75 by 36 feet, 3 feet to 10 feet, 133,000 gallons
The Main Pool is the original pool at Wedgewood Swim Club, an L shaped basin measuring 75 feet by 36 feet and holding 133,000 gallons of water. The floor drops from 3 feet at the shallow end to 10 feet in the diving area, a 30 by 25 foot well set apart for the diving board.
It is the pool most members mean when they say the pool. There is a steel ladder and a lane line for anyone swimming laps, a water slide at the edge, yellow umbrellas around the deck and a basketball hoop on the far side. It is for swimmers of every age who can handle the water, from a child on a first summer with a parent alongside to a teenager working up to the board.
The concrete deck right beside the water stays clear of chairs and towels, so the walkways around the pool stay open.
Lifeguards, the deep water test and the rules at the edge
Trained lifeguards staff the Main Pool during all hours of operation. Children under 12 may not be alone in water over their heads until they have passed a deep water test given by the pool manager or a lifeguard. Tests are available on request and are scheduled around the guards' availability. Passing the club's Green Tag Test is what opens every area of the club to a swimmer.
Diving belongs to the diving well by the board and nowhere else in the upper pool. On the slide, everyone goes feet first and sitting. Running, sliding on the deck, dunking, pushing and rough housing are out, and swimmers listen to the lifeguards and follow directions. A child wearing water wings, a tube or a life jacket needs an adult in the water or along the deck near them.
Food, gum and glass stay out of the pool areas; plastic water bottles are fine. Everything else goes up to the picnic grove. The full set of rules is on the policies page, and the Lap Pool and Baby Pool each have their own page: the lower pool is only for swimmers who have passed the deep water test, and the Baby Pool is for children up to age 6.
From Memorial Day to Labor Day, rebuilt in 2003
The pool opens with the club on Memorial Day and runs through Labor Day, daily from noon into the evening. The club calendar posts the hours, and special events can run later. If thunder or lightning is heard or seen, the pools and deck clear and stay clear until 30 minutes after the last instance. Closures go up on the Club Facebook group and the website, and an announcement comes 15 minutes before normal closing.
A summer at the Main Pool follows the club's own three words: swim, relax, enjoy. The slide, the board and the lane line are all here, and the picnic area with its tables and charcoal grills sits near the pools. One reviewer remembers walking down from Beechwood Road to the club all summer, every summer from 1963 to 1973.
The pool has been on South Matlack Street since members contracted Sapphire Pools in April 1958 for a 25 yard L shaped pool, and it opened that August behind a fence of turkey wire. The original 1958 steel pool was taken out in 2003 and rebuilt in plaster, the same shape in a new shell.
