February's Mascot of the Month - The Venice Plunge

Back in the day, salt water pools - often know as "plunges" or "baths" were quit common.  The one I heard the most about was the Venice Plunge in Los Angeles.  Venice being a planned community with canals and access to the ocean and was originally called "The Venice of America", now simply Venice.

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To get to Venice, one took the Red Car.  You used htat to get to the ocean, where the Venice Plunge was designed to meet your needs.
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The "Red Car" (and electric transportation system) ran to Venice in the olden days, and that is how people got to the beach.  The plunge provided changing rooms, swim suits as well as salt water pools, food, access to the ocean and other seaside benefits.  All of this was critical when you took public transportation to the ocean (whether the red Car in LA, the trolly in San Francisco or the train in England).
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Completed in 1908 and operating until the 1940s, the Venice Plunge was the largest of the beach houses in Southern California.  There were others in Santa Monica (at Pacific Ocean Park), Long beach and Coronado.

Many of these had heated salt water, since the ocean could be quite cold.  The Sutro Baths in San Francisco (see below) became quite popular, if you have ever ventured near the ocean in San Francisco you know why.
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There are some cool stories about working at the Venice Plunge, and the fuss set off when the "Santa Monica Lifeguards" used to come.  Apparently they were set-men in movies, and starred in training films.  They were it on a stick as one says.  One of these, not even the head lifeguard, was Tarzan's stunt double.

This is at the corner of Windward and Speedway / Pacific

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The depression couldn't kill it, but the war did.  And, following the war, private cars made the beach going experience completely different.  You know longer had to rent a suit, change in a locker or buy snacks form the plunge.
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In reviewing them on-line, I would have to say the Sutro Baths (in San Francisco) looked better - but my family talked about the Venice Plunge in such wistful tones I never forgot it.

The San Francisco Sutro baths, abandoned

The San Francisco Sutro baths (opened in 1896) had the world's largest indoor swimming pools.