A postcard view from the early 1930’s showing what was known as the Ford City Bathing Beach or the East Windsor Bathing Beach, and finally in the cast of this post amalgamation post card, the Windsor Bathing Beach.
It was located at the foot of George Avenue, opposite the long lost Henkel Mansion
Do you have any idea why this closed down?
I wonder why there aren’t any plans to bring something like this back to Windsor. It’s hard to imagine that it would cost more to build and maintain than a conventional inground pool and it could be a terrific feature. Chicago has several downtown beaches, and at least one section that’s cordoned off for swimming lengths.
Consider the price of land, for swimming area, parking, and then the swimming area would be closed because of unsafe water. Indoor pools may cost more but are also usable 12 months of the year.
The fear of catching polio from swimming in the river was a likely factor.
The Detroit River was much safer then.
It’s an undertoe concern now I imagine…
I hear that a lot – is there a good reason why the Detroit river undercurrents would be more dangerous today than it was, say, in the 1910s?
I suspect that the dredging of the shipping channel increased the current?
Until about 1966 when the riverfront interceptor trunk sewer was completed, it was a common occurrence to see raw sewage floating along the riverbank. The old sewers in the city area are combined sewers which used to flush turds and other human waste directly to the river during heavy rains. I remember going to Dieppe Gardens to see Queen Elizabeth’s royal visit in 1959 and being surprised to see “brown logs” floating around the Royal Yacht Britania. The vessel had moored right next to a sewer outlet. The Detroit River in the last century was never as pristine as some like to imagine.