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Saturday, July 25, 2020


LIFE photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt recorded these University of Michigan Medical School students taking time out from their studies to play piggyback in the pool in 1950.

  

11 comments:

  1. I've had the pleasure of doing this several times. Feels great both ways round...

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    1. It was...about a dozen of us fooling around in the pool. I got to swim naked twice a week for several years...happy days..

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    2. Something very special was lost when men could no longer swim nude at Ys and college pools. I was lucky enough to catch the tail end of that period in Ann Arbor and have fond memories of both those pools.

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    3. You're certainly a very lucky man to have been able to swim nude. I had a few months at school when it was optional. About a third of us did. Then in my twenties I joined a men only nude swim group. So liberating. men of all different shapes and sizes. I also became a better swimmer.

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    4. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    5. (REVISED) Guys younger than me (which is most of them)have no idea what a pleasure they've missed out on. Back in the pre-bodyphobia early 70's, I joined a men's fitness class at the local high school,which concluded with 20 minutes in the pool. Several in the class wore suits the first week, but each week thereafter someone decided to give his birthday suit a try. It was fun watching their reactions to swimming naked for the first time, and nude outnumbered suits by the time the classes ended.

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  2. Were there nude swim meets as well?

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    1. Yes, some high schools held nude male swim meets as recently as 1970. I don't know about the University of Michigan, though.

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  3. Were they closed meets or were there other spectators? If so, how public were they, and who might have been in attendance?

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    1. There were spectators much like one would get at a high school sports event, but they weren't as well attended as football, baseball, or basketball. Some were even mixed gender, but the girls wore suits. I have some very poor quality photos of them, but there are articles on line that describe the practice.

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