The summer of 2012 has arrived, got your layers?

(by Palma J. You, Archives Technician)

The featured 19^thand early 20^th century swim wear comes to you from Women’s bathing and swimming costume in the United States (Kidwell, C.B., 1968) which is in the Maritime Library stacks.  See the Keys Catalog of Library materials; it’s also accessible online via Project Gutenberg Ebook.

Perfect for San Francisco Bay weather...

Figure 1.—Bathing costume, from The Delineator, July 1884. (Smithsonian photo 58466.)

Figure 12.—Bathing costumes from a supplement to The Tailor’s Review, July 1895.
(Courtesy of Library of Congress.)

Fickle weathered San Francisco Bay is paradise to many a floaty communities, including swimmers in our very own Aquatic Park Cove.  Others co-existing in the water include sailors, mariners, rowers, kite and windsurfers, stand-up paddle boarding, marine wildlife, houseboats... and what do they all have in common?  Debris!

Time in the Bay waters can be a close encounter with debris.  One swimmer contemplated debris while swimming in Aquatic Park Cove.  Here’s a link the still relevant San Francisco Bay Debris, produced by swimmer Amy Miller for KQED in 2007. You’ll also find other San Francisco Bay focused material in the Keys Catalog of the Maritime Library.

Be aware and be safe. Happy summer!