What a great vid Bernie, the demise of all the great things
we had so much fun with mates
happy days
bobhamo

[IanA]

People would throw pennies in and dive for them. I got a face mask and swam to the water outlet at the deep end. Sometimes, I came away quite rich. Kids used to take cold toast, wrapped up in the waxed bread wrappers, to eat when they came out. Dad used to take me really early on a Sunday morning and he always bought a 1d packet of Beech Nut gum or, if he was feeling flush, a 6d pack of Wrigley's spearmint gum. I remember walking back towards Peel Road, past warehouses and their exotic smells, chewing away and proud to be with my Dad.

[filsgreen]

Thanks for those memories, Ian. We were easily pleased when we were kids.

[BossHogg]

I learnt to swim at Balliol Rd baths like the rest of the members who have posted. Looking at that video, it seems a hell of a lot smaller than what I remember, then again, I'm all growed up now!

[lynne99]

I also used to swim there, with Christ Church school and the Girls Grammar swimming gala. I was told , by my Dad, that it used to have sea water in it, which made you float better. I don't know when this changed, any ideas???
I used to take a tartan flask with mock turtle soup.. Remember drinking it walking past the post office, going for the 60 bus.

[Eddy Lloyd]

I went there with St. Joan of Arc junior school and done all my swimming certificates from one length up to half a mile, also my bronze medalion life saving certificate. I actually learned to swim in the canal at what we called 'the brokie bridge' going there with mates at the age of 7/8.

[Ernie Jackson. (Bunty)]

I learned to swim there. Decided to swim underwater so I wouldn't sink and it worked well.

Did anyone else wear trunks that Mum had converted from pullovers. The results will forever be in my memory.

Incidentally. What happened to the diving boards?

I remember climbing to the top, looking down at the water and going sheepishly back down the steps. When I was eventually brave enough to jump I lost my pullover/trunks.

[billygooner]

ernie, health and safety, I attend the replacement gym/baths in the north park diving is not permitted at all. regards billy.

[graham]

If I remember rightly if all the closets were taken one got changed on the balcony

[Forshaw]

Awesome memories of Bootle Baths . Many thanks for posting the video

[BOBHAMO]

bobhamo

[henry]

I remember putting 2d into the machine and getting brylcream out and then combing my hair in the mirror next to the machine

[Ernie Jackson. (Bunty)]

Thank you all for very happy memories.

The smells of bleach have all returned to my nostrils as I write...as has the hubbub and hollow resonating screams of the bathers ,,...the whistle of the attendant saying it was time to get out....I had long forgotten the brylceem machine but that smell is now also coming back..

Did anyone ever hire the towels available?

I also remember my dad walking along the side and pulling me along with the hooped rope provided for learners. Getting a 'mouthful' when it snapped. Knee knocking when we got cold but we still didn't leave before time.

How many of you are old enough to remember the scabies we had due to the bombing in the war. The attendant at the washing room at Balliol Road would scrub us raw.

[Sheelagh Tequila]

Love all these memories .... Like Eddy I went with St. Joans but I only remember getting a 20 Yard swimming cert which I still have, after the first yr we were moved to St. James and never had any more lessons. We used to get the bus back home with Miss McVey our P.E teacher, one day as we stepped off the bus on Rimrose Road my knicker elastic snapped on my navyblue barage balloons ....... cringe.........teacher couldn`t speak for laughing and I broke the school sprint record getting to the girls toilets......Used to go with Kathleen Haycock sometimes and we would spend our bus/train fare on sweets then walk home to Peel Road with bleachy smelling wet hair. Very happy days.

Sheelagh Tequila

[Bill fawcett]

Henry, you should have done what we used to do. We would suck the brylcream out of the machine and then spit it on our hands.

Bill

[Ernie Jackson. (Bunty)]

Now you tell us?.............You must have been a real sweet kisser Bill
.

[PeterR]

I was taught to swim there by MR DYKE portly fellow who stood for no messing and if we were upstairs getting dressed or undressed we tried to lift the curtain to see the girls cubicles

[nicolas]

I can remember Dykey with his big fat beer belly, one loud mouth! also remembering, when we used to go to the Baths with School, on
the Green double decker Corpy bus, and also remembering some of the Boy's from poorer families, with ragged and washed out towels, and some
didn't have towels with them, at all.

[PeterR]

Nicolas ! "Poorer families" WE Had towels my Dad used to make out of sacks ! we thought we were toffs -Then I being the Youngest lad in the family got the "Hand me own" clothes--a pair of pants was usually a hole surrounded by worn out material ! Peter.

[WatsonTommy]

me mother knitted me a cossie from a old woolen jumper and when you dived in it came off : the girlies knew this and waited for you to take that posing show off dive off the top diving board :oops :

[Dan]

Balliol Road baths was finally closed to the public at 12.00 on Sunday February 23 1997.

Bootle Times February 20 1997.





Bootle Times February 27 1997